Treatment worse than disease? Diagnosis through the study of public higher education elites

Abstract

The public system of higher education in Poland is widely seen as “ill” – incompatible with the aims assumed by its stakeholders. There is agreement as to the existence of the problem, but no agreement on the diagnosis or courses of treatment. The diagnosis presented in this article is based on a two-year study of higher education elites – academic leaders and government policymakers. The author proposes that a possible cause of the “illness” can be understood through the medical term of polypragmasia – a situation when a sick patient consults different doctors who provide different diagnoses and prescribe different medications that produce undesirable interactions. The university is “sick” because the Ministry of Science and Higher Education and academic leaders give it different “diagnoses” and prescribe different “medications.” While academic leaders emphasize the role of the university in pursuing truth, policymakers see it primarily as an engine of economic growth. In effect, the aims pursued by academic leaders differ from those assumed in recent Polish legislation, and stimuli stemming from political channels encourage behaviors incompatible with the academic ethos. Research findings suggest three areas of potential synergy that could become turning points towards a self-transformation of Polish higher education: elite education, merit-based funding of academic research, and “soft skills.”