Transformations in Research, Higher Education and the Academic Market: The Breakdown of Scientific Thought

ISBN-13: 9789401784085 / Angielski / Miękka / 2015 / 222 str.

Sharon Rider; Ylva Hasselberg; Alexandra Waluszewski

Opis

This volume tackles head-on the controversy regarding the tensions between the principles underlying Academe on the one hand, and the free market on the other. Its outspoken thesis posits that seemingly irresistible institutional pressures are betraying a core principle of the Enlightenment: that the free pursuit of knowledge is of the highest value in its own right. As market principles are forced on universities, inducing a neoteric culture of managerialism, many worry that the very characteristics that made European higher education in particular such a success are being eroded and replaced by ideological opportunism and economic expediency.
Richly interdisciplinary, the anthology explores a wealth of issues such as the phenomenon of bibliometrics (linking an institution s success to the volume and visibility of publications produced). Many argue that the use of such indicators to measure scientific value is inimical to the time-consuming complexities of genuine truth-seeking. A number of the greatest discoveries and innovations in the history of science, such as Newton s laws of mechanics or the Mendelian laws of inheritance, might never have seen the light of day if today s system of determining and defining the form and content of science had dominated. With analytical perspectives from political science, economics, philosophy and media studies, the collection interrogates, for example, the doctrine of graduate employability that exerts such a powerful influence on course type and structure, especially on technical and professional training. In contrast, the liberal arts must choose between adaptation to the dictates of employability strategies or wither away as enrollments dwindle and resources evaporate. Research projects and aims have also become an area of controversy, with many governments now assessing the value of proposals in terms of assumed commercial benefits. The contributors argue that these changes, as well as reforms in the managerial and administrative structures in tertiary education, constitute a radical break with the previous ontology of science and scholarship: a change in its very character, and not merely its form. It shows that the scientific thinking students, researchers, and scholars are encouraged to adopt is undergoing a rapid shift in conceptual content, with significant consequences not only for science, but also for the society of which it is a part."

Spis treści

Contributors.- 1. Introduction; Ylva Hasselberg, Sharon Rider, Alexandra Waluszewski.- Part one: POLITICS AND POLICY.- 2. Power – knowledge – morals: Society in the age of hybrid research; Thorsten Nybom.- 3. Innovation and control: Performative research policy in Sweden; Sven Widmalm.- 4. The scientific mission and the freedom of research; Arne Jarrick.- Part two: ECONOMIC MODELS.- 5. Contemporary research and innovation policy: A double disservice?; Alexandra Waluszewski.- 6. The foundations of knowledge according to The knowledge foundation ; Mats Hyvönen.- 7. Science policy in a socially embedded economy; Magnus Eklund.- Part three: RESEARCH AND SCHOLARSHIP.- 8. Down the slippery-slope: The perils of the academic research industry; Li Bennich-Björkman.- 9. In defence of discretion; Ylva Hasselberg.- 10. Publish and perish: A note on a collapsing academic authorship; Inge-Bert Täljedal.- Part four: HIGHER EDUCATION.- 11. Methodomania; Michael Gustavsson.- 12. Higher heteronomy: Thinking through modern university education; Sharon Rider.- 13. The academic contract: From “simply a metaphor” to technology; Daniel Ankarloo and Torbjörn Friberg.- 14. Conclusion – On the verge of breakdown; Ylva Hasselberg, Sharon Rider, Alexandra Waluszewski.- References.- Index.