Review: the Demise of the library school: Personal reflections of professional education in the modern corporate university, LJ Press

Richard Cox's book (2010) The Demise of the Library School: personal reflections of professional education in the modern corporate university, LIbrary Juice Press, presents various arguments, in some instances anecdotal, based on his experience as a faculty librarian and administrator within the LIS graduate school system, and on his extensive reading about higher education. 

The authors speaks from a position of higher education as a public good, within the context of democracy with democratic goals and purposes underpinning and permeating the very existence of the Western university system. Cox (2010: 11) states the concerns of professional schools (including LIS schools) "naturally embrace concerns of public policy and a societal good." 

Ironically, the author consciously notes in his introduction (and the title of his book) that his book is a personal picture and not a research paper while later in the book (120) speaks of views that "are missing the social, political, economic, and other contexts," pointing out the greatest weakness in his tome. He speaks of the changes and offers numerous quotes and opinions to support his various positions on issues, but does not speak to the very contexts that drove and continue to drive those issues. 

This approach isolates Cox's arguments from the very changes he notes, reducing our reading to merely a spectator sport or perhaps more appropriate to his archival profession, just a record of what happened from his point of view. In doing so he cheats readers of a broader understanding of threats to the system and thus potential ability to respond to such changes at a critical level. Though it must be noted he does provide a multitude of citations for the various arguments and texts for those willing to pursue the various knowledge presented.

His reflections, while he never mentions neoliberalism, do confirm that strands of neoliberalism found within higher education appear within professional schools within academe. Some of the strands noted are: pursuit of knowledge/educating vs credentialism/vocational training; community engagement vs service; preservation of memory vs Baez's bibliocaust or annihilation of memory (66); public good vs business; measures that support or reflect core functions vs accountability; the university as a social institution vs a business/industry; critical thinking vs branding/marketing/ranking; debate vs censure; democracy vs other; qualitative vs quantitative; long term investments and results vs short term; reading, writing and reflection vs increased teaching loads, increased assessments, increased time spent developing and responding to measures of accountability; insight and inspiration and knowledge vs "information and skills necessary to find employment (96);" faculty as source of knowledge vs faculty as delivery mechanisms; citizens vs careerists; diversity in creativity vs standardization/bureaucratization; students vs customers; transformation vs adjustment; faculty governance vs management by administration; contributing to a body of knowledge vs delivering scripts developed externally. Cox also notes (227) the existence of "scrutiny, supervision, regimentation, discipline,...censorship" under the corporate university model.

So where do we go from here? How does one come to terms with the competing visions of democracy and neoliberalism with the continuing change to the corporate university model? Is there a way forward that retains the best of both and jettisons the worst of both?