Shared governance=making all stakeholders feel as if they have a say in the important matters of the university (i.e. mission, goals, consultation on major decisions, etc.). Also, SG makes it incumbent upon the university president/chancellor to seek input from the major stakeholders before making these big changes. Faculty and students, especially, should be the first to know of the big changes, not the last.

It also and most importantly means that faculty have the right and the responsibility to vet and approve the qualifications of people who are hired at all levels, and especially at those levels where people have power over faculty. Thus shared governance keeps administrators at any level from hiring unqualified cronies to do their dirty work: shared governance insures that people who are hired for ANY job are qualified to do that job. It makes sure that competent administrators are in office and that your children have competent teachers in the classroom, not cronies of the dean or the chair---or the president. It also, as Amy Young points out, requires administration officials to consult with faculty colleagues about impending budget cuts so that the whole university can be part of the planning and therefore make sure budget cuts are as fair as it's possible to be---that no single part of the university should bear an undue portion of cutbacks. Shared governance is essential, absolutely essential, to the proper functioning of any university.