Why members of academic communities may feel uncomfortable ... · PDF fileWhy members of...
Transcript of Why members of academic communities may feel uncomfortable ... · PDF fileWhy members of...
Anton KRAMBERGER
University of Ljubljana, Slovenia
Why members of academic communities may feel uncomfortable with the (mis)management
of HE units after the Bologna reforms?
Main research question (MRQ):
Academic culture & HE management quality after the Bologna?
1. Elaboration of MRQ
2. Hypothetical implications
3. Evidence (ISA blogs)
4. Complications
5. Validity, concluding remarks
Outline
Basic idea:
By Bologna reforms (and EHEA) European universities rapidly populate emerging EU academic quasi-market, driven by competitive academic business units, what requires from them a resource-based type of HE management replacing slowly a traditional profession-centered, collegial-based HE management.
Main RQs:
What are major implications of a resource-based type of management within the (social science) academic space implemented along the Bologna reforms for academic community and its culture?
What is (was) disfunctional with old (mass) univ. systems?
What are good and not so good implications of Bologna?
Main research question
University
Bologna reforms (Knowledge -> Competences)
Academic market (EHEA)
Academic community
Academic management
Resource-based vs profession-based organisation
Key concepts
Qualitative elaboration of research question
Long tradition of universities under pressure: academic communities & its culture
universities as K-transfer&creation device
ethical reflections on social application of (scientific) knowledge
Recent macro changes (after 1960): around academic space (demography, markets, globalisation, ...)
competitive academic space (mass expansion, Clarke model, quality)
new techno-platform for K circulation (ICT & web etc.)
public funding cuts (public down & private up)
academic individualisation (decay of trad. professional communities)
Very recent macro changes (after 2000): Bologna (standardised programs, progression, certificates etc.)
Re-orientation towards resource-based management in HE units
Triple cuts: global crises & resource-based management & SocSci
Conceptual framework UNDERSTANDING PHENOMENA, TRENDS:
Traditional academic communities are (were) relatively autonomus leafs of a
university flower areas, spreading by their specific-area scientific ties across the borders, forming a kind of international professional community, anchored around specific-area academic culture & identity. Coexistence of multiple academic communities & universal cultures within a university. Basically, professions are (were) responsible for collegial management of symbolic life.
Signs: - specific histories of academic units & departments
- past sacrificies of academic members for academic freedom important
- common set of (scientific) professional beliefs
- academic culture is assumed (from new entrants), not managed
- professional logos and ethos prevail (no pathos, except for thruths)
Professional academic community & its culture
university
more professional autonomy less professional autonomy
free collegial conversation PR speech
less managerial control more managerial control
PROFESSIONAL INCORPORATION (K Domains) BUSINESS INCORPORATION (Outputs)
By Bologna, academic communities definitely shrinked with regard to traditional university - due to an increased central control of resources, by an emphasis on teaching, ... and are subject to ever-growing resource-based management by central university. Local corporate identity replaces areas of universal professional coherence. Nobody really cares of academic (universal) symbolic values and to that devoted daily life (perhaps only normatively).
Signs: - individualisation of academic careers (double careers)
- lack of professional belonging, what is replaced by corporate PR etc.
- academic culture not assumed (for new entrants), just managed
- lack of professional ethos, replaced by business logos, even pathos
Bologna captures academic community & its culture into an ill-defined short-term productive horizon (of fund raising)
university
B
university
New HE management
Goals Meanwhile, what happened with market corporations?
Only 5-6 nations export 90% of all knowledge, others adopt it
Market corporations prefer to follow financial-bubble economy
Profit & GDP seems to be most important (see Beyond GDP)
In Kondratieff terms, it is not quite clear whether current crises is
a temporary depression between two small peaks of the further upswing,
or
a beginning of the downswing phase of the 5th Kondratieff wave
For details, see: Korotayev & Tsirel (2010)
However, sociologocal inquiries clearly show that while efficiency
of global market corporations improved during liberalisations
since 1980, ethical concerns of the front-line organisations, by
their employees and managers significantly stagnated.
Q: Are Bologna academic corporations going the same way?
Basically, by Bologna a variety of traditional academic cultures & autonomy along with their symbolic life disappear:
An empowerment of academic (mis)management
Emerging of fragmented, segmented academic markets
Commodification of too specialised tracks of knowledge weak knowledge integrity (facts and values)
private knowledge circulation (transfer, creation)
none academic community & culture & autonomy (goals, critique)
Dualisation of academic labour markets
No room for urgent, practical interdisciplinarity
Hidden privatisation of academic resources
... and many other (bad) implications
Good implications ??
Methods implications (as thought experiments)
National reports, 29 countries (sept. 2011) with similar difficulties
All governments are passing Univ. reform bills with further cuts
More authoritarian HE managerial models are introduced
By Bologna, universities are turned into teaching colleges
Academic programs are loosely linked directly to markets (??)
Skills forecasts anticipate only more unskilled & high specialists
Increasing problems with employment for graduates
No interdisciplinarity, no human goals, no critique, no integral knowl.
Humanities & social sciences are under a direct attack
Problematic academic ranking systems flourish
Media studies rules, with hidden (MNC) advertisement agenda
On periphary, media representations are replacing R&R efforts
Collegial autonomy across HE rapidly vanishes (strong professions)
New strategic rent-seeking coalition (weak professions with HE mgt)
Main excuse is pervert: students (taste/choice of masess) in centre
Bologna also means a definite farewell to national research ...
More work overload in HE, especially for the waged youngsters
etc.
Evidence From ISA blogs: Universities in Crises
Strong historic messages types of polity formation
academic
Elite-1
Academic
Elite - n
Consolidated (professional) elites tend to form a limited democratic coalition, known as traditional academic, collegial autonomy (with regard to public authority)
Corporate
elites
Fragmented (corporated) elites tend to impose an autocratic coalition with masses,
known as competence-based Bologna allies weak professions & low-class students
Individualised students (mass) and displaced
professors, adapt to new programmes,
limited funds and rarer HE resources
Weak
professions
Organisational management of university (MNC behind)
Decay of state professions & community knowledge fragmentation
Academic community fragmentation (into rent-seeking coalitions)
Global power restructuring (MNC have a control over states aims)
Hard dualisation (segmentation) of national labour markets
Human communities under threat -> xenophobia (to others)
Employment: Few specialists & Plenty of all kinds of (poor-paid) services
???
Implications (scenarios) for academic community
Findings of Bologna effects from evidence (SWOT) Good things
Bureaucratic ivory towers of strong professions a bit restructured
Better acces to HE for more students, easier transitivity, exchange
Bad things
Knowledge & academic collegial culture dis-integration
Authoritarian HE mgt, increase in administrative auditing
Destruction of public university (traditional teaching & RD model)
Opportunities
Interdisciplinarity (consolidation of too fragmented Knowledge)
Smoother cross-border transmission of recent technologies
Threats
Weaker professions build new ivory towers (false self-advancement)
Irrelevant specialisations in academic tracks (for communities)
(Quasi) Privatisation of corporate resources within universities
Casualized labour force of mass graduates on short-term horizon
But, Bologna universities just try to adjust to global demand:
i.e.,
Information society -> Knowledge society -> Innovation systems ->