Learn to Consume, Teach to Account?
Anwar Tlili and Susan Wright
Abstract: The UK government’s 2004 law, aiming to make universities con- tribute to Britain’s success in the global knowledge economy, creates an explicit market in higher education. Students are presumed to occupy the sta- tus of consumer in an economic transaction with universities. The law gives students a right to information and an audit function so that their choices as ‘intelligent consumers’ will ‘drive change’ in universities. Interviews in two contrasting universities explore students’ responses to this discourse and reveal their different aspirations and concepts of education. Yet they share doubts that regimes of audit and notions of accountability to consumers will not make their voices really ‘count’.
The dominant subject position offered to an increasingly diverse provision’ (DfES students by the UK government’s White 2003: para. 4.2). Through exercising Paper, The Future of Higher Education (DfES choice, students are to be the drivers of 2003), is that of consumer. Indeed the doc- change in higher education. This article ument seems to take it for granted that will first analyse policy documents in students already occupy the status of con- order to ask where this discourse about sumers. The government first introduced students as consumers has come from, and a formal economic transaction between how it fits in with the Blair government’s students and universities in 1997 when image of ‘modern Britain’. Second, it will they made students pay £1,125 towards draw on empirical research to ask how their university fees each year. The 2003 students at different kinds of universities White Paper and the 2004 Higher Educa- respond to this discourse.1 tion Act not only raise student fees but, more importantly, they introduce an explicit market in higher education for the Global Knowledge Economy first time. In 2006, universities are to pitch their fees for each course at between £0 Tony Blair’s 1997 election mantra ‘Educa- and £3,000 per annum according to how tion, education, education’ was a sign that they competitively rank themselves a thesis advanced by Robert Reich (1991), against similar courses, and how gradu- an academic who became US Secretary of ates from that course prosper in the Labor during President Clinton’s first employment market. The Act aims to term, was now influencing the British make universities more responsive to their Labour Party. Reich argues that the future market and accountable to their cus- lies in what others have called ‘the global tomers. It establishes students’ rights to knowledge economy’. His argument is information, their consumer rights, so that that, because of international competition, they can ‘become intelligent customers of US corporations have shifted from high-
Anthropology in Action, Volume 12, Issue 1 (2005): 64-77 © Berghahn Books and the Association for Anthropology in Action Learn to Consume, Teach to Account? | AiA volume production to making bespoke, dependent on the fate of flagship giant high-value products for individual cus- corporations. No longer is each national tomers. As witnessed by IBM’s recent sale economy in a separate boat competing in a of its home-computer manufacturing to a worldwide regatta (ibid: 5). The role of Chinese firm, producing computer hard- governments is no longer to control a ware in the US no longer has sufficient national economy. Instead, Reich suggests, value added; profits lie in designing soft- governments should act to increase the ware to meet a particular user’s needs. proportion of the population with tertiary This market requires corporations to be education who have the skills of abstrac- agile, to switch direction to seize new tion, system thinking, experimentation opportunities. Corporations cannot oper- and collaboration required of symbolic ate with vast resources, armies of disci- analysts (ibid: 229). This will ensure the plined workers and predictable routines. country can maintain its prosperity by Instead they need the flexibility of a small attracting a good share of the global, high- core and a network of short-term alliances income work. Then, he suggests, the gap with smaller businesses, subcontracts and between those involved in the global econ- joint ventures—partners who will share omy and those left behind should be risks and returns. bridged by the ‘quaint’ idea of progressive This network is global and, as described taxation (ibid: 245-247). Governments by Reich, it is peopled by horizontally should use taxation to invest in the educa- organised creative teams of symbolic ana- tion of the ‘left behind’ in order continual- lysts. Some team members develop new ly to increase the proportion of the nation- ideas and technologies while others iden- al population who can become symbolic tify problems in customers’ operating sys- analysts and sell their services worldwide. tems to which these solutions can be applied. In all, they manipulate symbols— British Government’s Version of the Global data, words, oral and visual representa- Knowledge Economy tions—using analytic tools to simplify reality into abstract images that can be The globalisation argument is an impor- ‘rearranged, juggled, experimented with, tant aspect of the discourse New Labour communicated to other specialists, and uses to legitimise and depoliticise its poli- then, eventually, transformed back into cy options and its politics, especially when reality’ (1991: 177, 178). Forming 20 per- cuts in public spending are at stake. The cent of US jobs in 1990 and rising (ibid: global knowledge economy argument 179), these are the people who can com- dovetails with New Labour’s pattern of pete in a global labour market. legitimising neoliberal policies by attribut- Reich identifies a danger that these indi- ing their necessity to the irreversible viduals and corporations, forming what demands and the pace of the global econ- he calls a ‘global web’, threaten the very omy that Britain has to keep up with. No foundations of national economies and wonder Reich’s argument was attractive polities. Globally oriented symbolic ana- to New Labour ministers. Echoing Reich, lysts are tempted to slip the bonds of David Blunkett as Secretary of State for national allegiance and leave the less for- Education and Employment said, in Feb- tunate behind, threatening the social cohe- ruary 2000, sion of nations. The economic well-being of a nation’s citizens is no longer shared, The powerhouses of the new global economy are innovation and ideas, creativity, skills and tied to a nation’s economic power, and knowledge. These are now the tools for suc- 65 AiA | Anwar Tlili and Susan Wright
