Shaping for Mediocrity
by David Harvie

An insider account of the struggle for the soul of the university.

In 2021, as part of a programme called Shaping for Excellence, bosses at the University of Leicester made redundant numerous scholars in what was simultaneously an attack on academic freedom and trade union organisation. The authors of Shaping for Mediocrity not only had front-row seats in the campaign against these mass redundancies, they were in the ring - both as targeted employees and as trade union officers and negotiators. Shaping for Mediocrity tells the inside story of these attacks and the campaign against them. It situates this story within a longer history of struggle to make the university a place where critical thinking is possible, showing how events in Leicester are both reflective of higher education in the UK following four decades of neoliberal 'reform' and a particularly egregious instance of the increasingly authoritarian management of public institutions such as universities.

Reviews:
‘Do you think business schools should be helping to produce a low carbon, high inclusion, high democracy economy? Or should they be sacking academics who work towards these goals in order to produce a business-as-usual b-school that makes big profits? This urgent and beautifully written book shows why universities need to change, and what happens to free speech when higher education becomes a product.’ ~ Martin Parker, author of Shut Down the Business School: What’s Wrong with Management Education and Against Management: Organization in the Age of Managerialism
‘Gibson Burrell, Ronald Hartz, David Harvie, Geoff Lightfoot, Simon Lilley and Friends have provided the academic community with a comprehensive narrative of the most shameless and blatant violation of academic freedom I have ever personally witnessed. The authors were all made redundant as a result of Leicester University’s 2021 “Shaping for Excellence” – the vision of vice chancellor Nishan Canagarajah – which pitted management’s “right” to “disinvest” from an area of research against academics’ freedom to pursue an autonomous program of enquiry.

‘Critical management studies had been a beacon of success at Leicester and the international reputations of its exponents were beyond question. Canagarajah felt, however, that CMS didn’t attract the right kind of customer, and so its perceived adherents were targeted for redundancy on the flimsiest of assumptions. What placed them at highest risk, though, was a history of union organizing.

‘The authors expose the moral dissolution of a university’s leadership team in an era of competition, marketisation and managerialism where everything including research must be ‘governed’. In an era where university management seems impervious to accountability, Burrell et al name names including who was silent, who lent support and who were “the enforcers”. Their reflexivity and honesty stand in contrast to the deviousness and cynicism of the managers they encountered. Other administrators, they note, carried a weight of shame for the shabby scheme they were obliged to participate in, and resigned.

‘This is a book that should be read by every academic and trade unionist. What happened at the University of Leicester in 2021 could happen anywhere. Indeed, we see an escalation of “restructurings” which target arts, humanities and social sciences which are traditionally home to the kinds of critiques that irk the managerial cadre. Shaping for Mediocrity is a call to resist, to take back control of the university, and, above all, recognise the power of solidarity against the implacable tyranny of managerialism.’ ~ Liz Morrish, co-author of Academic Irregularities: Discourse and Neoliberalism in Higher Education
‘No area of existence is exempt from exploitation, including the acquisition of knowledge. State authority decides the matter, with particular regard to the needs of Global Capital. Our universities were thrown to the wolves many years ago; now students are being thrown too. There is no “right to education”. An ignorant public is the preferred option. The difficulty with “thinking” is that it leads to asking questions. The authors of this book expose the cynicism, the hypocrisy and the appalling cowardice of the British education authorities.’ ~ James Kelman, author most recently of God’s Teeth and Other Phenomena and The State Is the Enemy: Essays on Liberation and Racial Justice
‘This most welcome book uses an act of intellectual vandalism perpetrated by management at Leicester University as its springboard. This is part of a growing trend in the UK and US, where centres of critical thinking are dismantled as universities resemble corporations, using “market forces” as an alibi, in order to treat staff and support-service workers as disposable entities. The authors analyze this trend superbly while providing an intellectual basis for countering dismal developments such as the one at Leicester.’ ~ Kenneth Surin, professor emeritus, Duke University
‘Next generations will read Shaping for Mediocrity as a “future archive” of what we could have done collectively to save public higher education, and how those who fought the hardest battles were failed not just by the system but by the movement itself. Yet, the book is written with a humour, hope and humility that defy bitterness and defeatism. It documents forensically how small leaks of individual mediocrity sink large vessels built on collective hard work and benevolence. It teaches us important lessons about what can still be done to stop the toxic spread of neo-managerial capitalism in our public universities, before it is too late.’ ~ Mariya Ivancheva, author of The Alternative University: Lessons from Bolivarian Venezuela
‘Shaping for Mediocrity is an exposé of what neoliberal university management does when academic workers passionately promote a rigorous and useful critical education. Without fear or favour, the authors journey through a notorious seven-month battle at one university, which ended in bitter defeat with tragic personal and professional costs. While it is a saddening and emotional read, their experiences are invaluable hard lessons for all education workers engaged in struggles everywhere. I’ve read nothing like this book in five decades. I salute those involved.’ ~ Alpesh Maisuria, co-author of Life for the Academic in the Neoliberal University
‘Anyone who works in a university business school should read this book. No, anyone who works in a university should read this book. Actually, make that anyone who is interested in the abuse of power, rampant neoliberalism and how employees can be treated as mere resources, to be disposed of on baseless, knee-jerk, reactionary managerialist whims. It’s an absolute tour de force, a perfect example of parrhesia in a context where speaking truth to power is becoming more and more risky. I salute my friends and former colleagues for writing it.’ ~ Jo Brewis, Professor of People and Organisations, The Open University
‘While we have a lot of literature on the hypocrisy of the university as a supposed place of critical thinking, we have nothing so forensic and stinging as this real-time account of mass redundancies at one of the leading centres for critical scholarship and teaching in the UK, and perhaps the world. And yet despite the viciousness and brutality of the University of Leicester’s hostility to thinking, this is the story of fierce and creative resistance, common courage and care, and the ultimate victory of collective critique over capitalist perfidy at work in the university. In other words, you are reading the last word on the University of Leicester.’ ~ Stefano Harney, co-author of The Undercommons: Fugitive Planning and Black Study