ABSTRACT
What I was and what Higher Education (HE) was when I got my first job at the University of Sussex in 1975 is very different to what I am and what HE is now. That is in many ways obvious, but the extent of change, the nature of change and the modalities of change that make up that difference have been dramatic, to say the least. We have changed and been changed together HE and I. I started work in an HE system that was relatively small and quite elite, fairly autonomous, a pleasure to teach in, and predominantly scholarly. Teaching at Sussex was innovative, adventurous, and experimental (see Malcolm Bradbury The History Man, 1975, Secker and Warburg). I now find myself in a very diverse and segmented mass system that recruits, or did, large numbers of overseas students, primarily to generate income rather than to educate. HE institutions are now businesses and growth trumps scholarship most of the time. Institutions are ‘managed’ by specialist ‘leaders’ and spaces of democratic decision-making and opportunities for dissent have been minimised or erased entirely. Then almost all academics were employed full-time. Now:
More than a third of all UK academics work part-time, while fixed-term contracts are also the norm. The effect of job insecurity goes well beyond those on fixed-term and part-time contracts. It affects everyone's sense of security and puts subtle pressure on the extent to which academics feel they can afford to be independent. Sustaining a disinterested attitude to the results of your own research is tougher when the ‘successful’ outcome of a research project, and publications confirming this, are essential to keeping your job.
(Macfarlane, 2012: https://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/features/im-an-academic-and-i-want-to-be-proud-of-it/421337.article)