Global Neoliberalism as a Cultural Order and Its Expansive Educational Effects

International Journal of Sociology · 2022 · 54 citations

• Sociology
• Social Science
• Sociology

The global neoliberal era has sparked a burgeoning literature. Most accounts emphasize the political economy of the period, focusing on global markets and privatization. By contrast, we conceptualize neoliberalism as a broad cultural ideology that has reshaped how we think about people and institutions in all arenas of life, not just the economy. We delineate three main assumptions of neoliberalism as a cultural model. First, neoliberal ideology re-envisions society as consisting not of structures but of individual human persons who are attributed immense agency, entitlement, and rationality. Second, the neoliberal model redefines natural and social contexts in a manner that supports such imagined human actorhood, depicting them in terms of abstract rationalistic principles that apply universally. A third assumption, building on the previous two, is that progress is seen as emerging from universalized and abstracted human knowledge, rather than, for instance, from the material capacities of the state. Altogether, these assumptions amount to a dramatic cultural shift with broad consequences that include, but stretch far beyond, free markets. We illustrate these consequences by considering their expansive effects on education, drawing on existing studies and descriptive data. Overall, we expand sociological understandings of the cultural dimensions of neoliberalism.

Hyper-Management: Neoliberal Expansions of Purpose and Leadership

Organization Theory · 2021 · 50 citations

• Sociology
• Political Science
• Sociology

Recent decades have witnessed a discursive expansion of calls for abstract and charismatic management beyond the systematic administration of concrete settings—hyper-management. A first dimension of hyper-management is the lionization of individuals and organizations as empowered purposive actors, embodied in celebrations of vision, innovation, and entrepreneurship. A second dimension is the intended unification of empowered internal and external actors and their diverse purposes, manifest in calls for leadership qualities beyond formal authority such as communication, collaboration, and inspiration. The changes are broad and cultural, cutting across countries and social sectors, and are often decoupled from realistic practice. Thus they are better accounted for by a neo-institutional perspective than by theories emphasizing particular functions and interests. Hyper-management is generated by a culture of global neoliberalism and the ideologies of empowered individual and organizational actorhood that flow from it. During the global hegemony of neoliberal culture, hyper-management has become institutionalized in contemporary education programs, consulting arrangements, and exaggerated managerial status and income. But, given its cultural bases, current and future resistance to neoliberal globalization may undercut it.

The University and the Global Knowledge Society

Princeton University Press eBooks · 2020 · 50 citations

• Political Science
• Sociology
• Political Science

The university is experiencing an unprecedented level of success today, as more universities in more countries educate more students in more fields. At the same time, the university has become central to a knowledge society based on the belief that everyone can, through higher education, access universal truths and apply them in the name of progress. This book traces the university's rise over the past hundred years to become the cultural linchpin of contemporary society, revealing how the so-called ivory tower has become profoundly interlinked with almost every area of human endeavor. The book describes how, as the university expanded, student and faculty bodies became larger, more diverse, and more empowered to turn knowledge into action. Their contributions to society underscored the public importance of scholarship, and as the cultural authority of universities grew they increased the scope of their research and teaching interests. As a result, the university has become the bedrock of today's information-based society, an institution that is now implicated in the solution to every conceivable problem. But, as the book also shows, the conditions that helped spur the university's recent ascendance are not immutable: eruptions of nationalism, authoritarianism, and illiberalism undercut the university's universalistic and rationalistic premises, and may threaten the centrality of the university itself.