Neoliberal Higher Education Research Articles

Explicating collegiality and change management in neoliberalism during the dynamics of higher education institutions: : A Systematic Literature Review using PRISMA Checklist

Background This paper discusses the lack of references that comprehensively describe the changes in universities owing to the ideology of neoliberalism. This research also discusses how a university maintains its function and identity when the great wave of neoliberalism massively erodes collegiality as the original philosophy of the university through a case study of the neoliberalism ideology on higher education. This study also provides a comprehensive framework for higher education management and governance changes. Methods We selected all retrieved sources based on the keywords and analyzed all the documents we obtained. This study obtained data from Scopus retrieved on October 27, 2023, using the following keywords: (TITLE-ABS-KEY ("collegiality") OR TITLE-ABS-KEY ("change management") OR TITLE-ABS-KEY ("neolibelism")) AND TITLE-ABS-KEY ("higher education"). This study utilized bibliometric analysis to ensure a structured review of the literature on collegiality, change management, and neoliberalism in higher education. Results The findings show that organizational management, leadership, education, technology, curriculum, innovation, organizational change, decision-making, and human beings are significant trajectories of neoliberalism in higher education. Conclusions This study offers other constructs for accelerating leadership success in higher education. This relates to how change leadership can navigate changes resulting from neoliberal ideology.

Evaluating our “impact”: reflections from the personal learning advice service

The neoliberalisation of higher education in the UK has placed greater pressure on Learning Development units to demonstrate impact. Together with increased regulatory scrutiny from bodies such as the Office for Students in England (and the monitoring of B3 thresholds, awarding gaps, the Teaching Excellence Framework, and other measures), rigorous evaluation is arguably more crucial than ever. In this workshop, we offered reflections and learning from the evaluation of the four-year Personal Learning Advice Service pilot at the Open University (UK). The Personal Learning Advice (PLA) Service project is an Access and Participation Plan initiative which has delivered a one-to-one and group coaching and mentoring service (Clay et al., 2023) for students from disadvantaged backgrounds since January 2021 (Lochtie and Hillman, 2023). Coaching and mentoring approaches have been used by our team to support students’ learning and study habits, wellbeing, and help-seeking behaviours (Hillman et al., in press). In the first part of this workshop, we shared learning from approaches used to evaluate the work of the service – from narrative and empirical evidence to causal evaluation in randomised controlled trials (TASO, 2022) – and situated this in the wider literature on evaluation in HE (Sabri, 2023). We shared findings from our work and reflected on the standards of evidence in HE (OfS, 2019). In the second part of the workshop, we invited delegates to consider how they measure and evaluate impact in their own context. We also explored relevant LD scholarship and publications. Our presentation aligned with the ALDcon24 theme ‘Building Learning Development for the Future’, and we sought to invite discussion about the way we demonstrate ‘impact’ as Learning Developers.

Neoliberalism in South African higher education language policy: A decolonial perspective

The global spread and hegemony of English as a medium of teaching, learning and research has come to be closely associated with neoliberalisation of higher education in the universities across the world, and has negatively impacted on epistemic issues, especially in Global South universities. No permanent solution has been found on challenges of English hegemony, particularly in African higher education. This article adds to the advancement of neoliberal discourse in higher education in South Africa by analysing neoliberal manifestations in its higher education language policy agenda. The article used desktop analysis to assess relevant literature on mainstream neoliberal ideologies and manifestations in the language policy reform post-apartheid. Drawing on relevant literature and through critical discourse analysis, it integrated evidence from the selected sources associated with mainstream neoliberal ideologies and then analysed the neoliberal manifestations in the language policy reforms pursued in South African post-apartheid context to bring out how the neoliberal actors in the higher education sector have reconfigured neoliberal principles. The decolonial perspective premised on concepts such as coloniality of being, power and knowledge was used to critique the neoliberal manifestations in South African higher education language policy directives. The paper presents the argument that universities in the country are deeply entrenched in linguistic hierarchisation which perpetuates epistemic injustices in teaching and learning. The African higher education should endeavour to underpin its language policies in indigenous knowledge systems to help harness the African content while existing in a global space where all knowledges should be regarded as equally relevant.Contribution: This article contributes to the emerging discourse of neoliberalism in higher education in the Global South and its impact on language policy formulation and implementation.

