Preface
From time to time, a generation is faced with some very big choices. We are currently living through one of these times. Failures in globalism, the rise of populism, existential pressures around climate and resources, embedded racism and inequities, the shift from the analogue world to the digital one and, most recently, a devastating global pandemic, all contribute to a potentially overwhelming sense of systemic change. History suggests that there are long-term economic cycles where a number of innovations – social and physical – come together to reset society. We saw this with the introduction of the steam engine preceding the industrial revolution and we are witnessing a similar revolution today with the ubiquitous application of networked technologies. At these moments of change – these ‘in-between times’ – the future can go one of two ways, with the potential for the world to follow a more negative and destructive path (as we saw in the 1930s), or take a more humanitarian and sustainable turn (as I, personally, hope will occur today).
The choices that universities make at this time will play a critical role in determining which path we all take together as a society. On the one hand, universities might choose to stand back and largely be passive bystanders, remote from the world around them. On the other, universities will each embark on a deliberate evolution of their public purpose, in the same way that such adaptations have happened over millennia. This book will argue that the latter transformation is an urgent change that is both necessary and needed. Necessary as the social contract, under which universities have their licence to operate from politicians and public alike, is broken. Needed as the external environment they exist within is at a moment of flux which both threatens and invites opportunity.
In calling for this change, I make the case that the next step in the long history of universities is through embracing the concepts of ‘new power’. New power is an idea originally put forward by Henry Timms and Jeremy Heimans in 20181 that captures and explains some of the tensions I have felt throughout my career. New power is a set of values that focuses on participation, networks governance and radical transparency. It combines approaches like crowdsourcing and social media campaigns with social movements, leading to new structures and business models as such Airbnb and Uber, campaigns like Black Lives Matter and MeToo, and other mass-participation events such as crowd-sourcing the analysis of UK politician expenses by The Guardian newspaper. As such, it contrasts with ‘old power’ institutions that tend to have formal structures, centralised power and a managerial practice. It provides, in my view, a way to refresh and renew that social contract between universities and society. Universities are instinctively old power institutions where power is ‘jealously guarded, closed, inaccessible and leader-driven’.2 As Timms and Heimans describe it, old power is a currency that is traded, while new power is a current that connects.
In this book, I use the framing of new power and its associated practices to reimagine what the social purpose of the university should be in the 21st century. In doing so, I illustrate how the New Power University can resolve the very real tensions in the trade-offs that shape its purposes, including social vs economic goods, universalism vs elitism, collectivism vs competition, autonomy vs system dependence. All of this gets to the ‘soul’ of the New Power University. As such, this book is both a warning against the complacency of the old power, and a voice for the many who see opportunity and necessity for radical change in universities.
The book is split into four parts. I open Part One by introducing the case for the New Power University, by using three ideas that frame my central argument, namely that universities need to change and change rapidly if they are to adapt to the 21st century. I then locate this argument by briefly recounting the history of the evolving purpose of universities, suggesting that the New Power University is the next step on that journey.
Part Two has three chapters that explore the three missions of a university: learning, research and social responsibility. I argue that these three missions are of equal weight and mutually reinforce one another. The introduction of ‘social responsibility’ as a mission of the university will be explored and justified, acknowledging that not everyone will agree with this articulation (but noting that many universities were, actually, founded on this principle).
Part Three describes the people that make up the New Power University – that is the students, academic faculty and professional staff, and various wider communities which, collectively, give universities their licence to operate and enable them to deliver their purpose. This Part will examine their motivations, expectations, values and skills and how these are changing and will need to change.
Part Four will develop the thinking around missions and people and explore the conduct of the New Power University. I will argue that the existing organisational structures of the university are no longer fit for purpose and that this has implications on approaches to governance. The final chapter will make the case that the New Power University can no longer ‘sit on the fence’ on the contested political and social issues of the day and has to become an advocate on issues that matter to its communities.