cess and prosperity as much as natural The pace of both social and technological resources and physical labour power were in change means that (…) [t]his is truly an era of the past century. (Quoted in Wolf 2002: xi) lifelong learning. Today’s generation of stu- dents will need to return to learning—full- Charles Leadbetter, one-time policy advis- time or part-time—on more than one occasion er to Tony Blair and major author of the across their lifetime in order to refresh their knowledge, upgrade their skills and sustain Department of Trade and Industry’s 1998 their employability. Such independent learn- White Paper ‘Building the Knowledge ers investing in the continuous improvement Driven Economy’, expands on the idea of their skills will underpin innovation and and the imagery: enterprise in the economy and society (DfES 2003: para. 1.24). The generation, application and exploitation of knowledge is [sic] driving modern econom- The citizen, as lifelong learner, has to con- ic growth. Most of us make our money from tinually ‘invest’ in their learning, paying thin air: we produce nothing that can be for their tuition fees as a start, in order to weighed, touched or easily measured. Our ‘sustain their employability’ and survive output is not stockpiled at harbours, stored in warehouses or shipped in railway cars … That in an ever more ‘flexible’, more insecure should allow our economies, in principle at labour market. least, to … be organised around people and The British version of Reich’s thesis has the knowledge capital they produce. Our chil- developed a slightly different description dren will not have to toil in dark factories, descend into pits or suffocate in mills, to hew of the skills workers need in the new raw materials and turn them into manufac- knowledge economy. The labour force is to tured products. They will make their livings be flexible, that is, workers engage in through their creativity, ingenuity and imagi- short-term projects without job security nation (quoted in Wolf 2002: xii). and have to be able to keep switching The 2003 White Paper proceeds from this career track. Knowledge workers are vision: adaptable, they are both team players and able to work alone as self-starters. They Society is changing. Our economy is becom- should have ‘learned to learn’. This means ing ever more knowledge-based—we are that developments are happening so fast increasingly making our living through sell- ing high-value services, rather than physical that, according to government documents, goods. These trends demand a more highly- subject knowledge quickly becomes out- skilled workforce. (DfES 2003: para. 5.1) dated and irrelevant, and workers need to know how to find new knowledge. They The chattering classes who promote this are responsibilised: they know it is their ‘thin air’ thesis will presumably continue responsibility continually to update their to wear clothes and shoes, eat food and knowledge and skills throughout their life use other ‘physical goods’ produced and to invest in their own learning to stay through the toil of invisibilised workers in the labour market. Finally, they are exploited in other parts of the world. They incentivised through debt. The values and will also operate from offices cleaned by behaviour of a credit card consumer are the cheap labour of their own fellow citi- inculcated in young people, so that they zens, but unseen, in the hours of darkness. are prepared to get into debt to support The 2003 White Paper, still in a prophet- their life-long learning. ic, visionary tone, emphasises how eco- Government policy is to recruit univer- nomic growth depends on a shift to a ‘cul- sities into this project to create new kinds ture of lifelong learning’. of workers for the knowledge economy. Ever since the Thatcher government 66 Learn to Consume, Teach to Account? | AiA accused universities of having failed the citizen in new forms of governance. One economy (DES 1987), universities have of the roots of this idea in Britain is Mrs acquired ‘serving the economy’ as a major Thatcher’s famous statement ‘there is no function. But more recently, the govern- such thing as society. There are individual ment has inverted old Labour’s aim to men and women, and there are families’ moderate the economy in the interests of (Keay 1987). She tried to make unthink- society, and has declared that the purpose able the concept of society as a collective of universities is to change society to meet investment for mutual benefit, across gen- the needs of the knowledge economy: erations and through time—which is the way education as well as other social in- My central argument is that universities exist to enable the British economy and society to vestments used to be considered. Thatch- deal with the challenges posed by the increas- er’s image was of individuals, each pursu- ingly rapid process of global change. (Charles ing their own competitive advantage, in a Clarke [as Secretary of State for Education] space articulated through markets. The 2003) role of governments was to release indi- To achieve this, universities are to shift viduals from the trammels of the bureau- from an elite to a mass system and 50 per- cratic state to exercise their own freedom cent of people under thirty years are to within choices offered by the hidden hand. have been to university by 2010, according This image of the individual reappears to Tony Blair’s target. Mass university with new