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Dreaming of a more democratic academy
published on : 08-21-2014
Category : Higher Education
Ferdinand von Prondzynski’s opinion piece “Divergence has delivered results” (News, 14 August) made the familiar case for Scottish exceptionalism – its “democratic intellect” tradition – in matters of higher education ethos. As the author recognises, the recommendations of the Review of Higher Education Governance that he chaired “sparked some debate”, not only as far as the election of governing body chairs but also, one might add, on the proposed introduction of gender quotas on governing boards. Testament to the sparkling debate is the fact that, more than two years later, there is still no legislation to implement such recommendations. One might even question the current good health of the democratic intellect tradition itself, at least judging from the opinions expressed by Thomas Swann, winner of the “yes” category in the Scottish independence essay competition (“Visions of independence”, Features, 14 August). Swann writes that: “Scotland’s universities [have] generally gone in much the same direction as those in the rest of the UK” in key areas such as metrics, the research excellence framework, zero-hours contracts and the National Student Survey, hence he concludes that “the Scottish higher education system is little better than in the rest of the UK”. Swann’s rage at the status quo is mitigated only by his (romantic) hope that independence will deliver “another university”. Maybe he imagines a cooperative one (“All together now: towards cooperatives”, Analysis, 14 August), whose implementation would “simply” entail changing a university’s mission, as its proponents (again romantically) envisage. So where does all this leave a cynically inclined academic who still believes passionately in the possibility of a more democratic academia? In the uncomfortable certainty that whatever the result of the independence referendum Scottish academia is unlikely to become a garden of Eden, because as Felipe Fernández-Armesto realistically acknowledges in “Trouble in paradise” (Opinion, 14 August), “there are serpents in every Eden”. Anna Notaro Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art & Design University of Dundee Twitter: @notanna1 “There is nothing more fundamental to the protection of academic freedom and the free pursuit of the best…teaching and research than the governance structure of a university…[a] subject not…discussed enough,” comments a recent Council for the Defence of British Universities newsletter. Yet the discontent in Scottish universities about the “democratic deficit” in how they are run finds no echo in Hugh Pennington’s argument for his colleagues to vote “no” in the 18 September referendum on independence (“Visions of independence”, Features, 14 August). In his call for a “yes” vote – not to endorse the Scottish National Party’s White Paper celebrating “Scottish universities as they are” but to allow the opportunity for a sovereign Scotland “to create a genuine revolution” to address the “hope and rage” of Scots at the current state of affairs – Thomas Swann identifies many of the problems that the senior management system, based on dismissive superiority rather than meaningful consultation, fails to address.
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democratic academy Dreaming