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Public good
Academics argue against corporatisation and push for a return to tradition .
By Wade Zaglas
More than 1200 members of
Australia ’ s academic community have signed an open letter to state and federal education ministers to overturn what they see as a current corporate model of university governance and return it to its traditional roots .
Three Southern Cross University academics , Alessandro Pelizzon , Martin Young and Renaud Joannes-Boyau , penned the letter , concerned the Australian higher education sector is heading for an irrevocable crisis .
In an article the trio authored for The Conversation , they wrote that “ large-scale redundancies are announced almost daily , with estimates of up to 21,000 jobs at risk this year alone ”.
Just as problematic is financial modelling conducted by the University of Melbourne which found that “ prospects for the even the richest universities are bleak , while poorer universities face a veritable existential crisis ”. The article also states that the impact of job losses at regional universities will be even more significant , given the critical contribution they make to their local economies .
But can we just write these bleak statistics off as a consequence of the COVID-19 pandemic ? Well , according to the authors of the article and the 1200 academics who have signed the letter to “ return to a more democratic , cost-effective and functional structure for Australia ’ s universities ”, the answer is a resounding ‘ no ’.
THE RISE OF THE CORPORATE UNIVERSITY
Instead of COVID-19 , the authors assert that the financial problems facing Australian universities now are the product of a “ profound transformation over the last few decades ” that has resulted in universities that “ mirror the hierarchical corporate structures of the commercial sector ”.
Pelizzon , a senior lecturer at Southern Cross University , attests to witnessing this corporate shift in Australian universities some fifteen years ago . In stark contrast to Italy ( where he completed his first degrees ), and what he learnt from his conversations with colleagues who had been trained in many different countries , he realised that the Australian model of higher education was distinctly hierarchical and corporatised .
“ It emerged that the Australian model was significantly more hierarchical , and more oriented toward a commercial corporate narrative than what we were all used to in the rest of the world ,” Pelizzon told Campus Review .
“ Over the past 10 years , I have definitely sensed an intensification of this model , with increasing recourse to marketbased justifications for any strategic decisions made both within individual faculties and at a wider university level . Decisions have been increasingly centralised in the hands of a few , with little ( if any ) input from the rest of the collegium ,” he said .
“ Furthermore , decisions have been increasingly made without any transparency , and every conversation , every decision , every strategy appears to be under a cone of silence protected by confidentiality clauses ( be they legitimate or not ).
“ It ’ s not what universities are intended to be by law , nor what they are in the vast majority of the world ’ s countries . Rather , this shift is simply the result of habits . And now , the current COVID crisis has revealed , these habits have proven to be utterly unprepared to deal with a sudden crisis .”
This , the authors of the article remind their readers , bears no resemblance to the tradition of public universities for the public good in Australia .
“ Public Australian universities are created by legislation which enables them as statutory bodies with delegated legislative powers , similar to local councils ,” the academics told The Conversation .
“ Universities are not commercial corporations ; councils are not boards of directors . Vice-chancellors are not CEOs and students are not customers .”
THE IMPACT OF THE SHIFT TO THE COMMERCIAL CORPORATE MODEL
The article ’ s authors contend that Australia ’ s transition to a commercial corporate paradigm of higher education has weakened the very tradition referred to above . For instance , they allege the new model has seen intense competition between institutions , “ aggressive student recruitment ”, plump marketing budgets and increasing demands on staff productivity .
Regrettably , it has also brought about a casualisation of the higher education workforce ( particularly tutors ), “ increasingly autocratic councils ” and a cohort of very well paid senior and executive managers .
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