Academic capitalism is not great in Canada but it could be worse. It is in Australia.
Sean O’Brady and colleagues looked at survey data for academics from the two countries during COVID. They found that more extreme “neo-liberalism” among Australian university managements made life harder for casual staff.
They surveyed academics at seven universities in each country to find that casual academics in both had a similarly tough time during the Pandemic, because reliance on international student fees made their jobs insecure – more so than for continuing staff. But permanent academics in Australia had worse experiences than the Canadians.
The authors argue that this happened because there is more “neoliberalism, financialisation and managerialism” in Australia than in Canada, “where public funding, unionism and the tenure system are more resilient.”
Overall, they suggest responses to the Pandemic demonstrated:
- International tuition fees “are symbolic of the neoliberalisation of higher education,” exposing institutions to “shocks associated with instabilities in the global political economy.”
- Casuals were “negatively impacted” about the same in both markets despite Australian universities depending more on international income.
- There was more job security for permanent academics in Canada, where unions are stronger and laws less hostile.
The takeaway: “casualised jobs are not decent work, and it is unfair that such workers bear much of the risk of the universities’ entrepreneurial activities and unpredictable funding.
“UIniversities’ rhetoric about being a great place to work and promoting the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (which include decent work) is inconsistent with the reality that universities depend to a great extent on casual employment.”
