Reclaiming the University for the Public Good: Experiments and Futures in Co-operative Higher Education [1st ed. 2019] 978-3-030-21624-5, 978-3-030-21625-2

Table of contents :
Front Matter ....Pages i-xx
Now Is the Time for Co-operative Higher Education (Malcolm Noble, Cilla Ross)....Pages 1-22
Useable Pasts for a Co-operative University: As Different as Light from Darkness? (Tom Woodin)....Pages 23-43
Establishing and Sustaining Co-operative Universities and Co-operative Higher Education in International Contexts: Challenges and Possibilities (Amanda Benson, Cilla Ross)....Pages 45-66
Prefiguring the Idea of the University: What Can Be Learned from Autonomous Learning Spaces That Have Experimented with No-Fee, Alternative Forms of Higher Education in the UK? (Gary Saunders)....Pages 67-89
The Social Science Centre, Lincoln: Free, Co-operative Higher Education (Members of the SSC)....Pages 91-107
The RED Learning Co-operative: Research, Education and Development for Social Change (Fenella Porter, Tracy Walsh)....Pages 109-124
Phoenix from the Ashes: The Origins and Development of Leicester Vaughan College (Lucy Faire, Miriam Gill)....Pages 125-144
The Co-operative Intellect: Journeys in Radical Human Ecology (Luke Devlin, Svenja Meyerricks, Anne Winther)....Pages 145-167
The Co-operative as Site of Pedagogy: The Example of Edinburgh Student Housing Co-operative (Pablo Perez Ruiz, Mike Shaw)....Pages 169-183
Co-operative Research and Research Co-operatives (Thomas Swann)....Pages 185-204
Massive Open Online Course u.lab: Creating Transformational Learning in Scotland (Anne Winther, Valerie Jackman, Keira Oliver)....Pages 205-225
Collaging with Co-operators: An Arts-Based Inquiry into Member Perceptions of Co-operative Higher Education (Hannah Bland)....Pages 227-246
Seeking a Co-operative University: Reconstructing Adult Education and Reclaiming Higher Education as a Public Good (Malcolm Noble, Cilla Ross)....Pages 247-256
Afterword: A Student Responds (Sally Birch)....Pages 257-261
Back Matter ....Pages 263-271

Citation preview

PALGRAVE CRITICAL UNIVERSITY STUDIES

Reclaiming the University for the Public Good Experiments and Futures in Co-operative Higher Education Edited by Malcolm Noble · Cilla Ross

Palgrave Critical University Studies

Series Editor John Smyth University of Huddersfield Huddersfield, UK

Aims of the Palgrave Critical University Studies Series Universities everywhere are experiencing unprecedented changes and most of the changes being inflicted upon universities are being imposed by political and policy elites without any debate or discussion, and little understanding of what is being lost, jettisoned, damaged or destroyed. The over-arching intent of this series is to foster, encourage, and publish scholarship relating to academia that is troubled by the direction of these reforms occurring around the world. The series provides a much-needed forum for the intensive and extensive discussion of the consequences of ill-conceived and inappropriate university reforms and will do this with particular emphasis on those perspectives and groups whose views have hitherto been ignored, disparaged or silenced. The series explores these changes across a number of domains including: the deleterious effects on academic work, the impact on student learning, the distortion of academic leadership and institutional politics, and the perversion of institutional politics. Above all, the series encourages critically informed debate, where this is being expunged or closed down in universities. More information about this series at http://www.palgrave.com/gp/series/14707

Malcolm Noble  •  Cilla Ross Editors

Reclaiming the University for the Public Good Experiments and Futures in Co-operative Higher Education

Editors Malcolm Noble Leicester Vaughan College Leicester, UK

Cilla Ross Co-operative College Manchester, UK

ISSN 2662-7329     ISSN 2662-7337 (electronic) Palgrave Critical University Studies ISBN 978-3-030-21624-5    ISBN 978-3-030-21625-2 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-21625-2 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2019 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, express or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Cover illustration: © Serhii Chrucky / Alamy This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG. The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland

Foreword

Raymond Williams, the cultural critic and adult educator argued that adults turn to learning at times of change to understand what is happening, to adapt to it, and to shape it. There is no shortage of changes to confront currently—ecological, technological, demographic, and industrial—each with profound implications for the way we organise our lives together, and all of which necessarily involve engaging adults in collectively confronting how best we can frame a world worth living in. Yet opportunities to learn and reflect together on what needs doing and how best to do it have been reduced dramatically in recent years—as more than half the number of mature part-time students in English Higher Education have been lost in the last five years, and as two million students have been lost to further education since 2003. At the same time there has been increased erosion of intellectual and organisational autonomy in higher education, the impoverishment of further education colleges overwhelmed by endless changes in regulatory expectations, and the reduction of education policy to a subset of economic policy. A neoliberal dynamic stalks the earth with universities challenged to compete in a competitive global market, managerialism rampant, working conditions eroded, and student experience of university measured through income earned in future jobs. Where, in all this, is there space for the kind of education for democracy and exploration of alternatives that is needed to support people in addressing our challenges? v

vi Foreword

This is the context that has given rise to this vibrant and creative set of chapters which offer a vision of an alternative, co-operative, higher education, dedicated to the public good. As Hannah Bland points out in her chapter the case made here for a co-operative university is situated in and against a problematic context. There is a common concern to recreate a community of scholars, with flat management structures, democratic decision making, a pedagogy co-produced with learners, and a concern to recognise that what we know together is more than the sum of what we know on our own. There is, too, a recognition that for the imaginative initiatives developed in Brighton, Lincoln, Oxford, Leicester, Glasgow, and Edinburgh to be sustainable, secure funding is needed as well as commitment and solidarity. In the international examples looked at, Mondragon solved that problem in part by reliance on the support of the range of co-operative enterprises in the Basque Country, but that is not an answer easily found in the UK. The Co-operative College’s proposed solution is to take advantage of the English 2017 Higher Education Reform Act’s provision for alternative providers of Higher Education to be publicly funded, and to offer a federated relationship with existing local initiatives and co-operatives to validate learner achievements. Of course, as the University Extra-Mural provision of the past century attests, not everyone seeking to explore effective democratic Higher Education wants their study to be limited by the constraints of certification, and a federated Co-operative Higher Education will want to accommodate their work alongside accredited provision. As Tom Woodin’s chapter makes clear, the Co-operative College has a rich vein of experience in collegiate, co-operative, and collaborative education, and a fair number of short-lived initiatives too. Yet as E.P. Thompson’s The Making of the English Working Class showed, there is so much that can be learned and borrowed from such projects, however short-lived. There is much to recover too, from earlier co-operative educational practice. I have always been struck by the Co-operative Women’s Guild’s approach to developing their contributions to debates on suffrage and divorce law reform. Faced in their debates with strong majority views, and equally emphatic minority views, the Guild, under the leadership of Margaret Llewellyn Davies, developed public policy statements that reported both perspectives. That kind of respect for dif-

 Foreword 

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ference and divergent views would be of contemporary use in the aftermath of Brexit. All in all, Reclaiming the University for the Public Good: Experiments and Futures in Co-operative Higher Education, is an absorbing and inspiring account of work to demonstrate, in the language of the World Social Forum, that ‘another world is possible’, one where education takes learners away from passive absorption to active problem solving, and where students and academics all bring knowledge and experience to the table to construct a learning agenda. And once the struggle to secure a co-­ operative alternative in Higher Education is established, I look forward to a companion volume, bringing the same flair and energy to reclaiming the further education college and adult education provision for the public good. Wolverhampton, UK

Alan Tuckett

Contents

1 Now Is the Time for Co-operative Higher Education  1 Malcolm Noble and Cilla Ross 2 Useable Pasts for a Co-operative University: As Different as Light from Darkness? 23 Tom Woodin 3 Establishing and Sustaining Co-operative Universities and Co-operative Higher Education in International Contexts: Challenges and Possibilities 45 Amanda Benson and Cilla Ross 4 Prefiguring the Idea of the University: What Can Be Learned from Autonomous Learning Spaces That Have Experimented with No-Fee, Alternative Forms of Higher Education in the UK? 67 Gary Saunders

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5 The Social Science Centre, Lincoln: Free, Co-operative Higher Education 91 Members of the SSC 6 The RED Learning Co-operative: Research, Education and Development for Social Change109 Fenella Porter and Tracy Walsh 7 Phoenix from the Ashes: The Origins and Development of Leicester Vaughan College125 Lucy Faire and Miriam Gill 8 The Co-operative Intellect: Journeys in Radical Human Ecology145 Luke Devlin, Svenja Meyerricks, and Anne Winther 9 The Co-operative as Site of Pedagogy: The Example of Edinburgh Student Housing Co-operative169 Pablo Perez Ruiz and Mike Shaw 10 Co-operative Research and Research Co-operatives185 Thomas Swann 11 Massive Open Online Course u.lab: Creating Transformational Learning in Scotland205 Anne Winther, Valerie Jackman, and Keira Oliver 12 Collaging with Co-operators: An Arts-­Based Inquiry into Member Perceptions of Co-operative Higher Education227 Hannah Bland

