This is my new (very) little book about a big issue — the crisis in our universities.
This is how the blurb goes:
A strong higher education system is fundamental to civil society. The building of knowledge and the dissemination of information is vital to the proper functioning of our democracy. At the economic level, higher education is in the top three of our export industries; international students have become central to the hospitality, retail and agricultural economies; and the country desperately needs well-trained, knowledgeable citizens to shore up its future.
Yet, in February 2024, a detailed review of higher education in this country concluded that the system is broken and urgently needs fixing. The problems that afflict it are legion, including over-investment in international enrolment, an epidemic of casualisation and the burning out of a generation of academics, culture wars over the content and orientation of university research and teaching, the lack of sectoral coordination around the national interest, and the consequences of decades of funding cuts.
In Broken, Graeme Turner provides a reality check for those who imagine the academic life is one of privilege and leisure, laying bare the enormous challenges and lack of hope experienced by many in academia. He unearths the foundations of this crisis, then explains how the solution lies in an overhaul of the one-size-fits-all approach to university funding, the establishment of genuine full-time career paths, and the formation of an independent body to ensure our university system serves the national interest in both teaching and research, rather than the ferocious competitiveness of the marketplace.
Above all, we need to jettison the current economic focus on education, and re-embrace the idea that higher learning is a fundamental public good—and should be funded as such.
Published by Monash University Press on July 1. https://publishing.monash.edu/product/broken/
I will be doing book launches in Canberra, Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Adelaide.
Canberra. ‘Meet the Author’ in conversation with Frank Bongiorno on July 8, 5.30 for 6.00pm start, Kambri Cinema, ANU.
https://www.anu.edu.au/events/meet-the-author-graeme-turner
Sydney: In conversation with Hannah Forsyth at Gleebooks, 6.00pm for 6.30 start, July 10
Melbourne: In Conversation with Ben Eltham at Readings Carlton 5.30 for 6.00pm July 15
https://readings.com.au/events/graeme-turner-in-conversation
Brisbane: In Conversation with Roly Sussex at Avid Reader 6.00 for 6.30 on July 16.
https://avidreader.com.au/pages.11730-GraemeTurner-BrokenUniversitiesPoliticsthePublicGood
Adelaide: In Conversation with Justin O’Connor at Ern Malley 5.30 for 6.00pm on July 23.
https://events.humanitix.com/book-launch-broken-universities-politics-and-the-public-good-by-graeme-turner
Please come along.
