Globalization, Knowledge, Citizenship, Power

The authors of this work begin from the premise tht the neo-liberal reforms of the liberal university in Australia have left the institution in ruins as lean, mean entrepreneurial corporations concerned with money-making and prestige in a global information industry. The humanities are being downsized as research money and resources are directed by a New Class of managerialist administrators to ensure wealth creation by fostering techno-science and subsidizing high-tech industry. They argue that this is a disaster for philosophers, with fundamental research atrophying, the capacity for humanitites research and scholarship reduced to Third World status and public intellectuals contesting the neo-liberal mode of governance nowhere to be seen in the public eye. The work argues that it is possible for downsized critical intellectuals to find spaces amidst these ruins to work for a critical university that would help them to re-skill as public intellectuals.
Philosophy can contribute to this rethinking of the humanities, by drawing on its ancient heritage of a Socratic philosophy in the city, to develop an ethical philosophy in the city that writes for an eduated audience about the burning issues of everyday life. The authors assert that such a Socratic philosophy should take an oppositional stance to neo-classical economics and aim to keep the public conversation going about the destructive impact of the global market. The renewal of philosophy is developed by recovering a republican political philosophy that links education to citizenship and the good life in a free republic to defend ecologically sustainable ways of life of citizens in regional communities.