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13 Seeking a Co-operative University: Reconstructing Adult Education and Reclaiming Higher Education as a Public Good247 Malcolm Noble and Cilla Ross 14 Afterword: A Student Responds257 Sally Birch Index263

Notes on Contributors

Bradley  Allsop  is a PhD student at University of Lincoln studying youth politics under neoliberalism. He is also a student activist. Amanda  Benson  co-ordinates projects and research as well as designs and delivers training at the Co-operative College, Manchester. Specializing in gender, agriculture, international and community development, Amanda promotes sustainable and inclusive development both in the UK and worldwide. Before joining the Co-operative College, Amanda worked in community development in the UK, supporting adult learners through community training and mentoring. Sally  Birch  is studying in her final year for a BA (Hons) in Art and Humanities. She organised and led a campaign to try to save the Vaughan Centre for Lifelong Learning in Leicester. She is passionate about transforming lives through education. Sally is married with two children and works full time as a Learning Behaviour Mentor in a SEMH (Social, Emotional, Mental Health) school in Leicester. Hannah  Bland  Her interest in democratizing knowledge production comes from frustrations with her own experiences as a student in a traditional university coupled with an impatience for social change and a stubborn belief that education can and must play a role in bringing it xiii

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Notes on Contributors

about. Her work is shaped by her affinity to critical anthropological, feminist and activist research traditions. Hannah was an active member of the Co-operative University Working Group and currently sits on the Interim Academic Board. Luke  Devlin  is executive director of the Centre for Human Ecology, Glasgow, and a doctoral researcher at the Intercultural Research Centre, Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh. His work attempts to emphasize the interconnections between nature, culture, society and spirituality. Lucy Faire  is a twentieth-century social historian and a founder member of Leicester Vaughan College Community Benefit Society. She has several years of experience teaching mature students as an Associate Lecturer for the Open University (OU) and for the Vaughan Centre of Lifelong Learning, Leicester University, which will close in 2020. Miriam Gill  is an art historian with a particular interest in the middle ages and has a long experience of adult education. She is a founder member of Leicester Vaughan College Community Benefit Society. She teaches at the Vaughan Centre for Lifelong Learning which the Leicester University decided to disestablish in 2016. Valerie Jackman  is Leadership Lead at College Development Network, Scotland. Having worked as a lecturer for two decades, Valerie has extensive experience in Learning and Development and has developed a number of innovative programmes including u.explore. Valerie is a member of the holding team for u.lab Scotland and u.lab Ireland. Svenja  Meyerricks  lives and works in Glasgow: in community food projects, as a freelance educator and director of the Centre for Human Ecology. She holds a PhD on community projects and climate change in Scotland from the University of St Andrews. Malcolm Noble  is an economic historian. He teaches and researches at the Vaughan Centre for Lifelong Learning at University of Leicester and Leicester Vaughan College. He was awarded a PhD in Economic and Social History by the University of Edinburgh in 2017.

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Keira Oliver  is the research and learning lead on Workforce Scotland’s Collective Leadership initiative and Scottish Government lead for supporting the growth of u.lab in Scotland—a change leadership and community empowerment programme offered by Massachusetts Institute of Technology, based on Theory U. In 2012 she was awarded a PG Cert in Public Policy from the University of Edinburgh. Pablo  Perez  Ruiz  has been involved with student co-operatives since 2014 through the Edinburgh Student Housing Co-operative, the Swap and Reuse Hub Co-operative and the national network Students for Co-operation (SfC). In 2017, Pablo joined the Co-operative University Working Group as an SfC representative. Fenella Porter  is an activist and teacher in labour studies, development studies and women’s rights, with 25+ years’ experience working with women’s organizations and movements, development non-governmental organizations, and trade unions at national and international levels. Her teaching work has concentrated on activist education, enabling and facilitating critical thinking for the broader purpose of social change. With former colleagues from Ruskin College and the Co-operative College, she is a co-founder of the RED Learning Co-operative (Research, Education and Development for Social Change). Cilla  Ross  is an educator and work sociologist with a background in higher and alternative adult education. As vice principal of the Co-operative College Cilla has oversight of the triad of co-operative education, research and future thinking. Decent work, livelihood building and co-operative placemaking are priorities but wider research and practice includes radical education methodologies and research on the future of work. Most recently Cilla has been working on ways of challenging precarity through union co-ops, co-designing the first Co-operative University in the UK and devising projects which celebrate the Ministry of Reconstruction 1919 Report on Adult Education and consider its relevance for our time.

