I'm presenting at the University of Lincoln's Centre for Educational Research and Development conference on Thursday June 7. I'll be speaking about Educational technology and the war on public education.

1. Educational technology and the
war on public education
Doing and Undoing Academic Labour, University of Lincoln, 7 June 2012
Dr Richard Hall [@hallymk1, rhall1@dmu.ac.uk]

2. Act I: technology, alienation and
neoliberal enclosure

3. The locus of alienation is no longer the isolated object,
nor the distribution of products and tools, but “the
personified conditions of production” as a whole. In
these conditions, as we shall see, the worker is
alienated
(2)from the objects produced,
(3)from the means of production (i.e. the tools and
instruments through which production is carried out),
and
(4)from the process of objectification itself, because he
or she finds that his or her practical life activity stunts,
abuses, and undermines itself.
Wendling, A. E. 2009. Karl Marx on Technology and Alienation.
London: Palgrave Macmillan, p. 17.

4. Alienation is the precise and correctly applied
word for describing the major social problem
in Britain today… it is the cry of men who feel
themselves the victims of blind economic
forces beyond their control. It’s the frustration
of ordinary people excluded from the
processes of decision making.
Trades Unionist Jimmy Reid, elected Rector of the University of
Glasgow, in his Rectoral Address of 1972.

5. The work-ins of the 1970s: techniques and tools
3.Labour discipline: wages; attacks on unionisation;
productivity agreements; mergers.
4.A move from strikes to occupations, especially in
highly organised industries/centres.
5.UCS in occupation for months: labour controls
shipyards; sets an example; spatial co-ordination of
various groups.
6.Issues: consensus vs co-option; labour’s control
of spaces; gender/ethnicity; reproduction of control;
workers’ co-operatives set up.

6. Work-ins reflect/refract the edufactory collective’s
techniques and tools for reinventing higher
education as higher learning:
• general assemblies as democratic process;
• militant research strategies;
• research/teaching/labour in public.

7. The crisis is our university!
A Manifesto of the Transnational Struggles Against the Financial (i.e.
State-Private) University
Thesis #5: The opposite of university cuts is not money to the existing
academic power, but claiming funds for autonomous education and the
self-organization of knowledge production.
Thesis #9: The opposite of the corporate university is not the
state/public university, but the common university.
The Knowledge Liberation Front (2011). http://bit.ly/sUSaUe

8. [Technology] is a high level system that
affects the way humans interact with the
world. This means that one technology in
most cases can comprise numerous
artefacts and be applied in many different
situations. It needs to be associated with a
vision that embodies specific views of
humans and their role in the world.
Ikonen et al., 2010, pp. 3-4 [http://bit.ly/GM05en]

9. • The University is enclosed inside a systemic,
historical crisis of capitalism.
• Capital is enclosing historically-developed,
public/social value through commodification
and coercion [TINA].
• Within the University, educational
technology is a critical site of struggle.

10. Under the Global Agreement on Trade in
Services, all aspects of education and education
services are subject to global trade. The result is
the global marketing of schooling from primary
school through higher education.
Schools, education management organizations,
tutoring services, teacher training, tests, curricula
online classes, and franchises of branded
universities are now part of a global education
market.
(Lipman, P. 2009: http://bit.ly/qDl6sV)

11. Education markets are one facet of the neoliberal
strategy to manage the structural crisis of
capitalism by opening the public sector to capital
accumulation. The roughly $2.5 trillion global
market in education is a rich new arena for
capital investment.
(Lipman, P. 2009: http://bit.ly/qDl6sV)

12. Technology is used to alienate and enclose academic
labour inside hegemonic, fiscal “realities”.
• Public-private partnerships: services; re-engineering;
applications; outsourcing; consultancy.
• Discourses of efficiency/productivity to be rooted: analytics;
big data; reduced circulation time; changes in production;
workload monitoring.
• Legitimation of R&D: value-for-money; commercial
efficiency; business process re-engineering (c.f. European
Vision 2020; HEFCE 2012).
• Moral depreciation and constant innovation/value-creation:
Postone’s treadmill logic.