Labour in the guise of the life- education is an acceptance of Britain’s long learner in the learning society. As the well researched failure to organise high- Department of Education and Skills’ status technical and vocational education Green Paper ‘The Learning Age—Renais- (Wolf 2002). Whereas in countries such as sance for a New Britain’ makes clear, the Denmark only 29 percent of school leavers learning society is not just an economic go to university and a high proportion project. It is equally a political project of take a technical education as the route into nation building: ‘Our vision of the learn- a specific and well-regulated occupation, ing age is about more than employment. British school leavers are directed to The development of a culture of learning obtain a degree as the general requirement will help build a united society (DfES for entry into the labour market but with- 1998: Introduction [para. 8]). This echoes out specific skills or career prospects. Reich’s vision that society is likely to Mass university education also means a become more divided between those inte- very large part of the British population grated into the global web of the knowl- will be indebted and forced to display edge economy and those rumps of nation- inventiveness, ingenuity and flexibility to al labour forces left behind. There is a use their non vocational university widespread fear that once the world is no degrees to find employment. This ‘hidden longer organised in the form of national curriculum’ will instil them with some economies, nation-states will lose power characteristics of the new members of the and national governments will con- knowledge economy and learning society. sequently become less significant. The British government perceives a more immediate and tangible threat to come The Learning Society from the European Union. The European Commission has integrated this same dis- The lifelong learner is not just an econom- course about the learning society into its ic construct. It is also a discourse about the political project to build a transnational 67 AiA | Anwar Tlili and Susan Wright
state with what Shore calls a new demos Learning as an Industry (Shore 2000). Edith Cresson as Education Commissioner published a number of In the early forms of this argument, gov- papers on, for example, ‘Accomplishing ernment maintained that learning was Europe through Education and Training’ important for success in the new global and ‘Towards a Knowledge Based Europe’. knowledge economy. But now the argu- Martin Lawn (2003) argues that Cresson ment has come full circle. As education projected an image of ambitious individu- becomes not a collective investment als who are frustrated by the constraints reliant on taxation, but a positional good imposed by their own national education that responsible people pay for them- system and want to take responsibility for selves, continuing to do so through their their own learning. They want to choose lives, learning itself becomes a new, high- from a multiplicity of commercial and ly lucrative industry within the global state-funded providers of education, any- knowledge economy (Wright 2004). From where in Europe. These go-ahead, respon- the Dearing Report (1997) onwards, it has sible, flexible, mobile people would attract been argued that life-long learners should employers and global knowledge indus- be able to choose from a range of pro- tries with the result that they would create viders that, besides universities, includes an economically viable Europe. Such go- corporate universities (e.g. McDonald’s ahead life-long learners would have the Hamburger University), of which there shared values and common vision needed were fifteen in the early 1980s, four hun- to ‘deliver’ Europe. This will be a Europe, dred in the mid 1990s and two thousand in superseding the nation-state, whose locus 2002 (Taylor and Paton 2002: 4); work- would be in each individual citizen. The based training; specialised independent Blair government faithfully echoes this training organisations; distance learning discourse and rationale but tries to twist packages through CD-rom or the Internet; the go-ahead citizen/worker into the new and private e-universities like the Univer- occupant of modern Britain. It is as sity of Phoenix. The argument goes that, Britons, not as Europeans, that life-long for universities to succeed in this new learners are to generate new shared values environment, they should mimic the cor- which will unify society. These new citi- porations with which they will be compet- zens are to feel that it is the British gov- ing. They should resemble corporations ernment, not the European Commission, both in terms of their internal manage- that shares their values, loosens up the old ment, efficiency and productivity, and in rigidities of national educational institu- terms of their relations with their cus- tions, forges partnerships with commer- tomers. Universities should brand them- cial providers and creates the competitive selves (Johnson 2004) to attract customers environment that gives life-long learners to their educational product, as a life-style choice and quality in education provision. choice, just as Nike attracts customers to In this version, life-long learners will see its brand of training shoes. To succeed as a the national government, not the EU, as brand, universities will also have to deliv- the agent that enables them to fulfil their er value for money as judged by the con- ambitions. To whichever political project sumer. They should deliver what they the ‘learning society’ is harnessed, the life- promise in terms of learning outcomes long learner is an imaginary for both the and they should make their products com- new worker and the new citizen. mensurate across Europe, so that employ- ers can be confident of the nature and 68 Learn to Consume, Teach to Account? | AiA quality of the skills of workers wherever according students the status of adults, they were trained. financially independent of their parents The White Paper and the 2004 