Hierarchy Of Authority Research Articles

Emergent Leadership Structures in Informal Groups: A Dynamic, Cognitively Informed Network Model

This paper advances novel theory and evidence on the emergence of informal leadership networks in groups that feature no formally designated leaders or authority hierarchies. We integrate insights from relational schema and network theory to develop and empirically test a three-step process model. The model’s first hypothesis is that people use a “linear ordering schema” to process information about leadership relations. The second hypothesis argues that when an individual experiences a particular leadership attribution to be inconsistent with the linear ordering schema, that individual will tend to reduce the ensuing cognitive inconsistency by modifying that leadership attribution. Finally, the third hypothesis builds on this inconsistency-reduction mechanism to derive implications about a set of network structural features (asymmetry, acyclicity, transitivity, popularity, and inverse popularity) that are predicted to emerge endogenously as a group’s informal leadership network evolves. We find broad support for our proposed theoretical model using a multi-method, multi-study approach combining experimental and observational data. Our study contributes to the organizational literature by illuminating a socio-cognitive dynamics underpinning the evolution of informal leadership structures in groups where formal authority plays a limited role. The e-companion is available at https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2017.1171 .

Work discussion as a method for supporting peripatetic teachers of vulnerable children

ABSTRACTThis paper describes the process of setting up a work discussion group for one-to-one peripatetic teachers of vulnerable children, who would otherwise be working in isolation. These teachers are employed by the local authority to teach children who are not attending school for reasons ranging from serious illness to permanent exclusion from their mainstream school. The author discusses the different stages of this new intervention and changes and developments within the group throughout the year, starting with the initial idea to persuading the local authority hierarchy of its meaning and purpose, to finding teachers who were interested to attend, a room, and a mutually agreed time. The paper describes how teachers who work in locations such as libraries, bedrooms, living rooms, kitchens and gardens were provided with a reflective space to share the impact of working with children who had complex physical, emotional and psychological states. Through the presentation of individual pupil narratives, the author suggests that the task of the isolated teacher becomes contaminated by the pathology of the pupils, their family situations and the many factors that hinder the achievement of successful educational outcomes. She describes some of the challenging situations to which the teachers concerned have to adapt, including those who work with seriously ill pupils who sometimes are taught lying in bed. The teachers can be readily overwhelmed by a host of obstacles which include a lack of teaching resources, difficulty in registering students for public examinations, and without the protection of health and safety regulations in their workplace. These teachers can become overwhelmed and easily lose their grip of the teaching task. They become de-professionalised, without helpful professional boundaries and other elements of essential containment in place. The work discussion group was designed so that teachers could share the burden, re-establish their primary task of teaching the students and helping themselves and the students to keep going. The provision of a ‘thinking’ space where teacher–student relationships and behaviour can be discussed and ‘contained’ provides a potent source of renewal and mutual support in a developing project.

"You Are My Dwelling Place": Experiencing Black Male Vocalists' Worship as Aural Eroticism and Autoeroticism in Gospel Performance