Revaluing and devaluing higher education beyond neoliberalism: Elitist, productivist, and populist policy and rhetoric in a field of conflict

The transformation of higher education provision by neoliberal values has been well documented. However, recent criticisms and even attacks upon higher education indicate a new politics extending beyond neoliberalism. This article draws on the sociology of conventions to unpick the distinctions at work in these new criticisms of universities. By distinguishing between values based in the market world, industrial world and civic world, we elaborate the political basis of recent value controversies around higher education (HE), reflected in policy and rhetoric. Looking to reject aspects of the neoliberal HE model, some critics have sought to revalue higher education upon productivist values, attacking universities for failing to generate ‘use’ value for students and society. Populist actors have launched stronger criticisms, aiming to revalue higher education on nationalistic and traditional values. This has generated the devaluation of higher education in national public spheres. As higher education has expanded globally, this new politics emerges from conflicts within and between conservative and liberal elites. Trends in Hungary and Brazil indicate the successes and failures of populist attacks on universities. Trends in the United Kingdom and Australia reflect productivist revaluations of market-based HE. Elite revaluation and devaluation is producing an emerging new global politics of HE.

Unpacking the discourse surrounding the impact agenda in the Hong Kong Research Assessment Exercise 2020

Abstract Research with economic utility and social value has been increasingly valued. Such an emphasis can be evidenced by the newly included assessment element of ‘societal impact’ in performance-based research funding (PBRF) schemes in different higher education systems around the world. This paper investigates how the non-academic impact is constructed and perceived in the Hong Kong Research Assessment Exercise (RAE) 2020, taking into account the local socio-cultural characteristics in the context of Hong Kong. Data sources include 13 impact case studies in the education panel submitted for the Hong Kong RAE 2020 and semi-structured interview with 17 education academics in Hong Kong. Findings revealed that the non-academic impact was constructed through a narrative pattern: (1) problem identification: tensions and synergies between local and international discourse; (2) problem resolution: prioritization of the evidence-based applied education research (with funding); (3) resolution dissemination: strategic employment of promotional genre. The paper discusses how decolonization, academic entrepreneurialism and collectivist culture have characterized the framing and understanding of the non-academic impact in the Hong Kong academia, contributing to the discourse on neoliberalism in higher education by providing a nuanced, local perspective on the impact agenda. Policy implications for a more localized and flexible impact agenda are also provided.

Bibliometric Coloniality in South Africa: Critical Review of the Indexes of Accredited Journals

Bibliometric coloniality refers to the system of domination of global academic publishing by bibliometric indexes based in the Global North, which serve as gatekeepers of academic relevance, credibility, and quality. These indexes are dominated by journals from Europe and North America. Due to bibliometric coloniality, scholarly platforms and academic research from the African continent and much of the Global South are largely invisible on the global stage. In this article, we analyse the geographic coverage of five international indexes that are part of the Department of Higher Education and Training’s (DHET) lists of accredited journals in South Africa, and unpack systemic and structural factors behind the DHET’s choices. Our analysis shows that the DHET’s lists of accredited journals propagate and value academic journals based in the Global North as credible platforms for dissemination of knowledge, while erasing the African continent and Global South. This way, the DHET is directly reinforcing global bibliometric coloniality and contributing to the maintenance of Euro-American epistemic hegemony. We argue that South Africa, as Africa’s top producer of scholarly output, should lead the process of dismantling bibliometric coloniality and promoting African knowledge platforms. Working closely with other African countries and the African Union on the creation of an African scholarly index would be the first step in this process. However, neoliberalisation of higher education and the lack of political will to tackle coloniality of knowledge are preventing this from happening.

