The knowledge business and the neo-managerialisation of research and academia in France

Reprinted by permission of the Publishers from ' The knowledge business and the neo-managerialisation of research and academia in France, Gilles Pinson ', in The Knowledge Business: The Commodification of Urban and Housing Research ed. Chris Allen and Rob Imrie (Farnham etc.: Ashgate, 2010), pp. 197-217. Copyright © 2010 http://www.ashgate.com/isbn/9780754676904 The higher education and research system is often seen as an essential feature of the ‘French exception'. Higher education is free. Research is conducted inside large public research institutions by researchers enjoying a civil servant status. This conception and organisation of the higher education and research system is now under serious threat. For now more than a decade, reforms have been implemented in accordance with neoliberal and neo-managerial precepts. Their explicit objectives are the adaptation of the university and research system to the needs of the so-called ‘Knowledge society', the reduction of the autonomy of the academic community and the bureaucratic steering of higher education and research activities