A Shift Towards Academic Capitalism in Finland

Abstract

In this special issue, the first article provides a retrospective look at past articles published in this journal, the themes addressed by the authors, the authors' backgrounds and geographical distribution, and citations. The second article expands upon an earlier article, published in 2000, on hybrid-steering approaches in higher education. The third article takes a look back at a special issue published in 1995 and devoted to the future of universities. In the fourth article, the influence of organizational studies in higher education policy over the past 25 years is discussed. The fifth article reflects on past papers in this journal focusing on the external orientation of universities. In the final article, previously published papers on academic freedom and university autonomy are reviewed with the benefit of hindsight.At the University of Basque Country in Spain, interviews were held with students, academics, and administrators about the effects of globalization and internationalization on the university, the impact of English as the language of instruction, and perceptions of the university's multilingual language policy (English, Spanish, and Basque). The participants did not view globalization and internationalization as a new development but as a continuation of a trend. They valued English as a medium of instruction, but they worried about the threat English posed to linguistic diversity by forcing other foreign languages off the curriculum. Even so, the participants wanted to improve their English. (24 ref)-English Studies,

Explanatory accounts in international and comparative higher education research

“…Kauppinen and co-authors deployed mechanism-based approaches to comparative and international research to explain the rise of academic capitalism in Finland (Kauppinen & Kaidesoja, 2014) and the development of the European Research Area (Kauppinen, Cantwell, & Slaughter, 2017). In both examples, the outcome was assumed to be real (although the former is more subjective than the latter) in that they had happened.…”

Circulación y recepción de la teoría del “capitalismo académico” en América Latina

“…En esta dirección, se formulan variadas otras críticas a la teoría del AC como, por ejemplo, que se ocupa únicamente de la esfera del intercambio y no de la esfera de la producción y acumulación del capital, que en cualquier análisis del capitalismo deberían tener preferencia (Kauppinen & Kaidesoja, 2014); que no considera suficientemente los temas propios de la enseñanza, mientras presta excesiva atención a la investigación (Brunner et al, 2019); que pone un foco exagerado en la diversificación de las fuentes de ingresos pero no incorpora la existencia de proveedores privados con y, particularmente, sin fines de lucro (Jessop, 2017;Jungblut & Vukasovic, 2018); que incurre frecuentemente en confusiones terminológicas y un uso impreciso de conceptos claves (Deem, 2001;Mendoza, 2012); o que recurre a una variopinta fundamentación de su propia base teórica, invocando una mezcla de nombres de autores cuya relaciones conceptuales no se establecen sistemáticamente como Foucault, Mann y Castells (Slaughter & Rhoades, 2004). Por el contrario, algunos autores celebran este aparente pluralismo teórico; por ejemplo, se dice que Slaughter, Rhoades y Leslie "construyen el capitalismo académico con pensadores de Foucault a Marx, además de casi todos los más relevantes investigadores de la educación superior" (Maldonado-Maldonado, 2014, cap 11).…”

“…Segundo, un tratamiento dirigido singularmente al capitalismo académico de los países angloparlantes de altos ingresos, que por un tiempo operó como el paradigma del AC, postergando la incorporación de la perspectiva de varieties of capitalism (VoC) a ese enfoque (Jessop, 2017;Kaidesoja & Kauppinen, 2014). Desde una lectura de los márgenes, esa suerte de etnocentrismo teórico, que convierte en paradigmática una de las dos versiones del capitalismo de mercado reconocido por la teoría de VoC (Hall & Soskice, 2001), resulta completamente insuficiente.…”

Strategic choices of Finnish universities in the light of general strategy frameworks

“…examples of which include the definition of the third mission of universities to serve their larger societal environment, the implementation of a performance-related pay system, the implementation of a system for time management, and the adaptation of complex systems of quality control (Rinne, 2004;Kauppinen and Kaidesoja, 2014). A comprehensive change in the governance of universities took place following the new University Act of 2010, which extended their autonomous decision making and encouraged the recruitment of external actors, particularly from the corporate world, to their Boards of Directors.…”