Processes of change in academia – the impact of government and market
Processes of change in academia – the impact of government and market

Summary/Abstract: The paper describes the problems associated with the development of universities and higher education on a global scale and based on the example of Poland. To illustrate the subject, the research focuses on: (1) the idea of university autonomy and elitism from a historical and contemporary perspective, (2) the delusion of elitism and social advancement of education which is attributed to it, (3) the myth of flexibility of education generated among others by politicians. The text indicates the main processes in academia: (1) centuries long removal of the autonomy of universities, (2) the ‘humanistic ethos’ of universities is also removed, (3) universities are transformed into ‘vocational colleges’, (4) higher education is developed as one of the service sectors, (5) universities are transformed into institutions responsible for the labour market, (6) universities are entered in the ‘logic of the free market’, (7), the number of the educated is increasing, (8) the fetishisation of education, (9) the myth of flexibility of education and the its multifunctionality in the context of limited absorption capacity of the labour.

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