ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the wider economic and social forces at play globally and locally within Australian universities that shape access to higher education for international students. It describes the Learning Centre and its offerings to students, the position of international students in the university, and goes on to consider aspects of the space between research and practice that people daily navigate. Higher education is described as a competitive marketplace; English as a highly desirable commodity in this buyer's marketplace; international students as lucrative consumers; and universities as entrepreneurial sites offering access to this good. The chapter explores what neoliberalism is, and how it has reshaped/is still reshaping the university. It discusses the understanding of what neoliberalism is and then, more specifically, considers how the forces of neoliberalism are reshaping universities. Neoliberalism does not like organized labor; trade unions are seen as antithetical to the functioning of the free market: hence in part the rise of outsourcing in organizations.
