Universities are changing rapidly in response to the external pressures variously called globalisation, internationalisation or new public management.  It is time to understand these changes from the perspective of how the outcomes of higher education are influenced by different constituencies: governments, legislatures, judiciaries, business, research bodies, administrators and, of course, scholars and students themselves.  How does the classic university project of knowledge and enlightenment cope with the pressures of global contacts, innovation priorities and efficiency criteria of continuous evaluation?  In order to fully grasp the nature of these phenomena it is necessary to understand those forces in the larger world which impinge on those institutions in which we work.

Recent debates in the social sciences on new ways of understanding these shifts in the anatomy of power are important contributions to the thinking of these wider constituencies who need to be engaged in the debate. An integrative social science perspective with a wide scope is necessary. The U21 network provides an ideal platform for these discussions.

Conference papers and workshops are being requested that address the following issues

• (Higher) Education, the production of subjects and the reproduction of social and political orders.
   
• Articulation of state, education and cultural reproduction as a global phenomenon
   
• Colonial education: indigeneity, assimilation identity politics: colonial education, the socialization of colonized peoples, the issues of assimilation, identity politics (resistance), the formation of colonial regimes
   
• The role of the intellectual/academic in relation to the state: international comparisons
   
• New Public Management, and its affect on the transformation of governance of education.
   
• The logic of research, knowledge production and innovation, and the requirements of the NPM family of models
   
• Public sector reforms, the transformation of state strategies and the university system.
   
• The global arena and the cult of “good governance”

To present a paper, please send a preliminary title and brief abstract to Jonathan Friedman, one of the conference organizers at Lund University's  Department of Social Anthropology by 29 August 2008.

Those interested in attending the Symposium should also contact Professor Friedman.