The Pandemic Classroom and Supportive Relationships: Antidote to Neoliberalism in Higher Education? 2023 Hans O. Mauksch Address for Distinguished Contributions to Undergraduate Teaching

Research reviewed here reinforces earlier findings about the importance to higher education students of having supportive faculty. A 2022 faculty survey at a public Midwestern university demonstrates faculty awareness of student struggles during the pandemic coupled with a changing, more flexible and caring pedagogy to address student needs. Qualitative interviews in 2023 with students in the “pandemic cohort” suggest a desire for classrooms and student-faculty relationships that are at odds with the bureaucratic model of impersonality, rules and regulations, specialization, and a hierarchy of authority. What may be emerging from the pandemic is a kind of antidote to neoliberalism with an other-regarding rather than individualistic focus and a desire for connection rather than competition. Recommendations, implied by these data, for building these classrooms and supportive relationships and a discussion of the downsides of the “new normal” are presented.

How Does Neoliberalism Influence the Growing Trend of Higher Education?

With the election of Thatcher's Conservative government, the U.K. embarked on a reform of higher education that introduced the core idea of neoliberalism. The ensuing knowledge economy, university rankings, and the prevalence of accountability are all changes brought about by neoliberalism in higher education in the U.K. This study seeks to argue that while neoliberalism has brought some benefits to U.K. higher education, there are additional problems that cannot be ignored. These include the potential inability of graduates from disadvantaged backgrounds to access the career opportunities they desire, the claim of disempowerment by academics, and the disadvantaged status of humanities.

Internationalising research in a neoliberal climate: maintaining integrity in developing and executing funded comparative research

ABSTRACT This study contributes to the debate on the impact of internationalising research in the neoliberal climate, through the case of a multinational project funded through competitive bidding. While neoliberalisation of higher education has been explored from multiple perspectives, the impact around competitive research funding as a performativity measure has not received due attention, in particular concerning international collaboration. Research supported by competitive funding is often managed through rigid measures combining narrow success criteria and tight accountability. This paper discusses the challenges in developing and executing an international project in this context, as encountered by a multinational research team. Analysing the team’s reflective writing and written conversations spanning over three years, we illustrate how the team managed to engage in genuine knowledge-building and collaboration, which the global neoliberal research governance system inadvertently undermines. The paper concludes with some recommendations to redress such unintended consequences and effects.

Explicating collegiality and change management in neoliberalism during the dynamics of higher education institutions

Background This paper discusses the lack of references that comprehensively describe the changes in universities owing to the ideology of neoliberalism. This research also discusses how a university maintains its function and identity when the great wave of neoliberalism massively erodes collegiality as the original philosophy of the university through a case study of the neoliberalism ideology on higher education. This study also provides a comprehensive framework for higher education management and governance changes. Methods We selected all retrieved sources based on the keywords and analyzed all the documents we obtained. This study obtained data from Scopus retrieved on October 27, 2023, using the following keywords: (TITLE-ABS-KEY ("collegiality") OR TITLE-ABS-KEY ("change management") OR TITLE-ABS-KEY ("neolibelism")) AND TITLE-ABS-KEY ("higher education"). This study utilized bibliometric analysis to ensure a structured review of the literature on collegiality, change management, and neoliberalism in higher education. Results The findings show that organizational management, leadership, education, technology, curriculum, innovation, organizational change, decision-making, and human beings are significant trajectories of neoliberalism in higher education. Conclusions This study offers other constructs for accelerating leadership success in higher education. This relates to how change leadership can navigate changes resulting from neoliberal ideology.

The Neoliberalisation of higher education: examining the 2021 higher education transformation in Greece

ABSTRACT This paper examines the 2021 higher education reform in Greece through the lens of neoliberalism. It examines how its basic provisions align with the neoliberal spirit and how this is defended through language. The paper also argues that this law confirms the role of the Greek state as a neoliberal, interventionist state in favour of specific interests. On this purpose, two basic parameters of neoliberalism are explored, the process of commercialisation of education and the process of exclusion from education, and the role of violence within neoliberalism. Finally, it imagines the possible outcomes of this law for Greek higher education.

