Intertexts

Jeffrey R. Di Leo's Higher Education Under Late Capitalism: Identity, Conduct, and the Neoliberal Condition (Palgrave 2017) is the kind of read that lingers long after turning the last page. Di Leo's key points echo in multiple ways: in daily headlines in The Chronicle of Higher Education, in random conversations with faculty and fellow administrators, and in relationship to other recent books about contemporary academe such as Cathy Davidson's The New Education: How to Revolutionize the University to Prepare Students for a World in Flux (Basic Books 2017). While Davidson and others focus primarily on the need for pedagogical innovation, Di Leo takes a clear-eyed view of the academic workplace itself and finds it similarly lacking.

In Higher Education Under Late Capitalism, Di Leo examines different aspects of contemporary academe across nine chapters that range in topic from the academic workplace (a term Di Leo objects to in a later chapter, "Punch the Clock") to the impact of big data on academic decision-making. These chapters can be read as individual essays that examine the mostly detrimental effects of neoliberalism on various aspects of faculty life. Indeed, "Breaking Bad," the final chapter, appeared first as part of a collection on the popular television series of the same name. In this chapter, Walter White's progression from promising doctoral student to demoralized high school chemistry teacher to meth manufacturer extraordinaire is presented as a cautionary tale of the psychic costs of neoliberalism on the individual.

Di Leo opens Higher Education Under Late Capitalism with a refreshingly honest assertion in "The Two Austerities": Describing the sweeping changes in higher education as a "crisis" is disingenuous. We are more than a decade, for example, into widespread disinvestment in public higher education. The same goes for the rise of the assessment culture and increased focus on outcomes. These issues are no longer new or temporary. As Di Leo eloquently argues, wishful thinking that the fully funded and unfettered academe of the nostalgic past will be restored only delays the deep discussions that need to occur about the not-so-new status quo.

What do we need to discuss instead? Di Leo suggests focusing on neoliberal changes that affect the academic workplace in mostly negative ways: Austerity, transparency, happiness (or lack thereof), big data, and student debt.

Perhaps counterintuitively, in "Unlit Classrooms," Di Leo argues that transparency is not necessarily a positive. Indeed, he argues, the drive for transparency has given lawmakers and opinion leaders too much information that can be—and is being—used against higher education. Metrics used for formula-based models often lack important context. Here's an example: Is a 70 percent six-year graduation rate good or bad? It [End Page 158] depends (on the institution and its mission). Unfortunately, however, Di Leo asserts, neoliberalism's hammer often does not distinguish among proverbial nails. Context also doesn't often make for catchy headlines.

Even so, I struggled with Di Leo's argument in "Unlit Classrooms." No aspect of life is free of accountability. More often than not, the taxpayers who fund public higher education work in private sector jobs that include accountability measures and even time clocks. In that context, tenured and tenure-track faculty still enjoy tremendous freedom in the higher education workplace and are relatively free of the restrictions that govern even private sector professionals' work lives. We forget this distinction at our peril. If we're as good as we say we are (and I believe that we are), perhaps a better approach would be to redouble efforts to advocate for more meaningful and nuanced accountability measures to help us better serve our students and regions. I mean, in academe, we embrace rigorous peer review and that is an intellectual accountability system that doesn't appear to be going away anytime soon either.

Moreover, as an administrator, I fear that we haven't been transparent enough with faculty for shared governance to work...