Indian MBAs
4.31 Chapter Summary
As the world has become more globalised, higher education has become a saleable commodity, attracting thousands of students to study in different countries. The literature suggests that many international students are motivated by several factors, i.e. governments, employers, parents, and the
175 media, to develop their human capital, to improve their social identity, to secure employment and achieve a better standard of life.
Human capital theory suggests that improvement in knowledge and skills and resulting credentials, may result in various outcomes of objective external/extrinsic factors i.e. increased salary, career promotion; and, the improvement of subjective internal/intrinsic outcomes e.g. personal achievement and status for the holder (Baruch, Bell, Gray, 2005; Dailey, et al., 2006; Siebert, Kraimer & Linden, 2001).
Many societies place a value on these symbols of achievement, or credentials, which Bourdieu suggests may be termed ‘cultural capital’ (1986, p243), and are, he suggests, to ‘all intents and purposes a synonym for “status”’ (Moore, 2008, p102). This cultural capital acts as a signal of power and may also act as a facilitator to access certain employment opportunities and social groups, and may result in greater social mobility (Nunn, et al., 2007); such mobility may be achieved by individuals, and within the economy as a whole; this is a phenomenon witnessed in India, with its emerging urban middle class (McKinsey, 2007; Varma, 2007).
However, this transition is difficult to measure and beyond the scope of this study, as it is argued that ‘education alone is not sufficient in securing access to a better social class position’ (Themelis, 2008, p434), a view also expressed by Bourdieu, who argues that family background is an important determinant for the reproduction of social positions (Bourdieu, 1977; Webb, Schirato, & Danaher, 2002).
Research suggests that, in the UK, social mobility across classes exists, but has declined since the 1980s which ‘was mainly due to the occupational restructuring and the concomitant structural mobility’ (ibid). From the 1980s onwards, the UK changed from a manufacturing society to a service society, which required greater skills and human capital development. This phenomenon appears to be happening in India too, with a growing service sector offering more employment opportunities to those with knowledge and skills.
176 In an attempt to improve social mobility for all sectors of the Indian community, the Indian government has developed policies of affirmative action, to enable groups of individuals, lower castes and tribes, who are less fortunate, to benefit from reserved places in higher education and public sector employment. The aim is to give lower social groups a chance to improve their skills and job prospects, and hopefully to improve their cultural, and their social capital, and thus achieve social mobility (Sethiyand & Somanatha, 2010). This government strategy is not supported by all members of society as many see it as social engineering, which may result in resentment from those who are not favoured groups (please refer to Chapter 3 on caste).
India’s growing economy may offer many opportunities for educated and skilled business and management employees in the service sector, but it appears that a lack of Indian higher education institutions and concerns over the academic quality of many existing institutions, are encouraging many middle class Indian students to travel abroad to improve their human capital, which may result in greater cultural capital from their awards and social capital from their academic institutions, and may improve their chances for a good career. However, there appears to be a lack of research findings related to the outcomes and perceived benefits i.e. economic, cultural and social capital that Indian postgraduates acquire as a result of their study from UK and Indian institutions. There are also concerns from many quarters which suggest that, due to increased competition in the labour market, and an increase in the numbers acquiring credentials, elite jobs are becoming more scarce (Brown, 2003), and the true benefits and actual outcomes of postgraduate business programmes should be made more transparent in the light of these trends.
This research study aimed to determine if there was any evidence of social capital which may exist in Indian families to support the career development of their offspring and to explore the level of alumni links that are expected, and that exist, for the development of social capital; and to explore the perceptions of any benefits of social capital, for the groom and the groom’s family in Indian marriage arrangements with regard to postgraduates.
177 This section concludes the literature review for the study. The next chapter will outline the research paradigm, methodology and methods adopted to obtain the qualitative data, to provide further insight into the questions raised from the literature review.
