VIRTUAL EVENT: Tackling corruption in the university

Corruption narratives offer a lens for analysing social relations, economic interests, and hidden structures of power.

Moving beyond critiques of university administrations as bureaucratic, self-serving entities whose interests are increasingly at odds with the academic mission of the university, Cris Shore will question, what is corruption in academia and how does this problem relate to academic capitalism and the rise of audit culture? 

The context for his study is the extraordinary increase in institutionalised fraud prevention programs. His case study shows the introduction of a whistle-blower hotline at one Australasian university. He will examine the politics and interests behind such schemes. 

The increasing involvement of accountancy firms in non-auditing work, including anti-corruption services, illustrates how corruption narratives operate as market-making strategies. Cris will examine how commercialisation, risk management, and auditing proliferate anti-corruption initiatives. He will also explore how audit firms collude in the risk and corruption that they claim to ameliorate. 

He will conclude the session by assessing the implications for the anthropology of corruption and the growing penetration of universities by an increasingly commercially focused tax industry that, some argue, cannot even be trusted to regulate itself.

Speaker

• Cris Shore is Professor of Anthropology at Goldsmiths, University of London

Links

• Centre for Global Higher Education
• Department of Education, Practice and Society

Image: CHUTTERSNAP via Unsplash