Higher (DfES 2003: para 7.45). These ‘adult’ con- Education Act develop further this image sumers are also expected to make sophisti- of the university as an industrial corpora- cated calculations about where and how tion by trying to shift power from the sup- much to invest in the higher education ply side (what academics think are the market. Should they pay higher fees for a important ingredients of a degree pro- more prestigious course in a high-ranking gramme and interesting intellectual devel- university, in order to get high returns in opments) to the demand side (what gov- terms of better job prospects? Or will peo- ernment thinks universities should be ple with a lower-class or ethnic-minority doing and what students are prepared to background reckon that social constraints pay for). The White Paper explicitly links make such aspirations unrealistic? Do government through its grants and stu- they minimise debt by paying lower fees dents through their fees as the two ‘princi- for a degree at their local inner-city new pal funders of higher education’ (DfES university and by living at home to min- 2003: para. 4.13, Tlili 2003). The White imise maintenance costs? Critics say the Paper presumes that the demands of stu- latter calculation results in ‘perverse dents and those of the knowledge-based access’: previously excluded people can economy are identical: now obtain a degree, but of such low pres- tige that it will not give them the social The economic case for expanding the provi- mobility, job opportunities or financial sion of higher education is extremely strong. But as we expand, we must not compromise benefits that ‘traditional’ students from on quality, and we must make sure that the middle-class backgrounds gain from courses and patterns of study on offer really attending an old university (Jary and match the needs of our economy, and the Thomas 1999). The government denies demands of students themselves. (DfES 2003: Chap. 5 summary). this and claims the market will increase opportunities, not further exacerbate Underlying this argument is a simple inequalities. economistic logic that students will The White Paper, further, gives con- demand what the knowledge-based econ- sumer choice an audit function and makes omy needs, and indeed dictates. Thus, the it the main mechanism to ‘drive up quali- happy side-effect of the universities’ posi- ty’. Both students’ choice of courses and tive response to the economy is the satis- their participation in evaluations, faction of student demand. designed to influence the next cohort’s Students are expected to think of their choices, are meant to reward quality and degree as a personal investment. Their punish low standards: fees and living costs mean students cur- rently leave university with a debt of £10- The Government believes that student choice will be an increasingly important driver of 20,000. They should expect a return on this teaching quality, as students choose the good- investment of 11-14 percent in higher earn- quality courses that will bring them respected ings during their lifetime—the so-called and valuable qualifications and give them the graduate premium.2 The White Paper says higher-level skills that they will need during their working life. But student choice can only that by not requiring students to pay at the drive quality up successfully if it is under- point of entry, and allowing them to take pinned by robust information—otherwise loans that they repay as a graduate tax reputations will be built on perception rather when they are earning, the government is than reality. And it must also be supported by 69 AiA | Anwar Tlili and Susan Wright
clear expectations about the standards that versity, fairly low in the league tables. In every university must meet, so that no student both we chose students from a range of has to put up with poor teaching (DfES 2003: para. 4.1) social-science subjects. We interviewed first-year students soon after their arrival The government accords students a num- at university to capture their fresh expec- ber of rights against the university, and tations and we asked final-year students especially the right to information needed to reflect on their experiences at the end of to exercise choice and become ‘intelligent their first degree. These interviews took customers’. Universities are to publish an place in 2003, after the publication of the annual guide to courses (to be overseen by White Paper. We designed a group inter- the National Union of Students), sum- view, lasting two hours. First, we sought maries of External Examiners’ reports on to find out how the new students had cho- each programme, and reports on students’ sen their degree course and whether this views about the courses they have taken. differed between the two universities. Sec- These measures are intended to make stu- ond, we explored the notion that students’ dents feel empowered as customers and ‘informed choice’ would drive up stan- investors, to whom universities, the pro- dards by asking about course evaluations viders, are accountable. Academic research- and the mechanisms and politics through ers, subject centres and polling companies which their views are represented in uni- are experimenting with methods for col- versity decision making. Third, we asked lecting information on students’ experi- about their learning experiences at univer- ences that both future students can use to sity, whether they accepted the notion of make their market choices of university being consumers of education, and how and institutions and government can inte- they thought it might influence their grate into managerial processes to ‘drive learning. We conducted two group inter- up quality’.3 Since the 1980s, many univer- views with a total of sixteen first-year stu- sities have administered ‘course evalua- dents at the old university and one group tion’ questionnaires which have been used interview with five first-year students at internally in departments’ termly reviews the new university. We conducted one of teaching, and in staff