Bourdieu and Academic Capitalism: Faculty \u27Habitus\u27 in Materials Science and Engineering

In today’s interconnected world economy, science and technology (S&T) have become integral to economic growth and development. As such, governments have promoted knowledge-intensive economies in which research, its commercial exploitation, and intellectual work play a growing role (Slaughter & Rhoades, 2004). In this context, U.S. academic scientists and engineers, who conduct about one-third of all basic plus applied research and 13% of all total research and development (R&D) have become key players in the global economy (National Science Board, 2010). According to the theory of academic capitalism, faculty members in state universities use public resources to create circuits of knowledge that link higher education institutions to the new economy by commercializing research. At the same time, as state funding for research continues to decline, faculty engage in fierce competition for research funding from public and private sources given the high costs of research in S&T disciplines. Moreover, academic capitalism is magnified in these disciplines given the relevance of research in these fields to technologies with commercial potential. In S&T fields, academic capitalism in the academic profession is manifested in aspects such as industry-academia collaborations, spin-off companies, and patenting of research results (Slaughter & Leslie, 1997; Slaughter & Rhoades, 2004). This image of the faculty-entrepreneur in the new economy is in stark opposition with the traditional role of the academic profession. In particular, social theorist Pierre Bourdieu conceptualized universities and academics within them as shielded from economic and political forces, fully supported by the state, and with a high degree of autonomy that allows faculty and disciplines to generate their own values and behavioral imperatives (Grenfell & James, 1988; Robbins, 1993). Thus, Bourdieu’s views of the academy have been criticized as inadequate to capture the contemporary complexities around academic capitalism (Delanty, 2001). It has also been suggested that Bourdieu was not always consistent over the span of his lengthy career with his conceptual formulations (Swartz, 1997). This may also be the case with his work about the nature of the academic world given that it is clear that higher education as an organizational field is embedded within his broader theoretical framework in which all organizational fields are influenced by larger social, cultural, economic, and political conditions. Based on empirical data, we argue that Bourdieu’s theoretical framework is indeed quite adequate to describe the academic field in light of academic capitalism. To accomplish this, we present Bourdieu’s academic field based on his notions of field, capital, habitus, and strategy, and how these concepts might apply today in light of academic capitalism. Then, using Bourdieu’s academic field as the conceptual framework, we present an empirical study of faculty work in one specific field in engineering that exemplifies current tendencies brought by academic capitalism. Finally, we discuss the relevancy of Bourdieu’s framework to characterize faculty work in light of academic capitalism as well as providing a discussion of practical implications