A Marxist Critique of the Ruined University

Description

This book revitalizes the Marxian concept of critique for research into the transformation of universities. It consists of a set of comprehensive and interconnected theoretical tools, starting from the reflection on the political ontology of higher education, through the critique of political economy of the sector to the analysis of activist struggles within the universities, and back to the ontological concept of the common – a foundation for the university alternative design. The tools offered and discussed in context throughout the book allow for a productive use in overcoming the current crisis of the university, as well as to avoid the pitfalls present in contemporary debates around it. Unlike the dominant discussions on the university in crisis, the authors argue that to grasp its nature, one has to reach more profound than the level of appearances such as marketization and commodification. Szadkowski and Krzeski offer a compelling reappraisal of critique as a mechanism to liberate intellectual work. By linking critique to how knowledge is structured and commodified, they help us transcend reductionist narratives of a crisis-ridden University. Prioritising ontological renewal, they embrace the political and the common, enriching our collective ways of knowing the world as a movement. Pivoting around academic and student protests in Poland, the book enables us to imagine spaces and times of critical hope that resist the capitalist subjugation of intellectual activity to knowledge production. Richard Hall, Professor of Education and Technology, De Montfort University, Leicester, UK In the century since Antonio Gramsci new works in the Marxist tradition have made only modest contributions to social thought: the combined result of the savage repression in the West of the dangerous revolutionary ideas, plus the collapse in the East into jacobin conspiracy and dogmatism. If a living, vibrant Marxism had been part of the twentieth century mainstream then much catastrophe would have been averted. Now the drive for capital accumulation, sovereign individualism and rampant nationalism have brought us to the brink of ecological disaster and World War III. Into the void step two emerging scholars, Krystian Szadkowski and Jakub Krzeski with an original Marxist critique of higher education and the common good. There is hope in this development, vital resources for reflection, discussion and action. Simon Marginson, Professor of Higher Education at the Universities of Bristol and Oxford, UK, Honorary Professor at Tsinghua University in China, and Joint Editor in Chief of the journal 'Higher Education' Acknowledgements Book Description Contents Chapter 1: The Totality of Capital in Higher Education and the Integrity of Critique 1.1 How to Break Free from the University in Crisis? 1.2 Capital’s Totality 1.3 Crisis and Critique in Higher Education Revisited 1.4 In-Against-Beyond: Integrity of the Critique as a Method 1.5 The Book’s Overview References Chapter 2: Decrepitude of the Critique: Renewing or Casting Critique Aside? 2.1 Disentanglement of Crisis and Critique 2.2 Critique Among the Ruins 2.3 Critique in the Hands of Homo Academicus 2.4 From Sorrowful to Joyful Critique 2.5 Back to the Origin References Chapter 3: The Real Movement That Abolishes the Present State of Things: Marx (and Engels) on Critique 3.1 Why Marx? Why Now? 3.2 Marxian Point of Difference 3.3 Ruthless Critique as an Integral Critique 3.4 Three Moments of Critique: In-Against-Beyond 3.5 In-Against-Beyond Capitalist University 3.6 Critique Renewed? References Chapter 4: Ontological Foundations of Critique 4.1 Renewing Critique Through Ontology 4.2 Ontological Turn for Higher Education 4.3 Marx and the Practice of Political Ontology 4.4 Ontological Deadlock: Between the Private and the Public 4.5 Apparent Contradiction of the Private and the Public 4.6 Ontology and Critique References Chapter 5: Interlude 1: On Academic Robinson and His Preachers 5.1 Primacy of Individual in Science? 5.2 Getting to Know the Good Old Robinson 5.3 Embedding Robinson in the (Capitalist) Subjectivity 5.4 Academic Robinson and His Preachers 5.5 Academic Robinson Through a Marxian Lens 5.6 From Ontology to the Moment ‘In’ References Chapter 6: ‘In’: Critique of the Political Economy of Higher Education 6.1 Landscapes of the Political Economy 6.2 What Is Critique of the Political Economy? 6.3 Dominant Political-Economic Discourses in Higher Education Research 6.4 Marxist Political Economy of Higher Education and Its Limits 6.5 Capital in Marx’s Das Kapital 6.6 Capital in Higher Education 6.6.1 Production of Capital in Higher Education 6.6.2 Cycles of Capital in Higher Education 6.6.3 Capital’s Factions and Capture of Surplus Value in Higher Education 6.7 Types of Subsumptions of Academic Labour Under Capital 6.8 The Particular of Science and Higher Education: Measure, Prestige, Knowledge 6.8.1 Measure 6.8.2 Prestige 6.8.3 Knowledge 6.9 Critique of the Political Economy and the Academic Labour References Chapter 7: Interlude 2: Where to Hit? 7.1 Beyond Economic Determinism 7.2 Political Economy and Class Struggle 7.3 Political Reading of Marx and the Map of Contradictions 7.4 From ‘In’ to ‘Against’ References Chapter 8: ‘Against’: Workers’ Inquiry and Co-research 8.1 Critique and the University Struggles 8.2 Marx and Critique as Explication of the Dreams of the Epoch 8.3 Workers’ Inquiry 8.4 Workers’ Inquiry in Higher Education 8.5 Co-research 8.6 ‘Jowita Stays’: Example of Co-research 8.7 Co-research and Education Through Common Struggle References Chapter 9: Interlude 3: Embedding Counter-Subjectivity Within Militant University 9.1 From ‘Against’ to ‘Beyond’ 9.2 Counter-Subjectivity Beyond the Constituted Power 9.3 Echoes of May: Cunningness of Co-optation 9.4 Organising Counter-Subjectivity Within the Institutional Shell 9.5 The Common as Content (Not the Norm) of Militant University References Chapter 10: ‘Beyond’: Higher Education and Practices of the Common 10.1 Fragility of the Common in Higher Education 10.2 ‘Beyond’ and the Method of Critique 10.3 The Common, the Commons and Commoning 10.4 Capital and the Common 10.5 Practising the Common in Higher Education 10.5.1 Politics of the Common and the Role of Antagonism 10.5.2 Beyond the Property Relations 10.5.3 Benefits of the Common 10.5.4 How to Finance the Common Higher Education? 10.5.5 Governing the Commons 10.6 The Cycle of the Common in Higher Education 10.7 Constiuent Potentia of the Common References Chapter 11: Coda: Critique as Commoning 11.1 Commoning as Critique 11.2 Critique as Commoning References Index