appraisals to iden- group interview with five final-year stu- tify any weaknesses in individual teach- dents at the new university, but were ers. Now these evaluations may achieve unable to assemble a group of final-year Ramsden’s (1991) full purpose as pub- students at the old university and con- lished performance indicators, comparing ducted twelve individual interviews, degree programmes. using the same schedule, instead. Though a limited sample, the data capture a wide range of opinions, motivations and contin- What Kind of Consumers? gencies that inform students’ experiences and already call into question many of the The White Paper presents a picture of ‘the premises found in government’s discours- student’ as if all students’ motivations, es and policies on higher education. ideas of choice, political voice and con- cepts of learning will be the same. To Motivation and Choice explore these issues, we chose two con- trasting universities for an empirical Whilst the White Paper speaks of the need study. The first is an old university, high in for universities’ to diversify their provi- the league tables. The second is a new uni- sion to meet the variety of students’ needs, 70 Learn to Consume, Teach to Account? | AiA this emphasis is undermined by a sweep- ing to an economic rationality but because ing generalisation that students’ economic it sounded interesting. Acquiring a sub- calculus overrides all other motivations stantial knowledge of a subject they knew and purposes for entering higher educa- little about at the start was a challenge and tion. The White Paper assumes that stu- self-fulfilling. Sometimes they embarked dents enter university in order to improve on a social-science degree knowing they their job prospects. There is no room for would not be particularly employable. students to have motivations other than an instrumental one—such as a thirst for I wanted to understand how and why people do things, how they think, why they group learning or interest in a subject. In con- together, why they don’t. Just a general trast, our interviews revealed several understanding of how society works. (…) I motivations for going to university. At the think I always knew that doing a sociology old university, the majority (all but three) degree wasn’t going to actually direct me in a specific career. (…) [It] sounds a sort of ideal were ‘traditional’ students, school-leavers romantic notion of the university; I just want- whose parents had been to university, who ed to develop my knowledge. came from middle-class backgrounds and whose schools had expected them to go on One student acted on her father’s advice: to university. Such students had not actu- He’s a managing director so he says that most ally made a choice about whether to con- businesses are looking at where you went to uni tinue the family tradition of going to uni- and whether you’ve got a degree or not, not versity, as one said ‘I didn’t really think what you’ve done, so I just chose something about it, it’s just a natural progression’ that I wanted to do and found interesting. between school and adulthood. Contrary Many accepted that their degree would to government discourse, going to univer- not make them employable and they sity was a way of putting off adulthood, would have to take further training, or when they would join the labour market. gain experience through voluntary work. University was a liminal stage where they In contrast, going to the new university used all the resources of social life and was a much more purposive, rational learning to fashion their own selves, live action. Many students came from the independently, establish their own style of labour market and, apart from the views of social interaction and network of friends, one international student, the notion of all of which will shape their trajectory in maturing through higher education as part the world afterwards. Their choice of uni- of a natural progression was completely versity was based first on the reputation of absent. Prominent in these non-traditional the city and its social life, and second on, students’ accounts was a definite decision not the league tables, but the hearsay pres- to go to university because they and their tige of the university, where they would parents believed it was the key to better meet interesting yet similar people. The employment prospects. Non-traditional choice of course was a third consideration: families have adopted the ethos of upward I think all the opportunities here and knowing mobility and told their children they would that I was going to meet loads of people was get nowhere without a degree: ‘Mum was actually the reason that I came to university. I always, like, you’ll get a better standard of didn’t know what I wanted to study. (…) I just picked a random degree because I knew I life, and I was thinking the same.’ wanted to come [here]. Not many had specifically chosen the town or the university. Some students’ Most of the traditional students at the old family commitments meant they had to university chose their course not accord- 71 AiA | Anwar Tlili and Susan Wright
study close to home, or they attended the tion. We explored two dimensions of this local university because it was more eco- in our interviews: student feedback and nomical. Others’ low grades limited their student involvement in departmental, choice of university. None chose the uni- school and university committees. At the versity because of the town’s ‘fun’ poten- end of each course, students are invited to tial. All had chosen their course for instru- fill in an evaluation form. The assumption mental reasons, to improve their position underlying this practice is that students’ in the labour market. They fitted more serious evaluation of teaching is worth readily the government’s construction of taking into account when designing and students as rational actors and investors in delivering courses. But the form resembles higher education. As one student put it, a customer satisfaction survey. At the old they were paying for higher education