"You Are My Dwelling Place"Experiencing Black Male Vocalists' Worship as Aural Eroticism and Autoeroticism in Gospel Performance Alisha Lola Jones (bio) Within the twenty-first-century, historically African American, Pentecostal settings in which gospel music is performed, there is a long-standing tradition of ministers presenting songs and delivering sermons that promote sexual abstinence among unmarried individuals, encouraging listeners to wait until they get married to have sex. Essential prescriptions for maintaining chastity in the Worth the Wait movement include prohibitive teachings that Christian believers should guard their hearts, minds, and "gates" (i.e., ears and eyes) from sexually suggestive or erotic contemplation, pornographic entertainment, and self-pleasure through masturbation. Yet the songs and sermons through which such messages reach the "gates" of the congregation are themselves a physical and embodied discourse that—for many listeners and performers—can be understood as erotic and pleasurable. While the performance of gender and sexuality in gospel music has been marked as a taboo discussion in historically African American Protestant congregations, their rich interdependence is exemplified by albums such as Sacred Love Songs (1999) by T. D. Jakes, in which gospel music is intended to get (married, heterosexual) Christian couples in the mood for sex.1 Sacred Love Songs is based on the Song of Solomon and was marketed as "gospel" songs with the most "romantic and poetic texts ever written."2 Jakes, a preacher, narrates intermittently throughout the album, envoicing a divine blessing on the marriage bed and effectively cuing the act of procreative sex as an act of cocreation between husband, wife, [End Page 3] and God. Although there is a growing number of Christian same-sex marriages, most historically African American Protestant churches remain resistant to the movement. According to one iTunes review, the music is "as healing as it is entertaining[.] Sacred Love Songs encourages men and women to love each other in God's way with heartfelt musical messages." The album includes collaborations with popular R&B and gospel soprano, alto, and tenor (SAT) singers Tamar Braxton, Shirley Murdock, Jesse Powell, and Marvin Sapp, but the prominence given to Jakes's own deeper male voice as both speaker and singer draws upon gendered hierarchies of authority to reestablish bass timbres as the conventional sound for the sexual healing of African American Christian believers. The ambivalent reception of Sacred Love Songs and other similar recordings indicates both the success with which Jakes harnesses the erotic potential of gospel music and the discomfort that such an explicit acknowledgment of sonic eroticism causes for many religious gospel listeners, as it marks a glaring demographic omission in the project's potential impact: there is no exploration of a virgin, celibate, queer, or sensual listening to and feeling of gospel music through forms of sensory modalities (vision, audition, olfaction, gustation, tactility, and motion) in order to deepen love and spirituality in charismatic Christian social life.3 Furthermore, there is no consideration of the pleasure vocalists themselves may derive, concurrently maintaining Christian piety while providing forms of musical sexual healing for others.4 In this essay, I tease out the ways in which gospel singing is understood as erotic and sensual for nonheterosexual, single believers, both performers and listeners. I ask what we might learn about the pleasure derived from the auditory and bodily dimensions of gospel music making and contend that sexual abstinence discourses obscure the alternative forms of sensual and sexual exploration occurring in gospel music participation. Informed by womanist and feminist modes of analysis, I conduct this research as a formally trained, cisgender woman preacher, musician, and researcher who is sexually and nonsexually attracted to men, with what black feminist bell hooks might call an oppositional gaze toward black male musicians.5 My research on black men's worship is a critical affirmation of a tradition that I simultaneously respect and critique. Elsewhere, I have written that throughout popular gospel music discourse, white sexual paranoia about the black male body has been internalized by historically African American Protestant churchgoers. Cultural insiders exhibit a sociocultural fixation on the preservation of black masculinity and heterosexuality with recurrent questions such as "Are all the choir directors gay?" Thus, the gender expression of black...

Identifying key factors for mobilising under-utilised low carbon land resources: A case study on Kalimantan

Mobilising under-utilised low carbon (ULC) land for future agricultural expansion helps minimising further carbon stock loss. This study examined the regency cases in Kalimantan, a carbon loss hotspot, to understand the key factors for mobilising ULC land via narrative interviews with a range of land-use actors and complementary desktop analyses. The factors were broadly categorised into economic, agro-ecological, institutional and cultural factors, which were perceived as opportunities and/or barriers by different land-uses and stakeholders (with different business models), and can vary across regencies. Generally, oil palm was regarded by most interviewees as an economic opportunity, reflecting that there were no other more attractive options. However, oil palm may also be limited by various factors. For example, labour availability may greatly limit the actual amount of land that can be mobilised in many regencies due to low population density. These economic factors were interlinked with the agro-ecological factors, such as soil quality, which was often regarded as the reason of low economic attractiveness. The other two categories, institutional and cultural factors, are more subtle and complex, involving socio-political elements across the hierarchy of authorities. Understanding these factors requires understanding the relationships between different stakeholders and their histories. Past analyses on ULC land largely focus on a single crop or end-use. This study shows that mobilisation of ULC land has to depart from analysing the specific conditions within individual regencies, especially considering the views of multiple land-use actors on different land-use options and business models. Future research is recommended to assess available land-use options and business models by investigating how they are affected by each of the factors identified here and accounting for the policy targets set by individual regencies (e.g. economic development or food security) and the preference and capability of local actors.

