Audit Culture and Academic Production: Re-Shaping Australian Social Science Research Output (1993–2013) (original) (raw)

The Kafkaesque Pursuit of ‘World Class’: Audit Culture and the Reputational Arms Race in Academia

2020

Since the 1980s universities have been subjected to a seemingly continuous process of policy reforms designed to make them more economical, efficient and effective, according to yardsticks defined by governments and university managers. The pursuit of ‘excellence’, ‘international standing’ and ‘world class’ status have become key drivers of what Hazelkorn (High Educ Pol 21(2):193–215, 2008) has termed the ‘rankings arms race’ that now dominates the world of academia. These policies are changing the mission and meaning of the public university and, more profoundly, the culture of academia itself. While some authors have sought to capture and analyse these trends in terms of ‘academic capitalism’ and the ‘enterprise university model’, we suggest they might also be usefully understood theoretically as illustrations of the rise of audit culture in higher education and its effects. Drawing on ethnographic examples from the UK, Denmark and New Zealand, we ask: how are higher education ins...

2016. Globalisation and new developments in global university rankings

Globalisation and Higher Education Reform

In the past two decades, higher education has been going through a dramatic change, in large part to meet the dramatic challenge of globalization. A number of theoretical orientations have been devised to explain some of these changes, including intriguing labels such as Academic Capitalism and McDonaldization. These orientations usually give excessive attention to the market as the impetus for driving institutional reform, and the greatest indicator of this change is the growing importance of global university rankings. However, scholars, politicians, and pundits have also generated widespread criticism to rankings, and in response to that criticism, alternative ranking systems have begun to be formulated. This paper explores the growing criticism to established global university rankings and the criteria developed for alternative ranking systems, including the European Commission rankings, the Higher Education Evaluation and Accreditation Council of Taiwan (HEEACT) rankings, and the Webometrics Ranking of World Universities. We ultimately ask whether these new ranking systems are improving the process or adding to the negative attention to rankings.

Mis-measuring our universities: why global university rankings don't add up

2021

Draws parallels between the problematic use of GDP to evaluate economic success with the use of global university rankings to evaluate university success. Inspired by Kate Raworth’s Doughnut Economics, this perspective argues that the pursuit of growth as measured by such indicators creates universities that ‘grow’ up the rankings rather than those which ‘thrive’ or ‘mature’. Such growth creates academic wealth divides within and between countries, despite the direction of growth as inspired by the rankings not truly reflecting universities’ critical purpose or contribution. Highlights the incompatibility between universities’ alignment with socially responsible practices and continued engagement with socially irresponsible ranking practices. Proposes four possible ways of engendering change in the university rankings space. Concludes by calling on leaders of ‘world-leading’ universities to join together to ‘lead the world’ in challenging global university rankings, and to set their...