ser- university, first years did not take the vices and looked for ‘value for money’ in forms seriously: ‘just tick, tick, tick, tick return. By this they meant all degrees and I didn’t really think about it’. Some of should have a concrete, hands-on, voca- the third years spent time filling them in tional element that would give work expe- once their disciplinary identity had crys- rience and make them employable. tallised and they felt a commitment to the The results of our interviews in two con- teachers and the programme. The new trasting universities indicate that far from university was anxious to raise the student giving equal access to Blair’s meritocratic response rate before the next audit and Britain, the university has become a site of had refused to return students’ assign- social differentiation. This is clearly seen ments until they had completed the evalu- in the different motivations and expecta- ation form. This did nothing to allay stu- tions of the students. Traditional students dents’ suspicions that the course evalua- at the old university did not expect to be tion would not result in improvements. immediately employable after graduation, Students at both universities disliked but they chose a prestigious university the standard 1-to-5 ranking exercises that that gave them the social capital and net- make up the bulk of the form and thought works to fly high in the longer run. Non- it would be more useful to have questions traditional students at the new university seeking qualitative responses. Two stu- sought the qualification, skills and work dents felt the format of our group inter- experience that would give them immedi- view should be used for an open-ended ate access to a moderately improved posi- discussion with their tutor. In a way that tion in the local labour market. The two epitomised the contrast between their universities are sites for reproducing dif- stances on the student as consumer, the ferences in social class. This differentiation student from the old university saw such a is disguised in policy documents by treat- discussion as a means to engage students ing the student as a unitary category moti- in constructive debate about their learning vated by a uniform and purely economic while the one from the new university calculus and entitled to expect similar lev- said it would be a good sign that the uni- els of social and economic mobility as their versity had started ‘consumer research’. return on investing in a degree. Meanwhile, students from both universi- ties gained a strong impression from staff Political Actors that student feedback was not important. The forms were made available in the last The White Paper inscribes students as session of the course without time to fill active authors of change in higher educa- them in. Students did not know where the 72 Learn to Consume, Teach to Account? | AiA form goes or who looks at them, and only were students sitting on student-staff one student evaluation had resulted in committees in a department or school. much-appreciated follow-up and feed- There they could raise ‘gripes’ about back from staff. Amid the general feeling teaching and available facilities. At both of disempowerment, even the final-year universities, student representation was students in the old university who took perceived to be of hardly any consequence the evaluations seriously feared that they and they knew of no positive outcomes. were just computed into a general result The students’ union provided some train- and nobody read them. ing for representatives but the students The readiness of students from the new they represented had not been inducted university to step into the consumer’s into how they could make the system shoes was to a significant degree condi- work. Students were largely uninformed tioned by their dissatisfaction with their about the representative mechanisms and experience at their university. All students sometimes did not even know who their from the new university expressed a great representatives were. We encountered a deal of discontent, backed up by many feeling of disempowerment, insignificance concrete examples. They were disappoint- and anonymity within the university’s ed that courses were not designed to give structures that fostered a defeatist attitude them the opportunities for employment towards the university and a ‘why bother’ that they wanted. This dissatisfaction was position on student representation. aggravated by feelings that they were marginalised, that tutors were out of touch Experiences and Concepts of Learning and did not understand what they need- ed, and that administrative units dealt What then are the implications for learn- with them disrespectfully. Further, they ing? Does the government’s discourse were deeply discontented with the library, about students as consumers invite them work spaces and other facilities. They to see themselves as purchasing a product were aggrieved by the way they were to be delivered by their tutors? How does treated by the university, given that it was this discourse accord with students’ be- their fees that kept the university going. coming active learners, as employers are said to want? Students in both universities People aren’t viewed as customers, and in the were very critical of poor quality and end of the day, the thing is you are not coming here to be handed a grant and ticket to sell to unstimulating methods of teaching through come in, you have to study hard, but you ulti- lectures and tutorials. First-year students mately pay to come here. You are a customer. at both universities felt anonymous, disen- I’m quite lucky because work are already pay- franchised and dictated to, and that it ing for half. And you don’t get treated as a valued customer, you get treated as if you’re might be an advantage to have consumer lucky to be here sort of thing, and I think rights. At the new university, students felt that’s the wrong attitude. [Q1] that staff should deliver education to them, and they would use such rights to Complaints and a sense of not being prop- demand better lecture notes on the web- erly treated coloured virtually everything site, and complain about the academicism the new university students talked about. of what they are taught and its irrelevance The fact that they had such collective to their employability. One student said: grievances did not make them any more ‘In real life does it really matter that Marx engaged with student representation. At said this or that about the media because both the old and the new universities there that doesn’t make you do your job any 73 AiA | Anwar Tlili and Susan Wright