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Chapter 5: Methodology
5.11 Introduction
There are many choices of research approach available to researchers, e.g. qualitative, quantitative, or indeed both e.g. mixed methods (Tashakkori & Teddlie, 2003), which, depending upon your theoretical perspective, can be adopted to complete an investigation (Creswell, 2003). Prasad (2005) also suggests that the number of qualitative options which are available can be overwhelming. She further suggests that qualitative research implies a certain state of mind, for the employment of specific data collection and specific writing conventions, all of which are influenced by ontological and epistemological traditions, which often result in complex ‘and frequently bewildering amalgamation of metaphors, paradigms, techniques and procedures’ (Prasad, 2005, p3); and especially so, for the novice researcher. Prasad (2005) also argues that a substantial body of research in social sciences suffers from various forms of ‘positivist anxiety’, especially in management and business studies. Such work, she argues, may be described as, ‘a form of qualitative positivism’ (ibid, p4), rather than a study developed within the ‘craft traditions’. She further suggests that ‘research should be theoretically grounded and methodologically rigorous, even if rigor takes different forms from that which is to be found in positivist research’ (ibid). I aimed to achieve this craft tradition, in this qualitative study. This is an approach, which Denzin & Lincoln (2005) describe as strategy of enquiry; an approach which reflects my personal beliefs, and one which I developed, during the research methods module for
my PhD programme. The academics teaching on the research methods module highlighted a spectrum of qualitative choices, i.e. traditions and crafts (Prasad, 2005), available to me as a novice researcher e.g. basic qualitative, ethnographic, and grounded theory; and the historical philosophies which underpin the development of these qualitative research traditions. These research traditions, which ‘Hamilton, (1993) and Jacob (1987)’, in Prasad (2005, p8), suggest, comprise various assumptions, world views, orientations, practices and procedures, to enable research studies to
179 become ‘theoretically grounded and methodologically rigorous’ (Prasad, 2005, p6). Adoption of these traditions and crafts, it was suggested, would enable researchers like me, to perform meaningful qualitative studies of social phenomena to understand the world of my respondents, attempting to avoid, what Prasad (2005), refers to as the ‘anything goes’ group.
This research study, was not, as suggested by Sikes (2006, p106) of some other studies, ‘on dodgy ground’; nor simply undertaken to satisfy my curiosity, nor indeed, simply to confirm my personal theories, but would have value to increase our understanding of the expectations, outcomes and perceived benefits of Indian postgraduate study for others interested in these phenomenon and without impinging on the lives of those I studied. I have also addressed the importance of reflexivity i.e. the ‘understanding of both the phenomenon under study and the research process itself’ (Watt, 2007, p82), to indicate some of my concerns, so that the reader, has an awareness of my experiences and has ‘the opportunity to see how the researcher goes about the process of knowledge construction during a particular study’ (Rivas, 2012, p 499).
Merriam, suggests that this approach adds to the researchers identity, and enables critical reflection (Merriam, 2009) i.e. the opportunity to explain oneself, one’s values and attention to ethical issues, and to give an authorial voice, so as not to, as highlighted by one practitioner, ‘abandon one’s responsibilities as a researcher, or to operate surreptitiously as a ventriloquist’ (Hammersley (personal communication) in Seale, 1999, p16). However, the researcher should be careful of being radically reflexive to produce a trustworthy credible study, as this Seale argues, requires careful consideration, as ‘superhuman self-consciousness’ (Seale, 1999, p168), may, result in such self-criticism about one’s study, that it leads to the pursuit of a different research project, or, indeed, retirement from research altogether (ibid).
In this study, I have presented my methodological decisions, and identified and justified my research process and methods in as much detail as possible (Crotty, 1998). I have also used the actual words of my respondents to
180 highlight the perspective of the researched, adding my commentary to indicate my authorial presence, and to present the evidence which has led to my conclusions in order to ‘enhance the quality of the research’ (Seale, 1999, p177). This is not, however, in so much detail that it results in self- indulgent waffle, or, as Bourdieu suggests a ‘pretext for text’, (Bourdieu, 2003, p282, in Rivas, 2012, p499), but to provide knowledge about the phenomenon under study, to those who read it.
The interpretivist qualitative framework that I chose to adopt was to ensure a closer association with those who were being researched (Merriam, 2009), in order to provide a much deeper insight and understanding of the actual experiences of individuals i.e. my respondents, which in this study are as previously highlighted, Indian nationals.
This chapter will outline the background and rationale for this study, that led from the research question, research tradition, or, as it is often referred to, the paradigm, to the research design (Creswell, 2007) i.e. the theoretical framework, the methodology, and describe in detail the methods e.g. the focus group interviews, and the face-to-face semi-structured interviews, that have been adopted to obtain the data for further analysis (Silverman, 2005; Blaxter, Hughes, & Tight (2010). The main purpose of this study was to explore and provide a deeper and richer understanding of the expectations, outcomes and perceived benefits of UK postgraduate business education for Indian nationals; and to provide a window on their lived experiences. This chapter will also outline a broad overview of how the data was collected and analysed, and will address the qualitative issues of ‘credibility, transferability, dependability and confirmability’ (Denzin and Lincoln, 2005, p24), related to this study.