Engaged Scholars Navigating a Conditioned Legitimacy: World Class University and Agency

Chile is experiencing a national reform in community engagement, which has renewed the interest in this topic and spurred academic debate and research publications, new academic journals, networks, and events. This scenario, however, has not brought legitimacy to engaged scholars within their institutions, where they struggle to justify their work. The purpose of this article is to analyze the specific agentic practices used by engaged scholars in Santiago, Chile, to earn and maintain legitimacy in their universities, in a context shaped by accreditation policies and global university rankings. This qualitative research used ethnographic research methods, participant observation, and interviews with 52 scholars from two universities (one public and one private) in Santiago, Chile. Findings describe a conditioned legitimacy and three agentic practices used by engaged scholars in Chile to earn and maintain legitimacy: operationalizing, negotiating, and resisting.