Reflections on the Liberal University: Truth, citizenship and the role of the academic

The starting point for this paper is the fact that the organisation and practice of higher education, and our ideas about it, are informed by conflicting ideals. I explore some of this conflict by looking in detail at what I call the liberal model of the university, and at two competitors to it that have gained increasing influence in recent years: the economic and ideological models. I examine the main criticisms of the liberal university, and what I believe to be its strengths in comparison with these other two models