Standing ‘in’ and ‘out’ from the Crowd in a Small Genre: Proximity and Positioning in Applied Linguists’ Email Signatures

Abstract Neoliberal demands in higher education (HE) amplified by the affordances of digitalisation have led to the emergence of various academic branding practices, one of which is the use of email signatures for identity work and self-promotion. Examining a corpus of 200 email signatures created by applied linguists between 2011 and 2020, this study identifies core and optional moves and how the moves orient to proximity (scholarly communities) and positioning (reputational work). The quantitative analysis of the dataset supported by semi-structured interviews with a group of academics shows that while core moves provide basic identity information, optional moves are used strategically for positioning. A comparison by career stage reveals that mid-career academics utilize more positioning than early-career and established academics. The positioning moves in the second half of the decade draw more on academic achievements, multimodality, and digital presence. The study contributes to an enhanced understanding of how a small and originally inconspicuous genre becomes a space for academic branding and evaluates this development against the increasingly competitive and precarious conditions of the neoliberal HE sector.

Co-constructing new ways of working: relationality and care in post-pandemic academia

ABSTRACT In this article, we write collectively, using an autoethnographic approach to problematize the pervasive neoliberal performance culture in Higher Education (HE). While exploring the challenges many of us faced during the pandemic under neoliberal HE demands, we critique conventional notions of the ideal worker manifest in neoliberal discourses of performance and excellence. We explore the potential for academics and academia at large for critical engagement with self-care and caring for/with others. By adopting a relational approach rooted in an ethics of care, this study contributes to reconfiguring HE cultures of ‘excellence’, pointing to how care and relationality at work might allow academics to change the discourse of academic value and practices. Our collective reflection observes that practicing care individually and collectively in everyday academic work may be a powerful force for community growth and change.

Book review: Liz Morrish and Helen Sauntson, Academic Irregularities: Language and Neoliberalism in Higher Education

Book review: Liz Morrish and Helen Sauntson, <i>Academic Irregularities: Language and Neoliberalism in Higher Education</i>

Voices of English education department teachers on traces of neoliberal ideology in the ‘Kampus Merdeka’ concept

&lt;span lang="EN-US"&gt;Neoliberal ideology’s influence on higher education has been a concern for researchers on a global scale. Indonesian researchers have also examined the practice of neoliberalism in higher education. However, they only focused on the managerial dimension and there is a dearth of literature on the influence of neoliberalism ideology on educational policy. This study intends to close a gap in earlier studies by investigating the ideological remnants of Neoliberalism in the notion of ‘Kampus Merdeka’ or Emancipated Learning as perceived by 12 lecturers at English Education Department in Yogyakarta. This study employed a qualitative approach through the use of semi-structured interviews. The study found that university and departmental missions were aligned with industry demands; the curriculum was driven by industry; the teaching and learning process was determined by the market; the Tridharma of Higher Education was extended to industry; little emphasis was placed on moral and religious values; curriculum “vocationalization” was emphasized; collaboration with industry was focused; academic commodification and consumerism increased; and academic commodification and consumerism accelerated. The findings added to a new existing theme, that is increased collaboration with industry. Moral and religious values must be incorporated into the curriculum, as they are absent in ‘Kampus Merdeka’ paradigm.&lt;/span&gt;

Rationalization and Marketization: A Look at the Debate on Neoliberalism in Higher Education

This article tackles the ongoing debate surrounding the concept of neoliberalism and its application  within the realm of higher education studies. It contends that a sociological perspective can provide valuable tools to address this ambiguity and contribute to the process of conceptualization in this field. To achieve this, the article proposes a reinterpretation of the notion of neoliberalism in the context of higher education, drawing from insights derived from the sociological theory of Weber and Foucault.The article suggests, first, that the concepts of marketization and economic rationalization in higher education can help us better comprehend the transformation occurring within higher education systems. Using the case of Chile as an example, these concepts shed light on the privatization of the education system and the intensified  competition brought about by the 2018 reform. Notably, this reform paradoxically expanded the scope of State intervention while seeking to reduce the influence of market forces. Consequently, the notion of neoliberalism is positioned within a dynamic interplay between markets and the State, all under the influence of inherent dynamics of higher education.

