2021/01/01 by Beth Mintz · 3 citations
Social Sciences · #Higher Education Governance and Development #Higher Education Practises and Engagement #Higher Education Research Studies
paper · doi:10.1111/ajes.12370
crossref issued 2021/01/01 · crossref published 2021/01/01 · crossref published-print 2021/01/01 · openalex publication_date 2021/01/01 · crossref published-online 2021/03/31 · crossref created 2021/03/31 · crossref deposited 2023/11/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · crossref indexed 2026/07/29 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/30
Abstract A number of factors have contributed to the crisis in higher education, including the long‐term transformation in funding. In this article, I argue that neoliberalism can explain many of the processes leading to our changing commitment to colleges and universities and the cost increases that this change has produced. A number of neoliberal assumptions firmly rooted in conventional wisdom have contributed to a “student‐as‐customer” phenomenon, which is, itself, a cost driver. I look at the development of the student as customer as a vehicle for exploring tuition increases. I also examine the tension between education as a public and a private good and the marketization of higher education as crucial drivers of these transformations. In doing so, I emphasize that the student as customer has been created by the changes in the way we think about, organize, and fund education, rather than any fundamental change in young people.