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The purpose of this article is to develop a research-based conceptualization of a state's higher education market in the United States. The aim is to synthesize existing notions of the higher education market into a coherent starting point and to organize discussion of the market around subjects related to supply, consumption, and management. The conceptualization provides a state-level view of the higher education market appealing to state policy makers. The article draws on another study linking state policy to postsecondary performance. Results incorporate existing literature germane to the higher education market, within and outside of the higher education discipline.

State policy leaders now faceor soon will encountercritical decisions about their colleges and universities for two reasons: First, the success of American colleges and universities over the last half-century has given rise to high societal expectations. Second, unprecedented challenges to higher education are emerging from substantial demographic, technological, economic, and organizational transformations in our society. In this context, the paper aims to trace and summarize the complexity of general patterns in higher education governance, to describe the structural relationships that deeply affect institutional efficacy, and therefore must inform higher educational policy decisions. The authors claim that state policy strikes a balancesometimes explicitly, sometimes by defaultbetween the influence of the market (defined broadly as forces external to state government and higher education) and the influence of systems or institutions of higher education. An effective balance within and across three policy levelsthe macro state policy environment, system design, and practical work processes promotes the general welfare. The goal of state policy, then, is to exercise state authority to achieve public priorities by balancing, within and across complex policy levels, the influence of academic institutions and the influence of the market, broadly defined. ; The National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education