13. Act II: polyarchy and
technology as kettle

14. Polyarchy
• An elitist form of democracy manageable in a modern
society.
• Normalising what can be fought for in terms of organisation
and governance.
• Universal, transhistorical norms make it unacceptable to
argue for other forms of value or organisation.
• It is no longer possible to address the structural dominance
of elites within capitalism, or the limited procedural
definitions of democracy/participation/power.
Alienation and political enclosure reinforced technologically.

15. The Shock Doctrine: ‘control by imposing economic shock
therapy’.
• structural re-adjustment: competition and coercion
(internationalisation/distance learning)
• a tightening/quickening of the dominant economically-
driven, anti-humanist ideology (student-as-consumer; HE-
as-commodity)
• the transfer of state/public assets to the private sector
(efficiency; consultancy; outsourced services)
• the privatisation of state enterprises/elements in the name
of consumer choice, economic efficiency or sustainability
(state-subsidised privatisation)
Klein, N. (2007). The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism. Metropolitan
Books: New York

16. 1. Networks of power and affinity, that enable the re-
production of ‘geographies of social relationships’.
2. Networks form shifting assemblages of activity and
relationships that reinforce hegemonic power.
3. Transnational activist networks consisting of:
i. academics and think tanks;
ii. policy-makers and administrators;
iii. finance capital and private equity funds;
iv. media corporations and publishers;
v. philanthropists/hedge-funds interested in corporate
social responsibility etc..
aim to regulate the state for enterprise and the market.
Ball, S. 2011. Global Education Inc.
BUT c.f. Neary, 2012 and Davies, 2011, critique network governance.

17. HEFCE: http://bit.ly/JikvC

18. http://bit.ly/jom3Ht

20. JISC-Announce: what is legitimised?
5 March 2012: The case studies are examples of how
institutions working in an open way can enjoy cost savings, a
better student experience and make resources easier to find.
1 March 2012: A new tool launched by Cardiff University’s
information services directorate and JISC allows people to
assess the popularity and use of e-resources so they continue
to deliver value for money.
24 Feb 2012: JISC online webinars help your organisation
become more efficient and effective.
3 Feb 2012: "This report provides further evidence about the
value and impact of the resources and discovery systems which
UK academic libraries make available."

21. JISC-Announce: what is legitimised?
4 April 2012: how smart use of technology can help
universities minimise the expense of outreach and reach
a range of prospective students at very low cost.
19 April 2012: Case studies on The Troubles: We are
able to share our respective knowledge, skills and
resources for the ‘common good’ of British creativity,
ingenuity and economic growth.
1 May 2012: increasing open access to research articles
will have direct financial and practical benefits for the UK
as a whole, benefits that are especially valuable in a time
of austerity.

22. HEA, Strategic Plan 2012-16:
http://bit.ly/GDkuVd

23. The Treasury position, on shared services:
2.186 VAT: providers of education – The
Government will review the VAT exemption for
providers of education, in particular at university
degree level, to ensure that commercial
universities are treated fairly. (Finance Bill
2013)
HM Treasury (2012) http://bit.ly/GCRYCy

24. http://bit.ly/GI2nP4

25. The Treasury position, on technology and
research
a new £100 million fund to support
investment in major new university research
facilities, including through additional
provisions. The fund will allocate its first
bids in 2012–13 and will attract additional
co-investment from the private sector
HM Treasury (2012) http://bit.ly/GCRYCy

26. “Almost every field of employment now depends on
technology. From radio, to television, computers and the
internet, each new technological advance has changed our
world and changed us too.
“But there is one notable exception. Education has barely
changed. Our school system has not prepared children for
this new world. Millions have left school over the past
decade without even the basics they need for a decent job.
“And the current curriculum cannot prepare British students
to work at the very forefront of technological change.”
Michael Gove at British Educational and Training Technology showcase:
http://bit.ly/z1SZ9l

