The Strange Death of the Liberal University: Research Assessments and the Impact of Research

The changes to higher education inaugurated in Britain in the early 1980s as a result of the election of Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative government, ushered in a sea-change in how the public sector was to be managed and of the role of government in relation to public spending. This paper outlines the rise of market-driven higher education, and then examines the changes in the way accountability has been administered with regards to research assessment. Although it focuses largely on Britain, comparisons are made to Australia and New Zealand. It argues that in the shift from the RAE to the REF, there is a shift from accountability to control, with the increased de-professionalization for academics that this implies. Academics and universities’ autonomy are being eroded by the centralised organisation of accountability and its tie to financial provision, from the central state agencies at the centre of the state apparatus. What is recommended is a more devolved model whereby universities administer their own accountability regimes through a committee of the vice-chancellors