The latest issue of New Proposals: Journal of Marxism and Interdisciplinary Inquiry examines the corporatization of the university and resistance to it.
I’m pleased to be the co-author, along with John F. Welsh and Kevin D. Vinson, of one of the articles in the issue:
To Discipline and Enforce: Surveillance and Spectacle in State Reform of Higher Education
John F. Welsh, E. Wayne Ross, Kevin D. Vinson
Abstract
Drawing from concepts developed by the social theorists Michel Foucault and Guy Debord on the exertion of political power in contemporary society, this paper analyzes the restructuring of public higher education systems initiated by governors, legislatures and state higher education boards. The paper argues that the primary features of restructuring are (1) increased surveillance of the behaviors and attitudes of the constituents within colleges and universities by the state and (2) the spectacularization of reform by state governments. Surveillance and spectacle aim at the disciplining of individuals and enforcement of state policy and are forms of direct and ideological social control. They imply a transformation of relations between institutions and the state, particularly the subordination of the higher learning to state policy objectives.
Here’s the full table of contents:
New Proposals
Vol 3, No 2 (2010)
Universities, Corporatization and Resistance
Introduction
New Perspectives on the Business University
Sharon Roseman
Comments and Arguments
An analytical proposal for the understanding of the Higher Education European Space. A view from the University of Barcelona
Edurne Bagué, Núria Comerma, Ignasi Terradas
Resistance One-On-One: An Undergraduate Peer Tutor’s Perspective
Andrew J. Rihn
Articles
To Discipline and Enforce: Surveillance and Spectacle in State Reform of Higher Education
John F. Welsh, E. Wayne Ross, Kevin D. Vinson
Reviews and Reflections
Reflections on work and activism in the ‘university of excellence.’
Charles R. Menzies
Review of Peter Worsley, An Academic Skating on Thin Ice (Berghahn Books, 2008)
Sharon Roseman
The Exchange University: Corporatization of Academic Culture
Dianne West
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