Jan Currie – författare

Investigates the impact that certain globalizing practices have on European and American universities. Due to dwindling resources and the ideology of privatization, universities are becoming more corporatized and managerial. The authors investigate the consequences of these changes on the lives of academics and analyze how globalizing practices such as managerialism, accountability, and employment flexibility penetrate different universities.Globalization is a contested term. It exists in the form of an integrated world economy and global communication networks. Along with this material world, politicians have created a neoliberal ideology that exhorts nation states to open up their economies to free trade, reduce their public sector, and allow market forces to reshape their public agencies. In effect, this means a reduced role for government, lower taxes, and diminishing funds for public institutions like universities. The underlying thesis of this book is that globalization is not an inexorable force. All nations need to debate its consequences. The authors analyze how globalizing practices are penetrating universities. Are they creating a certain uniformity? Are academics adapting to or resisting particular globalizing practices?The premise at the beginning of the study was that European universities were responding differently to globalizing practices than Anglo-American universities. This premise was confirmed as some universities saw certain globalizing practices as inevitable and other universities resisted them. The authors asked academics and key managers how their funding had changed, and which accountability mechanisms their universities adopted. They also investigated the use of the Internet in their teaching. They found differences between European and American universities in their approach to permanent employment. The French and Norwegian universities were maintaining many of their traditional values and only the Dutch university showed some movement towards the globalizing practices, which American universities were more readily adopting.

In Academic Freedom in Hong Kong, Jan Currie, Carole J. Petersen, and Ka Ho Mok explore the unique situation in Hong Kong, a tiny jurisdiction in which there is active protection for the freedom of expression despite the close proximity and relationship with mainland China. Hong Kong scholars and intellectuals assume the responsibility of public critics, but this is not without an element of crisis. The authors draw upon interviews with academics and university administrators and examine two historical incidents that led to a strengthening of academic freedom, as well as the legal and political ramifications affecting the present and future. This book will interest East Asian scholars and academics in universities around the world where freedom of expression is threatened in this time of heightened security.