The Politics of Justification: Newspaper Representations of Environmental Conflict between Fishers and the Oil Industry in Mexico

Media representations of environmental conflicts between companies and communities play an important role in influencing ideas about the rightful exploitation of natural resources. This article examines local newspapers’ representations of fishers’ claims over resource access in a conflict between fishers and the oil industry in Tabasco, Mexico. Our analysis is based on articles from two newspapers dating from 2003–2004 and 2007–2012, and ethnographic data from 2011–2012. Drawing on Boltanski and Thévenot's theory of jus-tification, discussions on patrimonial collectivities, and studies of media and social movements, we suggest that Tabascan newspapers reshape fishers’ claims over resource access by portraying fisheries and oil as patrimony. Being an ambivalent vocabulary for the defence of space and locality within a con-flict over natural-resource enclosure, the newspaper narratives of patrimony both invoke subaltern concerns and reconstrue state authority and local hierarchies. Furthermore, the newspaper narratives are interconnected with fisher leaders’ narratives, in particular, while misrepresenting different fisher groups’ arguments, and thereby contribute to political division among the fishers as a whole.

The Effect of More Demanding Public Services Quality Standards on the Organization of Service Providers

ABSTRACTThis research aims to investigate the effects that more demanding quality standards have on the organization of public service providers. A hypothetical research model showing the relationship between the quality of public service and the organization of public service providers was tested through a survey carried out with managers of water companies located in Italy. Results show that the new regulations impact on the organization in terms of resources and the performance management system, while the degree of centralization (i.e., the hierarchy of authority and degree of participation in decision-making) is not significantly related to the more demanding quality standards.

Modernizing the flow of blood: Biomedical technicians, working knowledge and the transformation of Swedish blood centre practices.

The early 1980s saw a 'paradigm change' in how donated blood was handled and used by blood centres, hospitals and pharmaceutical companies. In Sweden, a five-year state-financed R&D programme initiated a swift modernization process, an alleged 'revolution' of existing blood centre practices. In this article, we use interviews and archival material to analyse the role of female biomedical technicians in this rapid technical and organizational change. In focus is their working knowledge, or savoir-faire, of blood, instruments and techniques. We give a detailed analysis of technicians' embrained and embodied skills to create safety in blood and its representations, handle contingencies and invent new procedures and techniques. These transformations are analysed as sociomaterial entanglements, where the doing and undoing of gender, sociomaterial practices, hierarchies of authority and expertise, and emotions are intertwined.

OPERATION OF CUSTOMARY LAW ON THE EXAMPLE OF INSTITUTIONS, RELATED TO HORSEMANSHIP AND FOSTERAGE IN THE SECOND HALF OF 19 - EARLY 20 CENTURIES

In the article the social entity of horsemanship and fosterage as an education method in the second half of 19 - the beginning of 20 centuries are researched. It is marked that, taking the equivalent place in hierarchy of judicial authorities of the region, they differed on composition of participants of trial. A research of institutes the horsemanship and fosterage are of great importance for understanding of the social processes happening in the second half of 19 - the beginning of 20 centuries. Horsemanship and fosterage, entered in system of the mains and the most characteristic traditional institutes of Adyghe and throughout the long time played the significant role in life of the Adyghe society. It is indisputable that custom the horsemanship and fosterage entering special system of military preparation, performed function of maintenance of high military mobility of society therefore it was cultivated in the Adyghe society and it was lit with norms of common law.