better.’ Despite their overriding preoccu- By the final year at the old university, pation with employability and the irrele- some students (but not all) had learnt how vance of a social-science and humanities to engage with lecturers. They built a per- degree to the ‘real world’ of work, some sonal relationship with one or two staff, students at the new university conceded heard about their research, told them that they had benefited: about their own dissertation research and achieved something akin to an exchange be- Well we’re doing now Marx, Weber, Durkheim, and you’re like: these boring peo- tween peers. These students had searched ple. But you do open your eyes; do later on for a way out of first-year anonymity think where did I got that idea from (…) when towards recognition as individual learn- you read books, you feel hmm, you feel a bit ers. They, above all, resisted ‘being more educated. stitched into the government’s discourse’ In contrast, students at the old universi- of students as consumers. They did not ty did not have the same sense of the eco- want to be a generalised result on a course nomic cost of being a student or feel pres- evaluation form, ‘a standardised result of sure to recoup the investment by immedi- standardised objectives’. Their search was ately entering the labour market. They had for individual recognition. Initially anony- a freedom from economic necessity which mous, they had gradually learned the uni- is perhaps a precondition for enjoying versity’s style of interaction and set of dis- learning, engaging with ideas and explor- positions (not necessarily in a conscious ing critical approaches for their own sake. way) which accorded them value in the Students at both universities had a per- department in their final year. This was sonal tutor charged with providing indi- the social capital that they valued, that vidualised pastoral and academic support they had gone to university to acquire, outside the formal teaching hours. In the and that they would carry into the world interviews it was revealed that students of work. Others in the old university did were reluctant to avail themselves even of not succeed in this, and none in the new the small allocation of time per student if university had this aspiration. Final-year the tutor was not approachable and students in the new university still dis- encouraging. At the old university and in liked direct contact with staff through dis- some parts of the new university that were sertation tutorials and they were suspi- trying to enhance their research perfor- cious that university talk of independent mance indicators, audit pressures worked learning was a euphemism for staff cuts. themselves out in the micro teacher-stu- The contrast between the dominant pat- dent relationship in such a way as to make tern of perceptions and views in the two students feel they were unwelcome universities should not be seen as a simple encroachers on staff’s research time. Stu- opposition, divorced from its wider social dents sensed that research is prioritised by conditionings, between a pursuit of eco- the university and by staff who ‘think stu- nomic return and a pursuit of knowledge. dents are a bit of a nuisance’. Students in The pursuit of knowledge for its own sake, the old university thought staff treated much like investing time and money in teaching as a burden that had to be com- aesthetic experiences for their own sake, pleted in minimum time in order to get presuppose freedom from economic neces- down to the real work that counts both in sity, and therefore a socio-cultural milieu, terms of income from the funding bodies to a great extent class-related, where the and of the university’s symbolic capital. pressing concern with securing and better- ing one’s chances in life can take second 74 Learn to Consume, Teach to Account? | AiA place and emerge from self-fulfilling pur- while some at the old university resisted suits. It seems that the combination of this massification as opposite to their growing up in a relatively low-income quest to acquire the social capital that social milieu with some degree of econom- would give them individual recognition as ic insecurity, coming to higher education a learner and that they would use for primarily to improve one’s life chances, upward mobility in the world of work. worry about the employability of a social- Our research indicates that universities, science and humanities degree and dissat- far from providing equal opportunities to isfaction with many aspects of one’s expe- a global network of symbolic analysts, rience at the university predisposed stu- were a site of differentiation which was dents to adopt the notion of student as cus- not only economic but social, and beyond tomer, and to mobilise it to make a strong that, rested on quite different ideas about demand for a ‘better deal’. The correlation, the nature and purpose of education. This and arguably causal relation, between is directly contrary to New Labour’s these factors was also evident from some claim, and hope, that higher education of our fieldwork data at the old university will play an egalitarian role. Indeed, with where the few students who were pre- New Labour’s break with the egalitarian- pared to identify with the category of cus- ism of social democracy, education was tomer expressed dissatisfaction with teach- enlisted to redeem New Labour’s contin- ing, tutors, the facilities and the way they ued appeal to the concept