The contradictory managerialism of university quality assurance |
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Authors: | Ian C Reid |
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Institution: | 1. Centre for Studies in Literacy, Policy and Learning Cultures , University of South Australia , GPO Box 2471, Adelaide, South Australia 5001, Australia iancreid@internode.on.net |
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Abstract: | This paper investigates how Australian universities are being disciplined to behave as commercial enterprises by the Australian Universities Quality Agency (AUQA). The manual produced by AUQA, for the purpose of conducting audits of Australian universities, is analysed. I use an analytical framework that provides a means by which a text from the ‘manual’ genre can be analysed with respect to social and political contexts, using Critical Discourse Analysis. I analyse changes in the language used in subsequent editions of the manual, drawing inferences about how the AUQA manual constructs universities to behave as particular kinds of business entities. Depictions of the globalised and virtualised university are silenced in the texts. Contrary to the rhetoric of the university being a flexible, globalised enterprise, I find that universities are constructed as localised businesses appearing to be independent of direct government control but nevertheless constrained in the scope of their operation. |
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Keywords: | quality assurance Critical Discourse Analysis higher education |
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