Historicizing academic freedom on universities, scholarly indeterminacy, and world ordering André C. Drainville

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Drainville, André C., 1963- author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Academic freedom.

Universities and colleges.

Universities.

Medical Subjects:

Universities.

Physical Description:

1 online resource

Place of Publication:

London Bloomsbury Academic 2026

Summary:

"André Drainville gives a provocative and necessary intervention into discussions of academic freedom, showing its connection to the evolving social relations of knowledge and power over the last thousand years. Rather than assuming that academic freedom is an established and well-defined, if threatened, right, Drainville historicizes the concept, understanding scholarly struggles for intellectual autonomy as part of the disputed, variously situated, processes of world ordering. Tracing instances of the freedom to think through the longue durée, he sets out a materialist history of the evolving relations between economic and social orders and the conditions of knowledge production from 12th century China to contemporary US campuses. In order to resituate debates about academic freedom within broader discussions of global forms of power and counter-power, the book draws on black existentialism, English labor history, critical political economy; French structuralist state theory; theories of global patriarchy; structural anthropology; postcolonial theory. Focusing on the little tradition of scholarly action, the book discusses two dozen moments in the development of the social relations of knowledge production that are not typically rendered as part of the (apparently) coherent and continuous dominant discourse of academic freedom. These span historical contexts from the pre-capitalist world economies, the formation of modern capitalism, the post-World War 2 world ordering, to the contemporary ‘new knowledge economy’. In each case, Drainville highlights how distinct structures of world order opened up, or narrowed, possibilities for scholars to institute self-regulated relations of knowledge production and how, above and beyond circumstantial considerations, scholars have time and again struggled for autonomy and indeterminacy. Rich in detail yet theoretically sophisticated, this book is an indispensable resource for those concerned with academic freedom and intellectual autonomy, historically and in the new knowledge economy"-- Bloomsbury Collections

Contents:

The Mongol moment

A world-system of universities

The crisis of universities

A global system of knowledge production

Conclusion : freedom in world ordering now

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index

Online resource; title from home page (Bloomsbury Collections, viewed August 28, 2026)

Other Format:

Print version Drainville, André C., 1963- Historicizing academic freedom

ISBN:

9781350576025

1350576026

9781350576032

1350576034

9781350576049

1350576042

OCLC:

1597385890

Access Restriction:

Restricted for use by site license