High School Crisis or Stagnation? From Humanitarian Metaphors and Journalism towards Weberian Political Sociology

This is a response to the article by P.A. Orekhovsky and V.I. Razumov, “The Carnival Time: Russian Higher School and Science in the Postmodern Era”. Treatment of the negative phenomena of modern higher education in Russia using such humanitarian metaphors as “carnival”, “postmodern”, “the society of spectacle” is not productive, as well as journalistic invectives such as “spiritual prostitution”. The Weberian paradigm of political sociology as more adequate approach includes four areas of analysis: 1) politics, administration; relations of power within the university and around it, 2) economy, monetary and other resource relations in higher education, 3) culture, symbolic sphere, status, prestige, reputation as social relations. 4) solidarity and conflict; violence and violence control. The usual qualification of what is happening in Russian higher education as a “crisis” is also doubtful. A real crisis is a condition that has ceased to be acceptable while the usual ways and means of correcting the situation are useless. With this understanding no “crisis” is observed in modern higher education in Russia. The dissatisfaction of certain groups does not at all lead to an unacceptable state, to the subsequent intensive search for reasons and adequate ways to rectify the situation. Indeed, higher education in Russia is gradually leaning toward greater bureaucracy, simulation, virtualization-distance, and segregation. This state is not referred to as a “crisis”, but as a relatively stable equilibrium, getting into the attractor with vicious “stability” i.e. stagnation with slow but steady degradation. An exit from this state is extremely difficult, fraught with great alarms and threats. In order to switch to the “successful dynamism” attractor the discontent of involved social should lead to productive discussions with the indispensable participation of management practitioners, administrations of different levels, potential employers, resources holders. These groups on the basis of solidarity and trust then should realize pilot reforms with monitoring, promotion and incentives for the dissemination of successful experiences

Bureaucracy · Epistemology · Militarization · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Postmodernism · Social science · Sociology · Law · Sociopolitical Dynamics in Russia