Information Asymmetry, Signalling and Screening vs. Audit Culture – Selected Challenges for Academic Governance (Asymetria informacji, sygnalizowanie i screening a kultura audytu – wybrane wyzwania dla ladu akademickiego)

A change can be observed in contemporary academic governance – from a trust-based culture towards the audit culture based on accountability. The purpose of this paper is to discuss the problems of such accountability from the economics-of-information perspective. The approach of the article is founded on a review of the most relevant contributions in the area of information asymmetry, signalling and screening and on the analysis based on deductive reasoning. The main finding of the paper is that asymmetrical information embodied in academic work challenges the management of academic staff. Signalling and screening methods, which are popular in business and relevant for the audit culture in the case of academic environment, face important obstacles. This is due to the specificity of work of academic professionals, which is in fact a credence good. It is also predicted that the pressure towards accountability could be used for redistribution of resources in favour of privileged groups of academic staff; privileged in the sense of easiness of measurement and signalling of research achievements.