Research Selectivity, Managerialism, and the Academic Labor Process: The Future of Nonmainstream Economics in U.K. Universities

This paper reports the results of empiricalresearch designed to explore the impact of researchselectivity on the work and employment of academiceconomists in U.K. universities.Research selectivityis seen as part of the general trend towardmanagerialism in higher education in both the U.K. andabroad. Managerialism based on performance indicatorsand hierarchical control has been contrasted withcollegiate control-based or informal peer review. However,analysis of the academic labor process has idealizedcollegiate relations at the expense of professionalhierarchies and intellectual authority relations. We argue that in the U.K., there has evolved amainstream economics which is located within awell-defined neoclassical core. We find that theexistence of lists of core mainstream journals which arebelieved to count most in the periodic ranking exerciseposes a serious threat to academic freedom and diversitywithin the profession, institutionalizing the controlwhich representatives of the mainstream exercise over both the academic labor process and jobmarket. In this way, managerialism combines with peerreview to outflank resistance to new forms ofcontrolling academic labor at the same time asreinforcing disciplinary boundaries through centralizedsystems of bureaucratic standardization andcontrol.