The humanities have not enjoyed preeminence in academe since the Scientific Revolution marginalized the old trivium. But they long continued to play a subordinate educational role by helping constitute the distinguishing culture of the elite. Now even this subordinate role is becoming expendable as devotees of the profit motive seek to reduce culture to technological delivery of cultural products (Noble, Digital diploma mills: The automation of higher education, New York: Monthly Review Press, 2003). The result is a deliberate downsizing of (...) the humanities as traditionally understood. Personal preferences aside, is this planned obsolescence morally defensible? Arguably not, if one appeals to traditional ethical norms. But what if its legitimacy is assessed instead according to the quite different norms of capitalism that figure so prominently in university administrators’ rationales as they embrace corporatization? The corporatization of American universities has had multiple effects, and some of these have not been entirely positive. In particular, it has had an adverse effect on the professional status and values of faculty. But how faculty respond to these changes varies according to their institutional situation. (shrink)

The recent trend toward privately owned and operated prisons calls attention to a variety of issues involving human rights. The growing number of corporatized correctional institutions is especially notable in the United States, but it is also a global phenomenon in many countries. The reasons cited for privatizing prisons are usually economic; the opportunity to outsource prison services enables local political leaders to save tax revenue, and local communities are promised a chance to create new jobs and bring in a (...) new industry. This article will address the history of prisons and the recent trend toward privatizing prisons and the perception of prisons as a for-profit enterprise. This new economic order brings with it a set of human rights concerns, including the relationship of for-profit prisons to increased numbers of incarcerated persons and increased sentences, racism and classism. The contractual relationship between political leaders and prison corporations will be addressed, noting that conditions of liability frequently mean that prison administrations lack motivation to safeguard the human rights of prisoners. The human rights issues often extend outside of the private prison itself, having a negative effect on the local community. (shrink)

منذ أن تبنت الحكومة الإندونيسية الجديدة سنة 2003 ما يسمى في الإنجليزية (corporatization) [والفرنسية (l’entrepreneurisation)] "الخصخصة"، دار نقاش فكري أكاديمي وسياسي موسع ضمن مجموعة من الدول الإسلامية والعربية حول طبيعة الشروط الموضوعية لخصخصة التعليم في علاقته بالليبرالية الجديدة. وأثار النقاش العام نفسه ردود فعل متباينة داخل هذه الدول وفق تيارين مركزيين: تيار الخصخصة اللبرالية للتعليم (كخيار استراتيجي لإصلاح منظومة التعليم العربي) وتيار الحق الجماهيري في التعليم الرسمي (حق الأفراد في مجانية التعليم)، ولم تسلم الجامعة والمعاهد العليا نفسها من هذا (...) النقاش الموسع، نظرا للخصوصيات الاجتماعية والثقافية والسياسية للجامعات – كقلاع مصفحة لا تقهر بلغة شريعتي- ضمن البنيات الذهنية والبنيات الموضوعية للأفراد والجماعات بالمجتمعات العربية. فما هي أهم منطلقات خصخصة التعليم العالي بالدول الإسلامية (النموذج الإندونيسي)؟ وما هي أهم الدروس المستفادة من التجربة الإندونيسية في إطار تنمية الشروط الموضوعية للجامعات المغاربية، والبحث عن سبل تفعيل الوحدة المغاربية انطلاقا من رهان وحدة منظومة التعليم العالي؟ . (shrink)

Smart Farming Technologies raise ethical issues associated with the increased corporatization and industrialization of the agricultural sector. We explore the concept of biomimicry to conceptualize smart farming technologies as ecological innovations which are embedded in and in accordance with the natural environment. Such a biomimetic approach of smart farming technologies takes advantage of its potential to mitigate climate change, while at the same time avoiding the ethical issues related to the industrialization of the agricultural sector. We explore six principles (...) of a natural concept of biomimicry and apply these principles in the context of smart farming technologies. (shrink)

This chapter touches upon the damaging impact of neoliberal reason on institutions of higher education, and my efforts as a teacher to help turn things around by re-vitalizing the classroom. After a critique of current neoliberal ‘borderline times’, the chapter takes the reader on a journey of diffractive re-imaginings in which I share some of my experiences of co-learning with undergraduates in an American feminist-philosophical classroom. My central argument is that the neoliberalism-induced crisis in education can be affirmatively counteracted through (...) experimentations with various posthuman and new materialist theories, and the Harawayan-Baradian methodology of diffraction in particular. Furthermore, informed by the impression that theory and pedagogical praxis go hand in hand in many contemporary feminist new materialisms, I zoom in on daily acts of resistance against the neoliberal corporatization of the American university, acts that actualized themselves as feminist new materialist pedagogies. Three examples of diffractive pedagogical strategies are then discussed in detail. (shrink)