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Gary  Saunders is a scholar-activist at University of Lincoln whose research and practice focuses on critical and democratic pedagogical initiatives both inside and outside of mainstream higher education. Gary’s doctoral thesis documents and critically reflects upon the creation and running of autonomous learning spaces that emerged in response to the UK Conservative–Liberal Democrat coalition government’s reforms to higher education in 2010. Gary is also involved in the development and implementation of Student as Producer at University of Lincoln which is part of an attempt to engage academics and students in a way that is critical of current attempts to marketize and instrumentalize higher education by involving all in the pursuit of scholarship through collaborative curriculum design and academic research. Mike Shaw  is a network co-ordinator for Students for Cooperation. He became active in the co-operative movement through co-founding the Edinburgh Student Housing Co-operative whilst studying maths and physics at the University of Edinburgh. He was also a trustee and elected officer for Edinburgh University Students’ Association and active in the NUS, the National Campaign Against Fees, and Cuts and Edinburgh Uncut. Laura Stafford  is a full-time parent and part-time scholar, working on the fringes of the gig economy and attempting to participate in mass intellectuality. Thomas Swann  is a Leverhulme Early Career Fellow at Loughborough University working in Politics and International Studies. His research focuses on anarchist forms of organization and democratic decision making, exploring how these can be made inclusive and effective from an intersectional anarchist perspective. Tracy Walsh  is a teacher and activist, starting her career in trade union education after studying at Ruskin College on a Unison scholarship. She is a doctoral researcher in the Department of Human Resources and Organizational Behaviour at University of Greenwich. Tracy is interested in working-class education, and with former colleges from Ruskin College

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and the Co-operative College, she is a co-founder of the RED Learning Co-operative (Research, Education and Development for Social Change). Anne Winther  lives and works in rural Scotland as a transdisciplinary researcher and activist. Her PhD investigating the sustainability of rural communities in Scotland was at University of Stirling. She is a member of the international u.lab research network and the u.lab Scotland network and is a director of the Centre for Human Ecology. Tom  Woodin is a reader in the social history of education at the University College London (UCL) Institute of Education. He has researched and published widely on co-­operatives and learning, including Community and Mutual Ownership: A historical review for the Joseph Rowntree Foundation and edited the book Co-operation, Learning and Co-operative Values published by Routledge. He also works on the history of education and is co-writing a history of the Co-operative College for Palgrave Macmillan. His most recent book is on workers’ writing and community publishing, Working-Class Writing and Publishing in the LateTwentieth Century. He co-edits the journal History of Education.

List of Figures

Fig. 1.1 Fig. 8.1 Fig. 8.2 Fig. 11.1

Fig. 11.2 Fig. 11.3 Fig. 11.4

The sweet spot of CHE (Thanks to Linda Shaw and Stirling Smith for their 2016 guidance in the development of this schematic)4 The co-operative intellect (After: Geddes in Davie 1961 (n11);  Newman 1907 (n41); McIntosh 2008 (n39); Read 2015 (n26); and Barnett 2018 (n37)) 154 Building capacity for co-operative education: Collectively taking the first steps of transition February 2019 167 Scharmer’s u-process as experienced in Scotland (drawn by Linda Hunter and adapted from a drawing by Kelvy Bird. Published online http://www.ottoscharmer.com/sites/default/ files/Scharmer_ETU_Fig 04_ThreeMovements_Web.jpg created under the Creative Commons Licence, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/ and in Scharmer, O. 2018. Theory U: Core principles and applications. Oakland, CA: Berrett-Koehler)210 The world’s first u.lab Hub Host Programme, Edinburgh, June 2017 213 In-person u.lab Scotland holding team at Edinburgh College, May 2017 215 ‘Personal development award, u.explore’ course outline (adapted from Scharmer et al.’s u.lab, https://presencing.org,

