Knowledge for Sale: The Neoliberal Takeover of Higher Education

Description

How free-market fundamentalists have shifted the focus of higher education to competition, metrics, consumer demand, and return on investment, and why we should change this. A new philosophy of higher education has taken hold in institutions around the world. Its supporters disavow the pursuit of knowledge for its own sake and argue that the only knowledge worth pursuing is that with more or less immediate market value. Every other kind of learning is downgraded, its budget cut. In Knowledge for Sale, Lawrence Busch challenges this market-driven approach. The rationale for the current thinking, Busch explains, comes from neoliberal economics, which calls for reorganizing society around the needs of the market. The market-influenced changes to higher education include shifting the cost of education from the state to the individual, turning education from a public good to a private good subject to consumer demand; redefining higher education as a search for the highest-paying job; and turning scholarly research into a competition based on metrics including number of citations and value of grants. Students, administrators, and scholars have begun to think of themselves as economic actors rather than seekers of knowledge. Arguing for active resistance to this takeover, Busch urges us to burst the neoliberal bubble, to imagine a future not dictated by the market, a future in which there is a more educated citizenry and in which the old dichotomies―market and state, nature and culture, and equality and liberty―break down. In this future, universities value learning and not training, scholarship grapples with society's most pressing problems rather than quick fixes for corporate interests, and democracy is enriched by its educated and engaged citizens. Contents Preface to the English Language Edition Acknowledgments The Market for Knowledge Crises Climate change Rising and more volatile food prices Water shortages Rising energy costs Widespread obesity Financial crises Liberalisms and Neoliberalisms Human knowledge is always limited An irrefutable logical model can transcend the limits of human knowledge Institutions must be reshaped so as to fit the logical model The ability of States to intervene in markets must be limited Social justice as both a concept and a set of policies is rejected as a mirage Selves are to be reconstructed as isolated and entrepreneurial Beyond Neoliberalisms The self is social Each institution promotes certain kinds of selves and rejects other kinds People, institutions, and things make society together Communities of scholars and invisible colleges are essential to the creation of knowledge Markets are forms of governance Educated citizens are essential for democracy; without democracy, liberty is illusory Addressing the crises that confront us requires that we imagine, debate, and enact new futures Administration Changing roles and increasing numbers of administrators Shift from academics to managers as administrators Creation of administrative careers Growth in salaries of top administrators Growth in advertising and marketing of universities and research institutes Growth in numbers of part-time and temporary (adjunct) faculty Changing sources of university and research institute financial support Universities by the numbers Education From public good to private good Shift from public support for higher education to individual support Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs A decline in foreign language instruction Education solely as a means of maximizing one’s salary Growth in testing and standardizing of knowledge Plagiarism Dumbing down higher education Research Counting publications Counting citations Checking prestige of journals Downgrading of books and book chapters Competing for grants Greater incidence of fraud Ghost and honorary authorship Forced citations by journal editors Rising costs of journals as a few publishers corner the market Conflicts of interest in research Changes in intellectual property rights Public Engagement and Extension Decline in public support Growth of private extension-like services Wider gap between research and extension Decline of public interest research Rise of strongly ideological think tanks Consequences Higher education is being rapidly altered Research is more and more dominated by immediate (often economic) ends Increasing corporate domination of the research enterprise Discouraging innovation and high-risk research The university as a growth machine Isolated scholars and organizational solidarity Can Our Universities and Research Institutes Address These Crises What kinds of universities and research institutes do we want How can we grapple with the wicked problems facing us Remembrance of Things Future: Some Specific Proposals for Change Make universities and research institutes (more) secure places Make universities and research institutes into models of democracy, deliberation, and discourse Help build more sustainable societies Better integrate research and education Recognize the importance of slow scholarship Bring the arts and humanities back in Teach each other and various publics Perform differently Conclusion: Toward a Plural World Notes References