Although neoliberalism is ‘characterised by a series of guiding principles’ which include ‘fiscal restraint, tax aversion and a preference for individualised, market- oriented approaches over collectivist and progressively redistributive ones, in reality these principles ‘are inconsistently and unevenly applied’ (Peck & Theodore 2012, p. 179). As a result, neoliberalism is sometimes referred to as ‘neoliberalisation’ as it ‘displays a lurching dynamic, marked by serial policy failure and improvised adaptation, and by combative encounters with obstacles and counter-movements (Peck & Theodore 2012, p. 178).
Neoliberalism also has the capacity to coexist with previous forms of liberalism. For example, since the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) in 2008, there has been a reversion by national governments to Keynesian economics, in a bid to restimulate the economy through national governments funding large infrastructure projects (Dean 2010). This is despite its principal opponent since the 1970s being Keynesian macroeconomic management, the welfare state and its associated social domain. In fact, neoliberalism represents a political ‘militant movement that draws its strength and gains its frontal character from that which it opposes’ (Dean 2012, p. 151). According to Dean (2012, p. 151), an analysis of neoliberalism highlights the ‘contingent sources, multiple forms, and heterogeneous and apparently contradictory elements’ which means ‘it is irreducible to a simple and coherent philosophy or ideology’. Dean’s (2012) analysis of neoliberal governmentality concurs with Foucault’s (1991) analysis of liberal governmentality in which the state is conceived of as both the instrument and effect of governmentality.
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2.4.2 Neoliberalism is a collective way of thinking
Neoliberalism is sometimes described as a ‘thought collective’. A ‘thought collective’ is defined as ‘an organised group of individuals exchanging ideas within a common intellectual framework’ (Dean 2012, p. 151). However, because a ‘thought collective’ involves ‘a field of dissension’, it represents more of a political movement than a consistent philosophy or ideology (Dean 2012, p. 151). For example, in the case of neoliberalism, a ‘thought collective’ represents a type of dynamic united political movement committed to achieving common neoliberal goals whilst allowing local and global variations and mutations and united whilst motivated by a common opposition to an alternative vision of society (Dean 2012). However, Taylor (2004) distinguishes a social imaginary from a social theory. Whereas a social theory is often only embedded in a small minority of the population, a social imaginary is a way of understanding or a way of thinking, which gives legitimacy to social practices:
By social imaginary, I mean something much broader and deeper than the intellectual schemes people may entertain when they think about social reality in a disengaged mode. I am thinking, rather, of the ways people imagine their social existence, how they fit together with others, how things go on between them and their fellows (Taylor 2004, p. 23).
A social imaginary is, therefore:
The expectations that are normally met, and the deeper normative notions and images that underlie their expectations, that common understanding that makes possible common practices and a widely shared sense of legitimacy (Taylor 2004, p. 23).
It is normalized through discourses and institutional practices:
…a social imaginary is not simply inherited and already determined for us, it is rather something which is in a state of flux. It is through the collective sense of imagination that discourses and institutional practices are created and given coherence and acquire the character of a taken for granted common sense (Rivzi & Lingard 2009, p. 444).
However, a social imaginary resembles the ‘régime of truth’ prevailing in every society in which one discourse is being perceived as more ‘true’ than another (Foucault 1980, p. 131).
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For the purpose of this study, neoliberalism is perceived as a social imaginary, or a way of thinking, which has been normalized through the powerful discourses of power/knowledge, over the last thirty years or so, following the election of the Federal labour Australian Government in 1983 and the subsequent 1988 Dawkins Reforms in higher education.
2.4.3 A shared understanding is normalized through local discourse
There is a dynamic relationship between common understanding and social practice. For example, Kjǣr and Pederson (2001) explain how neoliberal concepts are ‘institutionalised through local discursive processes’:
Discourse is a system of meaning that orders the production and conception of the social world in a particular context’, neoliberal concepts become institutionalised through local discursive processes in accordance with local requirements (Kjǣr and Pederson 2001, p. 220).
Social transformation occurs when new theories, held by the few, are able to penetrate the existing social imaginary and its existing concepts and social practices to the extent that a new social imaginary emerges comprising legitimized social practices (Taylor 2004). Therefore, Kjǣr and Pederson (2001) argue neoliberalism should not be perceived as a universal set of fixed concepts. In contrast, it should be conceived ‘as a more loosely connected set of concepts’ which are purposefully selected and ‘then stabilized in unique ways depending on the particular discursive and institutional contexts in which this occurred’ (Kjǣr and Pederson 2001, p. 221). Therefore, as the core principles of neoliberalism, such as competitive markets, deregulation, privatisation and marketization and performativity are normalized through localised discourses, Cahill (2010, p. 307) argues ‘actually existing neoliberalism’ is a more useful concept. Although new public management has become ‘a dominant discourse within universities’, there is immense variation across countries, and within countries, in relationship to how it has impacted traditional values and the extent to which it has ‘superseded collegiality’ (Hyde 2013 et al, p. 50).
While social imaginaries may represent a loose collection of concepts which have been normalised through local practise, a neoliberal social imaginary has gained global
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momentum through being promoted by transnational powerful institutions such as the World Bank, the IMF and the OECD. Therefore, despite core principles of neoliberalism being normalized through local discourses, a transnational neoliberal social imaginary also influences the discursive normalization process in higher education.