Carelessness: A hidden doxa of higher education

Abstract

This article explores the implications of new public sector ‘reforms’ for the culture of higher education. It argues that a culture of carelessness, grounded in Cartesian rationalism, has been exacerbated by new managerialism. The article challenges a prevailing sociological assumption that the character of higher education culture is primarily determined by new managerial values and norms. Carelessness in education has a longer historical trajectory. First, it has its origins in the classical Cartesian view of education, namely that scholarly work is separate from emotional thought and feeling, and that the focus of education is on educating an autonomous, rational person, homo sapiens, whose relationality is not regarded as central to her or his being. Second, it is grounded in the separation between fact and value that is endemic to contemporary positivist norms that govern not only scientific and social scientific thought (Sayer, 2006) but the organization of higher education (Grummell et al., 2009a; Lynch, 2006). What is new about new managerialism in higher education is the moral status it accords to carelessness. Given the moral imperative on women to do care work (O’Brien, 2007) and on men to be care-less, the carelessness of higher education has highly gendered outcomes.1