Exploring Indonesian Higher Education Neoliberalization: A Discourse on the Role of Accounting

The neoliberalization of higher education has attracted academic debate and public interest. Though less known by the public, accounting terminologies play a prominent role in that process more particularly in sticking commercial values to the life of universities that eventually made universities far from their own original missions. Applying Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA), this study explores the neoliberalization of Indonesian higher education by questioning how it took place, what kind of linguistic terminologies or jargon are mostly used, and how accounting concepts, terminologies, and technologies take a role in it. This study found that accounting—through its concepts, jargon, and technologies—helped a lot in making the success of the neoliberalization of Indonesian higher education. Accounting notions like efficiency, productivity, effectiveness, accountability, transparency, and fairness take their cognitive and emotive roles in supporting highly competitive modes of academic life in universities so that the core of neoliberal ideology, that is competition, has been made to be more easily, scientifically, and psychologically justifiable for both individuals and society. Moreover, transactional and commercial motive-based behaviours as an impact of the more liberalized way of life, expand rapidly to become a standard way of acting both on and outside the campuses which accelerates the formation of a more individualistic and competitive Indonesian society. Bureaucratically, the university officials—from the lowest level such as the head of the department up to the Rectors—tend to be more sensitive to achieving a series of standardised, quantitative, technical, short-term, and pragmatic performance indicators dictated by national and international ranking agencies like Webometric than to deal with more ideal, educational, and long-term mission achievement.

Neoliberalization of higher education in China: A critical discourse analytical approach

Drawing on a transdisciplinary approach to critical discourse analysis, this paper looks at the case of Chinese higher education to explore how neoliberal ideology is constituted, recontextualized, and legitimated in the public discourse of Chinese universities in a socio-political context marked by the intricate integration of administration and politics. The analyses show how these universities have endeavored to respond to the economic imperatives of a globalizing knowledge-driven economy while strategically absorbing the socio-political governance agenda inherited from the state's institutional legacies. The findings suggest that the discourse of higher education in China is a highly contested space for competing ideologies, reproducing a narrative that facilitates the commodification of higher education and dismisses the contradictions between ideological values at the glonacal nexus.

The role of social enterprise in student employability: the case of SIDshare, a co-curricular student led social enterprise

ABSTRACT Within Geography, as in other disciplines, the neoliberalisation of Higher Education has led to an increasing curriculum focus on graduate attributes with student employability as an outcome. The multiple and competing discourses of employability that shape pedagogies can at times ignore social enterprise and enterprising skills that are too often neglected within geography curricula. In this contribution we draw on our experience working with SIDshare, a co-curricula student run social enterprise operating as an NGO (non-governmental organisation), to show how enterprising skills nurtured through student communities of practice have enhanced employability. Drawing on a series of semi-structured interviews undertaken with graduates who previously participated in SIDshare we analyse how their engagement contributed to graduate employment outcomes. SIDshare had increased not only the development of enterprising skills and entrepreneurialism but also encouraged the development of transferable, so-called “softer skills”. These included strong interpersonal skills, team skills and good working relationships as well as professionalism developed through participation in an extracurricular student community of practice alongside engagement with external partners. Effectual and causal reasoning skills were developed further encouraging entrepreneurialism. Graduate interviewees clearly demonstrated that their career success had been aided by their involvement in the co-curricular student led social enterprise, SIDshare.

The Crisis of Higher Education: Neoliberalism and the Privileging of "Innovation" in The Twenty-First Century.

The authors of this paper maintain that challenging the frame of “innovation” as a privileged keyword for higher education is a fresh and useful intervention in the conversation about the neoliberalization of higher education in the United States. Since our home institution, Purdue, is being celebrated by US News for “innovation,” the focus on the concept enables us to offer a Purdue lens on the topic. The authors argue that three high profile developments that have taken place since 2013 under the leadership of Purdue President Mitch Daniels—the University Honors College, the Cornerstone Integrated Liberal Arts Program, and Purdue Global—may also be regarded as “ideological innovations.” Alongside the laudable aspects of each of these developments, we argue that each serves the administration’s plan to decrease faculty power, especially in the humanities, by promoting initiatives that, in each case, increase the precariatization of instructional labor at Purdue and that move curriculum design and the hiring of teaching staff away from traditional academic departments and toward a more centralized model of educational control under the direction of high-level university administrators in and outside the College of Liberal Arts.