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List of Figures

Fig. 12.1 Fig. 12.2 Fig. 12.3 Fig. 12.4 Fig. 12.5

Burnett and Evans, https://designingyour.life and the SQA PDA award, https://www.sqa.org.uk/sqa/57040.html) 219 “What LVC is not”, participating members of Leicester Vaughan College 235 “What FUB means to me”, Yvette (member of Free University Brighton)236 “What LSSC means to us”, Dianne and Annabelle (members of Lincoln Social Science Centre) 238 “What LSSC means to me”, Cara (member of Lincoln Social Science Centre) 239 “What FUB means to me”, Lianne (member of Free University Brighton)241

1 Now Is the Time for Co-operative Higher Education Malcolm Noble and Cilla Ross

In 2018, the University of Leicester announced that its next Chancellor would be David Willetts.1 For students and staff alike, it was hard to imagine a less appropriate candidate. The students’ union organized a petition objecting to the appointment as the University’s figurehead, a former minister responsible for £9000 tuition fees and notorious for comments around ‘feminism and the increase in working women for

 University of Leicester. 2018. Lord Willetts, former Universities and Science Minister, announced as new Chancellor of University of Leicester. https://www2.le.ac.uk/offices/press/pressreleases/2018/february/lord-willetts-former-universities-and-science-minister-announced-as-newchancellor-of-university-of-leicester. Accessed 28 March 2019. 1

M. Noble (*) Leicester Vaughan College, Leicester, UK e-mail: [email protected] C. Ross Co-operative College, Manchester, UK e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s) 2019 M. Noble, C. Ross (eds.), Reclaiming the University for the Public Good, Palgrave Critical University Studies, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-21625-2_1

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damaging the social mobility of working class men’.2 When Willets launched his book at the University the following week there were wide-­ scale protests. Yet even as a petition gathered thousands of signatures, this seemed to have no meaningful impact on the University’s management.3 This proved too much for many students and the occupation of the University’s administrative buildings ensued, something not seen on that campus since the 1970s. All of this however had nil traction, and at the time of writing, despite his not having attended any graduation ceremony, Willetts is Chancellor of that university. In short, staff and students—the members of the University—had no say in such an appointment, or indeed most aspects of the governance of the institution. In this example—and there have been similar moments at almost every university in the UK—it became apparent that, for all the baroque charade of ‘consultation’ and ‘engagement’—those hallmarks of New Public Management (NPM)—the university did not belong to its members.4 It became apparent too, in the context of the Universities Superannuation Scheme (USS) pension strikes of 2018, that universities en bloc were being run not in the interests of students, of scholars, or the common good, but a narrow neoliberal agenda. When we speak of a governance crisis in Higher Education (HE), the issue of unaccountability and lack of control by the majority sit at the heart of the problem. As a result of government policies, universities, and the education and knowledge they produce, are not public goods, but private ones. In this volume, examples are provided which show that there are alternatives. In this chapter, we introduce the context to these alternatives under three headings: what is Co-operative Higher Education (CHE), the  Leicester Union, University of Leicester should re-consider the appointment of David Willets as Chancellor. Change.org. https://www.change.org/p/university-of-leicester-university-of-leicestershould-re-consider-the-appointment-of-david-willets-as-chancellor. Accessed 28 March 2019. 3  https://www.leicestermercury.co.uk/news/leicester-news/university-leicester-david-willetts-conservative1304292. Accessed 28 March 2019 https://www.leicestermercury.co.uk/news/leicester-news/university-leicester-urged-re-consider1222424. Accessed 28 March 2019 4  There are many good introductions to NPM. Ferlie, E., L. Ashburner, L. Fitzgerald, and A. Pettigrew. 1996. The New Public Management in Action. Oxford: OUP; Christensen, T., and P. Lægreid. Introduction. In The Ashgate Research Companion to New Public Management, ed. T. Christensen and P. Lægreid, 1–16. Farnham: Ashgate; and J. Newman, ‘Serving the Public? Users, Consumers and the Limits of NPM’, in ibid., 349–60. 2

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Co-operative University Project (CUP) and the neoliberal university. We also offer a brief consideration of the themes this collection addresses.