of social justice, were treated by the university. Such stu- now rearticulated as equality of opportu- dents in both universities were attracted to nity and social inclusion. Education was the potential to politicise and mobilise the represented as a major provider of a field notion of students as consumers but did of opportunities capable of developing not connect with the traditional politics of and realising people’s latent ‘potential’, student representation. provided that they acted as responsible citizens and chose to take advantage of these opportunities. Many questions and Conclusion issues already surround New Labour’s at- tempts to consolidate a new higher-educa- The White Paper’s notions of accountabil- tion ethos as an equaliser of socio-eco- ity to consumers in which universities are nomic differentials. providers of an educational product to fee Where students perceive themselves as paying customers with consumer rights, is customers, as receivers of a service in return based on an assumed relation of contrac- for a monetary investment, this under- tual exchange. Paul Cooper (2004) argues mines the principle that what education on the contrary that just paying for some- ‘delivers’ should—for well-known peda- thing does not make it a commodity. His gogic and psychological reasons—follow interviews with students exemplify his from an interactive, cooperative invest- argument that education is much more ment of effort and endeavour between like a gift exchange than commodity ex- teacher and student. There is evidence that change, given that often elements of com- social-science staff in new universities are modity exchange are included in gift thinking hard about how to engage their exchanges. Our student interviews revealed new students in a critical pedagogy (O’Shea a wider spectrum of views. Some at both 2004). But, as already evidenced in our universities embraced their role as con- fieldwork, especially at the new university, sumers with rights against the university, students are beginning to narrowly con- 75 AiA | Anwar Tlili and Susan Wright
ceive of themselves as customers with said, ‘students don’t have any input into the—passive—expectation that they will any of the management that sort of filters receive a tailor-made teaching performance. down to what we actually get in the end Further, employability, as the most impor- of the day. Not that I can think of.’ The tant, and indeed most concrete, ‘return’ of regimes of audit, now linked to notions of higher education, becomes for them the accountability to consumers, seem to be ultimate criterion for evaluating teaching weakening a residual democratic ethos by quality. If students’ self-perception as re- which students could engage with staff to cipients of employable skills undermines discuss the purpose and nature of their their active participation in education and education, help shape views on both sides, fosters a narrow, one-dimensional model of and make students’ voices really ‘count’. the learning and teaching process, what will be the spill-over into the wider society? Anwar Tlili is Postdoctoral Research Officer, Cooper’s (2004) research argues that the Department of Education and Professional very fact of paying the fees does not neces- Studies, King’s College London. sarily make a student into a customer of the Susan Wright is Professor of Educational educational process which answers to other Anthropology at the Institute of Educational criteria than the narrow exchange relation Anthropology, Danish University of Education. between the university as profit-making provider and the student-payer. Our re- search reveals signs of an instrumentalist Notes rationality that endorses conformity of val- ues, norms and cultural perceptions. Such 1. This article derives from a project on Change in instrumentalism may militate against stu- Universities, funded by the UK’s Learning and dents’ very capacity to think otherwise or Teaching Support Network (now part of the to negotiate and live with difference, which Higher Education Academy). In addition to the authors, the research team included Anne Jep- is what the idea(l) of critical pedagogy, son and David Mills. democratic citizenship and democracy, and 2. These are the figures in the Dearing Report some aspects of social justice are all about. (1997: para. 25). The White Paper claims that Our research raises further questions graduates earn 64 percent more than non-grad- uates (DFES 2003: para. 5.13). about assumptions in the government’s 3. The Higher Education Funding Council for policy that students’ choices and views England commissioned research on how best to can become the ‘driver of change’ in high- collect and use student feedback (Brennan and er education. Students in our research dis- Williams 2004a and b) and the Higher Educa- tion Academy’s Subject Centre for Hospitality, liked the methods used to collect their Leisure, Sport and Tourism has conducted a views and most were suspicious that the Student Course Experience survey (Wall 2004). results were just quantified to satisfy audit inspections, but not actually used to im- prove courses and teaching. Those from References the new university who most embraced Brennan, J. and R. Williams 2004a the notion of students as consumers also Collecting and Using Student Feedback on had most grievances and the fewest expec- Quality and Standards of Learning and tations that student representation on uni- Teaching in Higher Education. A report to versity committees was effective, along HEFCE by the Centre for Higher with the most worries about employabili- Education Research and Information ty and the irrelevance of their courses to (Open University), NOP Research the demands of the labour market. As one 76 Learn to Consume, Teach to Account? | AiA
Group and SQW Ltd, Wolf, A. 2002 Does Education Matter? Myths About Education and Economic Growth, London: Penguin. Wright, S. 2004 ‘Markets, Corporations, Consumers? New Landscapes of Higher Education’, LATISS (Learning and Teaching in the Social Sciences) 1 (2): 71-93. 78