Bringing them into the tent – student association and the neutered academy

Abstract

Following the trend of many comparable countries, Australian universities are now part of a massified system which is a significant contributor to the national economy. The commercial university is solicitous as to its product and its position in the market, but must also navigate the regulatory environment. Uncontrollable aspects of the university, including staff and student organisations, can threaten the marketable image of the university corporation and its relationship with government. This paper considers the creation and regulation of student organisations in Australia. In Australia's federal system some state legislation accorded student organisations a legitimate place in university governance; most universities accepted the role of student organisations as beneficial to both students and the university itself. Since the 1980s, however, the financial leverage of the federal government purchased increasing intervention in universities, and this extended to the rearticulation of the role of the student organisations in 2006. The reorientation of the university sector has been facilitated by a reconfiguration of important relationships in the sector – between universities and students on the one hand, and universities and student organisations on the other. The contractualisation of relationships in the sector enables the modelling of the university on the commercial enterprise, creating other techniques of control, within a wider regulatory system steered by funding arrangements. The resulting depoliticisation of student organisations is part of a wider process of disengagement of universities from public critique and its embrace of commercial forms of governance generally.