ADVANCING ACADEMIC CAREERS IN INDIA: A REVIEW OF HUMAN CAPITAL, SELF-EFFICACY, AND INSTITUTIONAL MECHANISMS

DOI: https://doie.org/10.65985/APER.2026557321

Authors:

Ms. Sweena Kashyap, Dr. Shilpa Pandey, Dr. Imran Nadeem Siddiqui

Keywords:

academic careers, faculty development, human capital, self-efficacy, organisational support, higher education, India

Abstract:

Faculty career progression is a poorly-known and unequally-evolved phenomenon even in the context of the transformative scale of the Indian higher education sector, which is being under the National Education Policy 2020. The paper reviews three interrelated determinants of academic career success in human capital, self-efficacy and institutional mechanisms using the integrative lenses of the human capital theory, the social cognitive career theory and the organisational support theory. We claim that the prevailing Indian literature, despite its expansion is typified by three inherent constraints, a constricted, publication based conceptualisation of human capital that does not recognize teaching, international experience, and social capital; a general lack of regard of the mediation of psychological processes such as self efficacy; and a tendency to continue to describe measures that remedy deficiencies within an institution. Besides, intersecting inequalities of caste, gender, and region that organize academic careers in India have been kept silent by the literature. We suggest a theoretical reframing, which conceptualises human capital as jointly produced by individuals and institutions, regards career self efficacy as socially dispersed instead of agentic, and has equity as an analytical imperative. The future research agenda is presented, and it focuses on longitudinal designs, multidimensional measurement, intervention research, and comparative research based on institutional types and states. The conclusion of the review gives certain implications to the faculty development policy in under researched areas like Chhattisgarh.

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