Overall, my argument is a mix between a critique of the current managerialism that defines contemporary old power universities, a manifesto for the future New Power University and a provocation to stimulate the higher education sector into rapid change, to ensure that the institution of the university survives and flourishes through the 21st century. I know that the ideas put forward will delight and disgust my colleagues in equal measure. There are ideas that, I suspect, will be enthusiastically embraced and others that will be rapidly repelled. That is fine – but a debate is desperately needed so I would be delighted for these ideas to be challenged and shaped as part of that deliberation.
I do ask the reader to try and avoid ‘cherry picking’ the ideas that you instinctively agree with and rejecting those you don’t. In writing the book, I have tried to apply the ideas and values of new power systematically and have, consequently, ended up in places that I did not anticipate when I began the journey.
There are also a number of gaps in the case I make for the New Power University, some of which I touch on but don’t elaborate and others I avoid. The first group includes topics such as the relationship between further and higher education, the role of technical universities, research-led teaching, diversity and inclusion, and the regulation of universities. The second group includes three substantive issues that I consciously do not address. First, I have avoided the critical topic of financing universities. I have done this for three reasons. First, I strongly believe that, with any enterprise, you have to start by deciding on purpose (putting in place your ‘value proposition’ in management-speak) before you work out how to finance that, either on a not-for-loss or for-profit basis. Second, models for financing vary by jurisdiction and, thus, it is a very difficult topic to address in a single chapter of a book (and, indeed, is worthy of a tome in its own right). Third, while not directly addressing the issue of costs, much of this book is about value – the value of education, the value of research and the value of being socially responsible.
The second gap is that I disproportionately draw on examples from the UK, Australia and North America. This means that my arguments are anchored in an Anglo-Saxon model of higher education, reflecting my lived experience. Where possible, I have reached out to colleagues beyond this cultural and geographical boundary but stress, from the outset, that this was not systematic, but rather used as a way of informally testing and challenging some of the ideas I present.
Finally, I have avoided any detailed commentary of the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on higher education. Part of this is pragmatic – I was about half-way through the book when the pandemic took hold in Western Europe in March 2020, and I wanted to avoid both having to undertake a significant rewrite or making this book about COVID-19. More substantively, I would contend that, while the arguments I put forward pre-date the pandemic, the impact of COVID-19 both amplifies and accelerates my arguments. As universities begin to navigate the post-COVID world, they will, by necessity, implement some of the ideas I put forward in this book. That said, in the Postface, I do provide a very brief reflection on the implications of the COVID-19 pandemic on the New Power University.
In keeping with the new power topic of this book, I established a global sounding board of friends and colleagues to bounce ideas off, shape my thinking and to share examples from around the world. For me, this has been one of the most rewarding aspects of this project: through my network, I have been able to meet and connect with individuals from across the world. They have enthusiastically engaged in the process and reviewed some of my earlier drafts. Their generosity in time and ideas is fully acknowledged. I have already mentioned these incredible people in the Acknowledgements, but I want to highlight the contribution of three individuals. The first is my former boss and former President and Principal of King’s College London, Ed Byrne. Ed inadvertently put me on the path that led to this book by asking me to ‘hold the pen’ in formulating a new strategy for King’s in 2015. It was through this project that I really engaged with the idea of what universities are for and began to be increasingly uncomfortable with the status quo but optimistic about the potential for change.
The resultant strategy, Vision 2029,3 was co-produced through an open consultative approach with over 1,000 colleagues at King’s, but two individuals were central to that process, and thus central to the ideas put forward in this book. The first is Louise Gough, with whom I have worked closely at King’s, first on Vision 2029 and then on implementing our commitment to service (more in Chapter 5). We spent many an hour debating and shaping numerous ideas that are developed in this book. The second is Ross Pow, from Power of Numbers,4 who helped Louise and me facilitate the consultative workshops at King’s and then take the ideas from those discussions into Vision 2029. When I began to think about writing this book, I asked if Ross would be kind enough to help me out both in brainstorming the structure and content of each chapter and in reviewing my early drafts. He generously agreed to do this, and I am indebted for his input.
Needless to say, while all these conversations and exchanges have stimulated my thinking, I am responsible for any mistakes or misunderstandings and the involvement of these amazing people is not necessarily an endorsement for the New Power University.
1Timms and Heimans (2018).
2https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2018/apr/20/new-power-jeremy-heimans-social-media.