「独立法人」はindependent corporationですからprivatizationと言うことではないでしょうか。

周りに何か手がかりがありませんか。

法人化 in connection with universities is 'corporatization', at least in connection with the recent legal changes to the status of national universities in Japan.
独立 I presume is adding on the idea of these corporated universities now being 'independent'.
Indeed, the whole idea of an institution becoming a 'coporate' is that the institution in question takes on a 'legal personality' of its own, making it effectively 'independent'.
Note that corporatization and privatization are two seperate things. A public entity may be corporatized without being privatized- an attractive concept for post-leftie 'third way' types.

Depending on the context you may wish to avoid the word privatization. One can be an independent legal entity and still, for all practical purposes be owned by the government. As an independent legal entity you may choose whether to receive money from the government and do as the government says, or fund yourself and do as you want. As an independent legal entity you are also taxed differently.

Specifically, privatization implies the sale of publicly owned property. In effect, ownership of the property is transferred from the government to the private sector through the purchase of stock. The property can be land, buildings, factories, companies, or even a university -- in effect, any marketable asset owned by the government.

More generally speaking, privatization can refer to any transfer of ownership from the public to the private sector no matter how it is achieved, but this is a more popular usage and the one that Can probably has in mind.