ABSTRACT
This chapter presents some closing thoughts on key concepts discussed in the preceding chapters of this book. A manifestation of the knowledge business is the orientation of research towards useful and applied programmes of work, increasingly through the context of contracts with government and business partners. The book includes the commodification of cultural products, such as learning and knowledge, as part of a broader degeneration of the intellectual content of the academy. The objective of knowledge business is to make higher education work better to serve the business community, while, simultaneously, turning the academy into a business to fulfil, Mandelsons dictate, for the universities to focus more on commercialising the fruits of their endeavour. The universities raison dtre is no longer to serve the public interest, broadly defined, but to interact with government and corporate programmes relating to the enhancement of economic competitiveness.
