Entrepreneurial U, or Bildung in the Ruins

Abstract

This article addresses the rise of entrepreneurship as a hegemonic mode of contemporary postsecondary education. It revisits Bill Readings's arguments about the corporate “University of Excellence,” which framed universities as ruined institutions that had abandoned their mission of subject formation as skills training gained prominence. It suggests that in the entrepreneurial university this problem has been resolved, as a global culture of entrepreneurship has replaced national culture as the guiding concept within them. The article traces the academic framing of the term “entrepreneurial university” from its genesis in the 1980s to its instantiation in current modes of pedagogy, managerial policy, funding, and social action within the university system. Although the focus remains on North American institutions, the article suggests that the hegemonic nature of entrepreneurship dispensed by entrepreneurial universities has a broader scope and has become the dominant global model of advanced education.