董事会非正式层级与研发投入

基于社会学的关系契约理论，董事间依据董事个人权威和社会资本形成的非正式层级在董事会决策中发挥重要作用。研发投入属于董事会决策中的一种，本文旨在探讨董事会非正式层级中董事任职差异程度对企业研发投入的影响。以2009~2010年在创业板上市的58家企业为研究对象，实证结果表明董事会非正式层级越清晰，董事内部地位差异越大，研发投入越多；技术独立董事对非正式层级清晰度与研发投入间的正调节效应不显著；董事会规模越大，决策效率降低，非正式层级清晰度与研发投入间的正向关系被削弱。 Based on the sociological relationship contract theory, the directors play an important role in board decision-making because of the informal hierarchy of directors' personal authority and social capital. Owing to R&D investment as an important board decision, the purpose of this paper is to explore the impact of the status and level of directors on the R& D investment in the informal hierarchy of the board. This paper selects 58 companies which listed on the China Growth Enter-prise Market from 2009 to 2010, and the empirical results show that the informal hierarchy is clearer, the difference of the directors’ internal status is greater, and the R&D investment will in-crease. The effect of independent technology directors on the level of clarity and R&D investment is not significant. The board size is larger, the efficiency of decision making is lower, and the positive relationship between informal level clarity and R & D investment is weakened.

Advance Directive in End of Life Decision-Making among the Yoruba of South-Western Nigeria.

End-of-life decision making is value-laden within the context of culture and bioethics. Also, ethics committee role is difficult to understand on this, thus need for ethnomethodological perspective in an expanding bioethical age. Anthropological approach was utilized to document Yoruba definition and perspective of death, cultural beliefs about end-of-life decision making, factors influencing it and ethics committee role. Interviews were conducted among selected Yoruba resident in Akinyele LGA, Oyo State, Nigeria. Content analytical approach was used for data analysis. Yoruba culture, death is socially constructed having spiritual, physical and social significance. Relationship between the dying and significant others influences decision making. Hierarchy of authority informs implementing traditional advance directive. Socialization, gender, patriarchy, religious belief and tradition are major considerations in end-of-life decision making. Awareness, resource allocation and advocacy are important ethics committees' roles. Further research into cultural diversity of end-of-life decision making will strengthen ethical practice in health care delivery.

Authority, power and distributed leadership

A much greater understanding is needed of power in the practice of distributed leadership. This article explores how the concept of social authority might be helpful in achieving this. It suggests that the practice of distributed leadership is characterized by multiple authorities which are constructed in the interactions between people. Rather than there being a uniform hierarchy (relatively flat or otherwise) of formal authority, organizational members may be ‘high’ in some authorities and ‘low’ in others, and people’s positioning in relation to these authorities is dynamic and changeable. The article maps different forms of authorities, provides illustrations from educational institutions, and concludes with implications for educational leadership. A key conclusion is that everyone is involved in the ongoing production of authorities by contributing to who is accepted as or excluded from exercising authority and leadership.

The Influence of Hierarchy on Idea Generation and Selection in the Innovation Process

The link between organizational structure and innovation has been a longstanding interest of organizational scholars, yet the exact nature of the relationship has not been clearly established. Drawing on the behavioral theory of the firm, we take a process view and examine how hierarchy of authority—a fundamental element of organizational structure reflecting degree of managerial oversight—differentially influences behavior and performance in the idea generation versus idea selection phases of the innovation process. Using a multimethod approach that includes a field study and a lab experiment, we find that hierarchy of authority is detrimental to the idea generation phase of innovation, but that hierarchy can be beneficial during the screening or selection phase of innovation. We also identify a behavioral mechanism underlying the effect of hierarchy of authority on selection performance and propose that selection is a critical organizational capability that can be strategically developed and managed through organizational design. Our investigation helps clarify the theoretical relationship between structure and innovation performance and demonstrates the behavioral and economic consequences of organizational design choice.The online appendix is available at https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2017.1142 .

