On 23rd June, the University of Exeter announced its proposals to make severe cuts, which will equate to around 150 job losses. This managerial decision, justified by the university as in line with government strategy, was described by the co-chair of the University and College Union (UCU) as “academic vandalism”. The announcement has received significant backlash, exemplified by an online petition which has reached over 21,000 signatures.
Exeter is not unique in a trend of universities in “crisis-mode”: since May, both the University of Nottingham and the University of Sussex have used similar language of ‘sustainability’ and ‘market demand’ to justify their brutal funding cuts, hiring freezes, and mass redundancies. This article will outline how this increasingly widespread phenomenon cannot simply be explained by poor management and economically difficult times. By understanding the context of the marketisation of the Higher Education sector, we can see why we have reached this moment of crisis. In this way, these short-term neoliberal restructuring schemes will only continue to worsen the current state of decline.
The burden is falling disproportionately on the arts and humanities
Public figures who have spoken in protest of Exeter university’s decision include writers, broadcasters, and even the Archbishop of Canterbury, who stated that while “unpalatable choices” have to be made in fiscally difficult situations, it is concerning that the arts and humanities are “automatically identified as the first and softest targets”.
This observation is particularly clear in the case of Exeter. Senior management claims that there are no plans for department or course closures, but 85% of expected redundancies will affect academics in the Social Sciences, Humanities, and the Arts for People and the Economy (SHAPE) fields.
The growing regional inequality of access to non-STEM courses has been warned by a study performed by the British Academy. The map produced by the study signals “cold spots” across the UK - regions where access to SHAPE subjects is rapidly disappearing. The Academy argues that the concentration of SHAPE subjects to specific regions and higher-prestige institutions is diminishing the opportunities to the many students who are unlikely to be able to afford relocation to universities outside of their region.
Historical context: the neoliberal ‘marketisation’ of UK universities
Market-logic arguments are increasingly normalised by university management spokespersons, encouraged by the reforms that have occurred over the last few decades. Broadly speaking, since the 1990s Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) have shifted from functioning as public goods to private profit-driven institutions, whose “success” is measured in relation to the production of graduates, research, and knowledge seen as commodities serving a capitalist interest.
A turning point came after the 2010 Browne report, an investigation by the Department of Education, which reinforced the neoliberal “truism” that universities will perform better if they act more like businesses according to market forces. The reforms that followed included public funding being replaced by teaching grants, and a threefold increase in tuition fees since 2012. Furthermore, the government removed student number controls in 2015 so that recruitment could fluctuate with demand.
The effect on UK universities since these neoliberal-style reforms can be summarized by three major phenomena:
Firstly, perpetual financial difficulties: after the 2015-17 increase of fees, higher borrowing across the country led debt levels to almost triple between 2010/11 and 2020/21. Due to the reliance on uncapped international student fees, even minor fluctuations cause concern of fiscal instability. The vulnerability to exogenous shocks has thus led to short-term reforms that target the courses at ‘high risk’ of enrolment decline. These subjects are typically SHAPE courses, viewed as less commercially valuable. The two most-affected courses have been English and Classics, seeing a 20% decline in the Northeast and East Midlands for early career staff in the last year.
Secondly, instrumentalisation: universities, encouraged to compete to attract students, are ranked across an array of quantified metrics. For example, the Office for Students now uses employability as a proxy for educational quality. Research is evaluated by the Research Excellence Framework, which includes journal prestige and ranking as part of its criteria. Meanwhile, the National Student Survey scores teaching staff based on student responses. These metrics supposedly help universities evaluate the quality of education and research. Yet the excessive quantification of university impact ignores the more intrinsic values that higher education produces and overlooks the non-linear and less immediate economic value of non-STEM courses.
Finally, these changes have led to a concerning shift in the primary function of the university sector. The traditional societal and cultural importance placed on universities is now seen as secondary to its economic value to the consumer – the student. As universities brand themselves as specialized and compete for higher rankings, the university experience has become less pluralized. A qualitative study found that the majority of interviewed undergraduates used discourse that concerned their “entitlements” as students, in other words to ensure they were getting “good value for money”. While some students mentioned the benefits of their intellectual and personal self-development, the decision to enroll in university is more broadly perceived as a financial investment against calculated future financial gains.
This perspective is completely understandable in the context of high youth unemployment and the significant decision to consent to thousands of pounds of student debt. The gradual marketisation of universities is undermining the non-economic, societal value of HEIs as centers of cultural and knowledge production.
Frequent restructuring has become the norm at universities like Goldsmiths, who have seen three major redundancy schemes in the span of only five years. With little assessment of the local and broader impact of these enormous cuts, perhaps this “crisis” is not an efficiency failure but the consequence of marketisation itself.
A dangerous trajectory
The latest Education Committee Report released in May predicted that 124 institutions will be in deficit this year and 24 facing insolvency. The report concludes that the government should allow universities to fail and should allow for an “orderly exit” of other institutions, to permit a natural transitional period of market-led restructuring.
Programs that have taken years to design and perfect are thrown away overnight. Academics note that they are not given adequate financial evidence for the circumstances that put their careers on the line. In the case of Exeter, its prior annual report declared that 2024-5 was another “year of continued financial stability”, raising questions as to the necessity of the incoming slaughter to their humanities personnel.
If left unchallenged, this pattern of efficiency cuts will likely see the merging and closures of lower and middle ranking universities, especially post ’92 institutions. While specialisation and market-driven reforms may appear a ‘natural’ phenomenon, we are at risk of legitimising unequal access to diverse higher education programs for our next generation.
While neoliberal rhetoric boasts of the superiority of science courses for economic growth, the importance of humanities and social sciences must not be forgotten in the context of new socio-economic challenges from democratic backsliding to the ethics of AI. Short-term decision-making has already had damaging consequences, and we should consider how we can resist and find alternative models outside of the neoliberal paradigm if we care about protecting the future of higher education.
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