Junior faculty of color in the corporate university: implications of neoliberalism and neoconservatism on research, teaching and service

Abstract

In higher education today, an overwhelming acceptance of neoliberal and neoconservative ideologies that advance corporate logics of efficiency, competition and profit maximization is commonplace. Market-driven logics and neoconservative ideals shape decision-making about what is taught, how material is taught, who teaches, who does research, who belongs, what counts as valid research and, ultimately, the purposes of higher education. Against this backdrop, in this essay, I provide a critical analysis of the ways in which market-driven and neoconservative values shape the experiences of junior faculty of color in American research universities. That is to say, I am concerned with the ways in which neoliberal racialization structures the lives of junior faculty of color in the US academy. In my analysis, I reason that in order to substantively improve conditions for junior faculty of color, there is a need for those concerned with change to fine-tune understandings of the US academy – its history and new re-alignment with the market, neoconservative ideals and corporate values – identifying in the process the non-benign impact of the corporate university on scholarship and teaching, working conditions and visions for social justice and equity.

Keywords:

• racialization
• neoliberalism
• neoconservatism
• higher education
• USA
• faculty
• social change
• social exclusion
• commericialization
• educational policy

Notes

1.I use ‘we’ to include myself among critical educationists in the US academy concerned with the impact of neoliberalism and neoconservatism on higher education.