What is Co-operative Higher Education? Co-operative education has a long and complex history, with global reach, multiple meanings, and encompasses a ‘rich ecology of educational provision’.5 Although it still warrants further research, co-operative education has undergone increased scholarly attention in recent years.6 For example, Woodin discussed the emergence of co-operative community education in the nineteenth century when it fluctuated between the practical and the utopian; Vernon described how co-operative education was an early innovator in technical education and workforce development; Shaw reminded us of the role of the Co-operative College in supporting the growth of co-operative education and the global movement internationally and more recently, there has been a focus on co-operative schools.7 There has also been a long-standing ambition for over 150 years to establish CHE and even a co-operative university (CU), and recent research has focused on co-operative provision at this level.8 Regardless of level, what is nearly always privileged in any discussion of co-operative education is the claim that its difference lies in its  Shaw, L. 2015. Mapping Co-operative Education in the UK. In Co-operation, Learning and Co-operative Values, ed. T. Woodin, 162. London: Routledge. 6  See Shaw, L. 2012. Co-operative Education Review. Manchester: Co-operative College; Shaw, L. 2013. What Is Co-operative Education? Manchester: Co-operative College Unpublished Paper; Shaw, 2015, 161–76. 7  Woodin, T. 2011. Co-operative Education in Britain During the Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries: Context, Identity and Learning. In The Hidden Alternative, Co-operative Values, Past, Present and Future, ed. A. Webster, 78–95. Manchester: MUP; Vernon, K., ‘Values and Vocation: Educating the Co-operative Workforce 1918–39’, in ibid., 37–58; Shaw, L. 2012. Co-operative Education Review, 13. Manchester: Co-operative College; Davidge, G. 2016. Rethinking Education Through Critical Psychology: Co-operative Schools, Social Justice and Voice. London: Routledge. 8  Saunders, G. 2017. Somewhere Between Reform and Revolution: Alternative Higher Education and ‘The Unfinished’. In Mass Intellectuality and Democratic Leadership in Higher Education, ed. R. Hall and J. Winn. London: Bloomsbury; Neary, M., and J. Winn. 2017. There Is an Alternative: A Report on an Action Research Project to Develop a Framework for Co-operative Higher Education. Learning and Teaching 10: 87–105. 5

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Pedagogy

Institutions & Delivery

Content

Active learning based on co-operative values. We start from the needs of learners around real issues. Participatory approaches – learning is a process. Solidarity not competitive learning. Research which underpins all we do. Institutions & Delivery – flexible, distributed, starts from where people are at in creative learning spaces. Content – democracy, governance, values and principles, co-operative identity, member control, social justice, social purpose.

Fig. 1.1  The sweet spot of CHE (Thanks to Linda Shaw and Stirling Smith for their 2016 guidance in the development of this schematic)

advocacy and commitment to participatory and active learning approaches—whether in the nineteenth-century reading room above a co-operative shop, in study circles, in using distance and correspondence course methods, or through online learning.9 Whilst these methods and pedagogies are now widespread in mainstream HE, this was not always the case whereas such approaches often characterized co-operative adult education from its inception and certainly in its present.10 CHE consists of a bundle of pedagogic approaches underpinned by values: active learning, listening, researching, writing and thinking; participatory and action research; critical thinking; interdisciplinarity; solidaristic not competitive practice; collective, personal and individual reflection, self-awareness; inclusivity and collaboration. A successful alignment of these approaches, fused with appropriate content and delivery, results in a CHE sweet spot, see Fig. 1.1.11

 Woodin, T. 2015. Co-operation, Learning and Co-operative Values, ed. London: Routledge.  Woodin, T. 2011. 11  See Benson and Ross in Chap. 3 of this collection and https://www.mondragon.edu/en/information-of-interest/learning-model 9

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In this volume the terms CHE and CU are used together. CHE might take an institutional form, for example, existing as a Co-operative Higher Education Institution (HEI), and thus constitute or be approximate to, a university, as well as describe tertiary education which reflects and draws upon particular pedagogical and ontological approaches. However, CHE can take place within a mainstream university, by employing the pedagogical and ontological techniques noted above. A co-operative university is very specifically a degree-awarding body which is likely to deliver CHE, but it might also provide HE which is not co-operative: that is, that the organizational structure is co-operative, but the education provided is not co-operative in character.

