The new political economy of higher education: between distributional conflicts and discursive stratification

The higher education sector has been undergoing a far-reaching institutional re-orientation during the past two decades. Many adjustments appear to have strengthened the role of competition in the governance of higher education, but the character of the sector?s emerging new political economy has frequently remained unclear. Serving as the introduction for the special issue, this article makes the case for a multidimensional strategy to probe higher education?s competitive transformation. In terms of conceptualizing the major empirical shifts, we argue for analyzing three core phenomena: varieties of academic capitalism, the discursive construction of inequality, and the transformation of hierarchies in competitive settings. With respect to theoretical tools, we emphasize the complementary contributions of institutional, class-oriented, and discourse analytical approaches. As this introduction elaborates and the contributions to the special issue demonstrate, critical dialog among different analytical traditions over the interpretation of change is crucial for improving established understandings. Arguably, it is essential for clarifying the respective roles of capitalist power and hierarchical rule in the construction of the sector?s new order

The Politics of an Experimental Society: Creating Labor Market Flexibility in Europe

In the quest for economic growth, rich democracies’ governments have embraced the goal of creating labor market flexibility. To that end, they have pursued simultaneous changes in the three main institutional realms structuring modern welfare capitalism – the industrial relations system, the set of labor market regulations and the welfare state. While commonly framed as the removal of workers’ social protections, the politics of labor market adjustment continue to differ in unexpected ways across diverse national contexts. This paper introduces the analytical tools for a comparative analysis of the quest for labor market flexibility in the United Kingdom, Germany and Denmark. Among a set of alternative perspectives on national variation during the last three decades, the paper stresses the importance of inherited institutional arrangements for social protection. Systems built around occupational status preservation tend to block measures that could increase labor market flexibility, while those offering universal provisions based on citizenship can help achieve flexibility in the labor market. This perspective puts into question the dominant frame of associating the achievement of labor flexibility with the removal of social protections. It indicates that – even in today’s post-Keynesian world – social protection does not have to be economically harmful. If substantiated by further research, these findings have obvious implications for the United States, another rich democracy

Wettbewerb oder Oligarchie in der Wissenschaft? In seinem neuen Buch spricht Richard Münch Klartext ; Münch, Richard, Die akademische Elite : zur sozialen Konstruktion wissenschaftlicher Exzellenz. - 1. Aufl., Orig.-Ausg. : Frankfurt am Main, 2007

Veröff. im Internet: http://www.gsonet.org/shared/articles/newsletter/08/BookReviewMuench2.pd

Toward Institutional Innovation in US Labor Market Policy: Learning from Europe?

Veröff. im Internet: http://brie.berkeley.edu/publications/WP193.pd

The Transatlantic Agenda for Labor Market Reform: Increasing Adaptability Through Continuing Training

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