Defrosting the Icebox: A Contextual Analysis of Andy Warhol’s Raid the Icebox 1

Abstract This article provides a contextual analysis of Andy Warhol’s landmark exhibition Raid the Icebox 1 (1969) at the Museum of Art, Rhode Island School of Design. Unconventional in both content and installation, it is one of the earliest exhibitions organized by an artist from a museum’s permanent collection. Unlike previous studies, which analyse the exhibition through Warhol’s biography or artistic practice, this article focuses on the institution and the artist-curator. While the museum sought to render its historical treasures relevant to a younger generation, I argue that Warhol enacted a form of institutional critique that undermined hierarchies of display, value and authority.

Predicting leadership relationships: The importance of collective identity

In many organizations, leadership increasingly looks less like a hierarchy of authority. Instead, it is better understood as a network of influence relationships in which multiple people participate, blurring the distinction between leader and follower and raising the question, how do we predict the existence of these leadership relationships? In this study, we examine identification with one's organization and work team to predict the presence or absence of a leadership relationship. Using Exponential Random Graph Models (ERGMs) we find that employees who strongly identify with their company and team are more likely to view others as a source of leadership. We also find that employees who strongly identify with the organization are more likely to be viewed by others as a source of leadership. Implications for enhancing the understanding of plural forms of leadership and leadership development are discussed.

Blue Suede Shoes to Doc Marten Boots

This paper will focus on two seemingly disparate music based case studies-Elvis and punk rock-and their associated “religions.” An argument will be made that Elvis and “his religion” could be viewed as what is often represented as a traditional “Catholic” tradition with pilgrimages, flowers, candles, prayers and miracles (including resurrection). Ethics and charity work are undertaken as emulation or invocation of Elvis rather than a morally driven action or compulsion. Concurrently, punk music (in its various forms) could be viewed as what is traditionally represented as “Protestant” with its stringent self-reliance, rejection of hierarchy and questioning of authority, its crucial importance on questioning, action and black and white view of the world. Ethics form a key part of punk and are driven by strong morality and a desire to wrest change. However the dialogue between these two case studies (and indeed geographies of USA and UK) can be made all the more coherent and fruitful when structured through an Implicit Religion framework and thus stand in tribute to Edward Bailey and the partnerships he sought to create through Implicit Religion.

Globalization and its Positive Impact on Indian Economy

After the amendments of liberalization, privatisation, and globalization in 1991, India gained a new paradigm. It opened up as a hub of efficient labourers and also as an efficient market. Globalization acted as an initiative for the improvement of technology and skills. Technology triggered the productivity level, and it also initiated a proper platform for the service sectors (like IT hub) and manufacturing sectors. The improvement of technological skill increased due to the opening up of Research -Development and also due to the improvement in education system. The governance and structure of the government changed i.e. the hierarchy of the central authority was segregated into centre and periphery (state-district level management-local governments-Zillah parishad-gram panchayat), this system provided an overview for proper implementation of active schemes. Impact of Globalization gained importance when the country became an investment hub of foreign companies and multinationals. As the globalization attracted foreign investors to invest in the financial market (like stock market, share market), the commodity market also expanded. India was experiencing a population explosion at that time which acted as the major engine behind the growing commodity market. The positive impacts of globalization were excessively felt from 1994 onwards when the government catered higher amount of foreign direct investments (FDI) and foreign institutional investment (FII). Therefore, this provided a stage to establish MNC’S (multinational corporations). . Multinational corporations (MNCs) are most simply defined as a corporation or enterprise that conducts and controls productive activities in more than one country. They are important drivers of global economic activity, but have an ambiguous relationship with different forms of regulation that promote labour standards. Considering their global nature connecting different societies, Multinational corporations are generally related with high adoption of private manner of governance falling under the path of corporate social responsibility (CSR). These huge firms, mostly from North America, Britain, Europe, and Japan but also increasingly from newly industrialized countries like South Korea, Taiwan and Brazil, present an unique opportunity but may also pose serious problems for many developing countries in which they operate. Two central characteristics of multinational corporations are their large size and the fact that their worldwide operations and activities tend to be centrally controlled by their parent companies. They act as the major force in the rapid globalization of world trade. Thus this led to a reduction in poverty by drafting a drastic change in the economic policies. This level of foreign investment restructured the economy from its core. India’s economic performance in the post-reform period created a growth rate of 6.7% within a 5 year span of globalization; this helped India to gain confidence in the world market and made it one of the fastest growing economies. Thus this paper provides a guideline to cover all the positive aspects of globalization on Indian economy.