The UK Co-operative University Project As discussed in Chap. 3, there are co-operative university models to be found internationally and whilst diverse, they are distinguished to a greater or lesser extent from mainstream universities by a commitment to CHE and to co-operative forms of governance and democratic practice.12 In the UK the Co-operative College’s work with a number of co-­operative universities helped early thinking about whether or not to seek university title or degree awarding powers (DAPs), and more tangibly, the idea of a UK co-operative university emerged from a trio of contexts. First was a report written by Dan Cook in 2013 for the Co-operative College which explored the barriers and enablers to the realization of a co-operative university.13 The report contributed to an emerging body of interest, literature and research on alternative models of Higher Education and CHE from within the HE mainstream.14 At the same time ­academics,  Boden, R., P. Ciancelli, and S. Wright. 2012. Trust Universities? Governance for Post-capitalist Futures. Journal of Co-operative Studies 45: 16–24. 13  Cook, Dan. 2013. Realising the Co-operative University. Unpublished report for the Co-operative College. 14  Wright, S., et al. 2011. Report on a Field Visit to Mondragón University: A Co-operative Experience/Experiment. Learning and Teaching 4: 38–56; Social Science Centre, Lincoln. 2013. An Experiment in Free, Co-operative Higher Education. Radical Philosophy 182: 66–7; Yeo, S. 2014. The Co-operative University? Transforming Higher Education. In Co-operation, Learning and Co-operative Values, ed. Tom Woodin. London: Routledge. 12

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educators and practitioners were experiencing heightened levels of alienation, casualization, instrumentalization and performance management and this, coupled with deepening concerns about student debt, vice chancellors’ pay and work precarity, resulted in the growth of a values-­ based community of academic practice interested in pushing forward on co-operative Higher Educational thinking.15 Second was the passing of a piece of legislation—the Higher Education and Research Act 2017 (HERA)—the latest iteration of long-term trends in the marketization and privatization of Higher Education.16 The Act should be seen in the historical context of the neoliberal attack on public goods and services as this ideology has transformed universities into businesses, run as corporations, and the education provided by them as private goods benefiting individual students. The Act introduced a single new regulator, the Office for Students (OfS), which enables the emergence of ‘challenger institutions’ to complement existing Higher Education and offers a faster route to acquiring DAPs. Thus whilst the legislation is designed to dismantle the public university, it also opens the door to new providers, including a co-operative university. A third and final context is the proliferation of co-operative and social solidarity models into new economic and social spaces and sectors—such as the gig economy. There is clearly a renewed interest in the co-operative as an alternative social and economic form to capitalism as new models of work and social organizing emerge.17 This has prompted fresh thinking not only about what sort of co-operative education is needed for the future but also a recommitment to reconnect co-operative education with its

 Brown, R. 2013. Everything for Sale? The Marketization of UK Higher Education. Research into Higher Education. Routledge; Neary, M., and J. Winn. 2017. Beyond Public and Private: A Framework for Co-operative Higher Education. Open Library of Humanities 3 (2): 2, 1–36; Winn, J. 2015. The Co-operative University: Labour, Property and Pedagogy. Power and Education 7 (1). 16  https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2017/29/contents. Accessed 19 May 2017. 17  See CICOPA. 2018. Global Study on Youth Co-operative Entrepreneurship. Geneva: ICA; Webster, T., et al., eds. 2016. Mainstreaming Co-operation. Manchester: MUP; Roelants, B., et al. 2012. The Resilience of the Cooperative Model: How Worker Cooperatives, Social Cooperatives and Other WorkerOwned Enterprises Respond to the Crisis and Its Consequences. CECOP, CICOPA; and Bird, A., P. Conaty, and C. Ross. 2017. Organising Precarious Workers, Trade Union and Co-operative Strategies. London: TUC. 15

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roots in adult education, as is originally evidenced in the 1919 Ministry of Reconstruction enquiry into adult education.18 In 2016, partly in anticipation of the proposed legislation, a group of representatives from the co-operative movement, academics, educators, practitioners and students began to meet informally to consider the Co-operative College’s response to HERA. This became the Co-operative University Working Group (CUWG) which was encouraged by a fresh report scoping the viability of a UK co-operative university.19 A recommendation to the Co-operative College’s Trustees was approved: that a twin-track approach should be taken to explore the formation of DAPs to enable a growing range  of  Higher Education co-operatives to provide degrees in federation, enabling all to offer formal qualifications and access student loan finance. The CUWG consulted widely with a number of Higher Education co-operatives to seek a definition of what a UK co-operative university might look like and did this through a series of roundtables: Democracy, Members and Governance; Accreditation, Curriculum and Pedagogy and Livelihood and Finances. Clearly any co-operative university would need to conform to the International Co-operative Alliance (ICA) Co-operative Identity Statement and be owned by its members—aligning values with governance.20 As with any university, a co-operative university would also award degrees, have students and use a university title. Additional defining characteristics reached by consensus during co-­ working include a set of CHE principles: 1. The Co-operative University Project is a living, collective project run democratically by its members: students, researchers, teachers and

