Neoliberal university governance subordinates academic freedom to institutional transactions

Evidence

In December 2013, the regents of the University of Kansas waged a direct assault on academic freedom, allowing the “CEO” of a state university to “suspend, dismiss or terminate from employment any faculty or staff member who makes improper use of social media.” “Improper use” includes speech that “interferes with the regular operation of the university, or otherwise adversely affects the university’s ability to efficiently provide services,” or “is contrary to the best interests of the University.” The justification of such radical curtailment of academic freedom was to protect transactions and relations between the university and state legislators. — Wendy Brown, Undoing the Demos, 663

Categorization

• XREF: Direct example of the larger thesis that economized rationality colonizes non-economic spheres, including academic freedom; connects to the book’s central argument about neoliberalism as political rationality. — connects to: Economists embedded their university vision in administrative structures that outlive them. — Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste, 2132; Industry groups rent university prestige to launder paid advocacy as academic scholarship — Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste, 573; University restructuring locked in economists’ institutional shelter from accountability — Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste, 589 (+9 more)

Broader Connections

• Neoliberal governance reshapes scholarship to serve economic usefulness #expands (0.85) — Wendy Brown, Undoing the Demos, 626
• Neoliberal freedom can be a vehicle for governance and domination #complicates (0.75) — Wendy Brown, Undoing the Demos, 153
• Tenure-track conformity to power precedes and explains academic quietism #qualifies (0.72) — Hamid Dabashi, Brown Skin, White Masks, 325
• Neoliberal-corporate relations defy both independence and instrumentality framings #complicates (0.72) — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin, 31