Salesperson brand attachment: a job demands-resources theory perspective

Sales researchers have largely ignored the idea that salespeople form attachments to the brands that they sell, and that these attachments hold important consequences for sales outcomes. Drawing on job demands-resources theory, the authors suggest that salesperson brand attachment (SBA) serves as a unique psychological resource for salespeople. Using data from 154 salespeople from the beverage industry, they provide evidence that SBA increases selling effort toward the brand, and ultimately job satisfaction. In addition, they show that salesperson's brand attachment acts as a buffer against perceived job demands, including job codification and hierarchy of authority. In general, results support the job demands-resources framework and confirm that SBA is a resource that may be leveraged to offset job demands, under certain situations.

E&P Notes (December 2015)

E&P Notes Study Finds Surface Spills a Higher Risk to Groundwater Than Fracturing Trent Jacobs, JPT Senior Technology Writer Researchers at Yale University who analyzed groundwater wells in the Marcellus Shale area have determined that hydraulic fracturing is highly unlikely to be a direct source of contamination. The 3-year study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, also found that well casing failures and produced water containment ponds did not impact the groundwater samples taken during the study. The researchers concluded that the samples that tested positive for some of the same organic chemical compounds used in drilling and completion operations, but not in dangerous concentrations, resulted from accidental spills on the surface. Statistics Point to Water Injection as Cause of Earthquakes, But Understanding Why Remains a Geological Puzzle Stephen Rassenfoss, JPT Emerging Technology Senior Editor A surge in earthquakes tightly clustered in southern Kansas that followed the large increase in produced water injections prompted the state to cut the daily limits on disposal wells in that area to see if that will help solve the problem. Based on 3 months of reduced injections through mid-September, “the results were encouraging,” said Shelby Peterie, a research geophysicist at the Kansas Geological Survey. Her presentation at the Society of Exploration Geophysicists’ annual meeting in New Orleans in October showed there has been a reduction in the intensity of the earthquakes reported, but not the number of them. From Air to Sea: Introducing Crew Resource Management to the Offshore Industry Trent Jacobs, JPT Senior Technology Writer Despite a number of recent and high-profile jetliner crashes, commercial aviation has entered into a new era of safety. Seven of the past 10 years have seen the fewest fatal accidents in the industry’s nearly 7-decade history and this year is on track to be the safest yet. Aside from the significant improvements made in aircraft reliability, much of the progress has been attributed to the communication and operational training program known as crew resource management (CRM). The basic principle of CRM is to encourage key personnel to speak up when they detect problems or notice mistakes while maintaining the hierarchy of authority. Air Gun Inventor Creates A Lower Pressure Option Stephen Rassenfoss, JPT Emerging Technology Senior Editor More than 50 years after inventing the air gun, Stephen Chelminski is working on a new version of the industry standard designed to be more in tune with the current needs of the industry and its regulators. While the components used would be familiar to anyone who has worked with an air gun, it has a fatter shape and produces sounds in a lower range. If it were a horn, it would be a tuba and a standard air gun would be a trumpet. The goal is to reduce the energy emitted to produce the lower frequency range that is useful for seismic, while decreasing the emission of frequencies said to cause trouble for marine life. “Something like 3% to 6% of the energy from an air gun is turned into useful energy for seismic. The rest is wasted,” said Chelminski, chief executive officer of Chelminski Research, during an interview at the recent Society of Exploration Geophysicists’ (SEG) annual meeting in New Orleans. Drilling Competition Offers Real-World Skills Challenge Stephen Rassenfoss, JPT Emerging Technology Senior Editor Vimlesh Bavadiya is leading a team of engineering students at the University of Oklahoma (OU) to repeat its victory in SPE’s Drillbotics competition next year. The competition to build the best automated drilling machine was created to provide engineering students with a dose of real-world experience, where teamwork is required to attack a complex challenge when time and money are limited, the rules change, and in the end, things break. “It was a very difficult path. But it was very good,” Bavadiya said, summing up the experience of the five-member team that won the first ever Drillbotics competition, which was created by the SPE Drilling Systems Automation Technical Section.