27. Act III, Scene 1: militarisation
“at the very forefront of technological change”

29. http://bit.ly/nLQJFG

30. http://bit.ly/GJjTPu

31. http://bit.ly/HoMFaU

33. http://pearsoncpl.com/about/

34. http://bit.ly/JA50p7

35. http://bit.ly/KctK7T

36. See also:
• hacking competitions, education departments and national security:
http://bit.ly/J5NSqt;
• the use by Universities of drones, with connections between U.S.
military, academic research, defence contractors: http://bit.ly/JLld6T;
• public/private partnerships in the UK that focus upon wireless video
surveillance: http://bit.ly/LTn6Ba;
• the deep connections between the military and research inside UK
universities: http://bit.ly/LFOzDL; and
• the disconnect between our activist promotion of technologies that are
apparently transformative in the global North at the expense of their
implication in war in the global South, like the Raspberry Pi: http://bit.ly/
HUGTBC.

37. Act III, Scene 2: control
“at the very forefront of technological change”

38. A re-focusing of technology-in-universities around
services that define student-as-consumer:
3.selling student services, based on commodifying the
student lifecycle;
4.business/learning analytics;
5.cloud/software-as-a-service/outsourcing; and
6.increased marketing beyond North America/Western
Europe.
Do we critique, question, take issue with the broader
politics of our educational investment?
Gartner, 2011, on Blackboard acquisition: http://bit.ly/KwvZ4u

39. See also the uncritical implementation of the following.
• Mobile learning [in spite of human/labour rights abuses]
http://bit.ly/yTNDM9;
• Direct university/industry partnerships:
http://bit.ly/GHSWRG
• Implementing communications solutions like MS Lync
that enable surveillance/enclosure: http://bit.ly/tYHbgj
• The coming fetishisation of learning analytics and data-
mining: http://bit.ly/xmbqrq

40. http://bit.ly/MNPOpn

41. Advertizing and online profiling practices are the opiate of
the masses in the age of digitally-networked corporate-
militarism (the present stage of capitalism)... a mass
mediated Opium War (and often literal war) distracts the
masses from awareness that we have already long since
arrived at the techno-scientific level to provide security
and equity and hence universal emancipation for all,
distracting us endlessly instead into internecine struggles
over pseudo-needs and pseudo-strivings that leave the
obsolete bloodsoaked hierarchies enjoyed by elite
incumbents in place, and so seduces us into ongoing
collaboration with the terms of our own exploitation.
Carrico, D. 2012. The Unbearable Stasis of "Accelerating Change“. http://bit.ly/LRheIQ

42. Act IV: against coercion
How might knowledge about academic labour be connected to efforts to humanise
knowledge production and learning within and beyond the university?

44. On technologies for occupation or work-ins
Occupation/work-ins are painted as extremism
Yet there is a raft of them
Many with educational or outreach agendas
That give voice through communiques
And there are radical educational alternatives as works in
progress
And worker/student movements in social centres and beyond
And in knowledge liberation and hacking the social factory

45. It took both time and experience before the workpeople
learned to distinguish between machinery and its
employment by capital and to direct their attacks, not
against the material instruments of production, but
against the mode in which they are used.
Marx, K. 2004. Capital Volume 1, p. 554.
Technology discloses man’s mode of dealing with
Nature, the process of production by which he sustains
his life, and thereby also lays bare the mode of formation
of his social relations, and of the mental conceptions that
flow from them.
Marx, K. 2004. Capital Volume 1, p. 493.

46. “only in association with others has each individual
the means of cultivating his talents in all directions.
Only in a community therefore is personal freedom
possible... In a genuine community individuals gain
their freedom in and through their association”
Bottomore, T.B., and M. Rubel, M. 1974. Karl Marx: Selected Writings
in Sociology and Social Philosophy. London: Penguin.

47. for a critique of the consumption and
production of technology;
for processes of dissent, occupation,
protest and refusal, and pushing back;
for the courage we share in re-imagining
and re-producing something different;
for the abolition of alienated labour.

48. “At the heart of it all is a new sociological
type: the graduate with no future”.
Mason, P. 2011. 20 reasons why it is kicking off everywhere:
http://bbc.in/hSZ3Ak

50. Educational technology and the war on public education is licensed under
a
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License
.