Smash the system: British universities and the rise of market Stalinism

As a new generation of school leavers now consider their options on the basis of predicted A-levels and Highers, what kind of education can they expect to receive on locked-down campuses with remote teaching governed by social distancing? The sorry truth is that Britain’s universities were in a mess long before coronavirus. Rampant grade inflation, over-dependence on wealthy foreign students (as exposed by the pandemic), vice-chancellors paid more than the Prime Minister and glitzy new corporate-style campuses – all while staff wages and working conditions were screwed down. Universities tossed aside their claims to being centres of independent learning when university leaders and academics piled en masse into anti-Brexit campaigning. And they have repeatedly made themselves laughing stocks with their bans on speakers, fancy dress and proliferating speech codes.

One set of solutions mooted to these problems is to change the way universities are run. These changes are cast in the mould of modest reforms to the structure of incentives that confront university leaders in their commercial decision-making.