Релативизација ауторитета у постмодерном добу: „Закон о деци“ Ијана Макјуана

Hierarchy of moral values and relevant authorities, in the public as well as in the private sphere of society, has never been so vague as in the postmodern age, which is primarily influenced by the social philosophy of capitalism and globalism, thus changing forever the image of the traditional family, relationships between members of closer community, as well as the way in which people perceive themselves. The novel Children Act by Ian McEwan presents court cases related to problematic situations of children, usually innocent victims of various unfortunate circumstances, legal regulations, decisions and personal beliefs of adults. During the settlement of these disputes, the focus is on the struggle for supremacy between different socio-regulatory authorities: the secular court, religious communities, institutions of medical and social sciences, whereas each of these parties offers their own view of an acceptable solution. In some situations, the court often does not have a real solution, and the only option is to make a choice between less deterimental options, in accordance with the law. In an atmosphere of postmodern ambiguity and relativism, there is no one “correct” answer or solution, but multiple individual perspectives, each representing the truth from their own point of view. Th is paper deals with issues of public authority and personal autonomy, their mutual relationship and the consequential impact on the lives of ordinary people. The Court, as an instrument of the state, in some cases grants legitimacy to a certain solution, while in others it enforces a solution, thus putting an individual in a rather isolated position. The only way individuals can overcome these challenges and obstacles is to achieve internal stability by building their own moral standards, despite the conflicts and contradictions of the surrounding world.

Mark Olssen on neoliberalisation of higher education and academic lives: An interview

This article is based on an interview conducted with Mark Olssen in October 2014, and the subsequent discussions. These conversations invited Olssen to reflect on his experiences of neoliberalism as a practising academic who has worked in the UK for some 14 years, and also to comment as a researcher and writer who is well known for his work on neoliberalism, especially in relation to higher education policy. While focusing on a question of how neoliberalism has changed the context in which academics work, following Olssen’s lead in his own research, in this interview he articulates a Foucauldian understanding of neoliberalism that can be seen as a specific mode of government rooted in economic discourses of competition ( Foucault, 2008 ). The accentuation of the competitive forces shaping higher education, linked in Britain to periodic audits such as the RAE and the REF, have become increasingly visible within higher education institutions through techniques, such as performance indicators and targets, the increasing role of non-academic managers, the adoption of line-management authority hierarchies, linked to strategic planning, quality assurance, annual appraisals and audits that now function as a regular part of university governance ( Olssen and Peters, 2005 ) and which discipline the way academics ‘conduct their conduct’, in Foucault’s phrase. By drawing on various examples from Olssen’s experience, it is argued that academics in neoliberalised institutions have been seriously deprofessionalised, the sources of which must be traced to complex causes ‘in the whole network of the social’ ( Foucault, 1982 : 345). Although this complexity of power is increasingly constraining, it is also suggested that it still offers some opportunities for academic resistance. The summary of our conversations is presented in this article, aiming to address the ways in which neoliberalism has transformed academia. We argue that the replacement of traditional liberal collegial models of governance by neoliberal technologies has diminished the academic freedom and professional self-determination of academics within the university acting to the detriment of autonomous research endeavours and propelling an escalation of the ‘dark times’ so vividly depicted by Tamboukou (2012: 860) . In general terms, the article contributes to wider scholarly debate on neoliberalisation of higher education and academic work.