 Bibby, A. 2015. The Co-operative Disadvantage: Why the Movement Needs a Level Playing Field - Co-operative News. [online] Co-operative News. Available at: http://www.thenews.coop/97065/ news/general/co-operative-disadvantage-movement-needs-level-playing-field/. Accessed 22 March 2017; see https://www.co-op.ac.uk/adult-education. And Ministry of Reconstruction. 1919. Adult Education Committee: Final Report. London: H. M. Stationery Office. 19  Ramos, E. A. 2017. Feasibility Study to Acquire Degree Awarding Powers (in the light of the Higher Education and Research Act). A report for the Co-operative College. Manchester: Co-operative College. 20  The ICA is the apex body of co-operatives globally; see https://ica.coop/en 18

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other stakeholders, in solidarity with their communities and with other co-operatives locally and globally. 2. Arising out of the co-operative movement, co-operative education is values based on principle, mutual in practice, and justice orientated in outcome. It is based on mutual learning and shared knowledge, whereby students play a central role in educational design, content and delivery. Spaces of learning are driven by justice, equality and fairness. 3. Co-operative Higher Education is based upon the principle that teachers and students have much to learn from each other and their communities. 4. Co-operative Higher Education aims to establish shared knowledge and understanding for people and the planet with an aim to: • Co-create educational and social practices based upon political and economic democracy • Challenge injustice, inequality and exploitation in all its forms • Strengthen, enhance and grow co-operative leadership to boost the co-operative sector, the labour movement and other social justice movements • Develop thoughtful understandings of co-operation • Enhance well-being and foster the possibility for everyone to explore their full range of abilities 5. Co-operative Higher Education is underpinned by ways of learning about and researching co-operation through the active and equal participation of everyone. We have a view of the world that is based upon co-operative values, integrity, equality and a commitment to education with a social purpose. 6. Ultimately, the co-operative university will be a federated network of independent and autonomous co-operatives. Some discussions within the roundtables were challenging for all participants. For example, an informal, individual and collective assumption was that a UK co-operative university would offer courses at low fees.

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However, the CUWG was ultimately persuaded by the expert leading the Livelihood and Finances roundtable that this would not necessarily benefit low income students in terms of repayment criteria nor guarantee a high-quality offer.21 What is more, CUWG collectively recognized and accepted that Higher Education has a relatively high unit cost because education is an expensive but vital public good. Likewise there were sensitive discussions about the relationship between the Co-operative College, which is applying for DAPs, and the federated co-operatives. How might the federation as a self-critical scholarly community deal collectively with quality or economic problems in one of its members? An Interim Academic Board which consists of representatives of each federated co-operative, associated trade unions of the co-operative and student movements, and other adult education providers continues to explore these challenges. The focus at the time of writing is on planning and delivering CHE which attracts students from within and without the existing and emerging co-operative movement as well as wider alternative constituencies. Co-operatives and other forms within the social solidarity economy are an alternative to the neoliberal economic model; however, they are often seen as hidden alternatives.22 Fundamentally a co-operative is a business, a people-centred enterprise which is owned and run by and for its members. Profits generated are either reinvested in the enterprise or returned to the members. The formal ICA definition of a co-operative is that it is: An autonomous association of persons united voluntarily to meet their common economic, social and cultural needs and aspirations through jointly owned and democratically controlled enterprises.23

Co-operatives are driven by values not just profit, and share internationally agreed principles which strive to build sustainable global  McGettigan, A. 2013. The Great University Gamble: Money, Markets and the Future of Higher Education. London: Pluto. 22  Webster, A., et al., eds. 2011. The Hidden Alternative, Co-operative Values, Past, Present and Future. Manchester: MUP. 23  https://www.ica.coop/en/cooperatives/cooperative-identity. Accessed 24 March 2019. 21

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s­ olidarity.24 These values are self-help, self-responsibility, democracy, equality, equity and solidarity; co-operative members also believe in the ethical values of honesty, openness, social responsibility and caring for others. Yet it is not only these values that distinguish co-operatives from other businesses. What makes a co-operative different is how it holds a set of principles which revolve around alternative ownership and democratic governance and which are guidelines to putting values into practice.25 In summary, the co-operative model offers a political economy of social value, solidarity and sustainability, rather than pursuing only profit. Whilst in the UK co-operatives are associated primarily with the retail sector, globally co-operatives are ubiquitous and can be found in almost every corner of the economy—agriculture, fisheries, transport, social care, education, services and finance. According to the ICA, co-operatives account for 1.2 billion members, with one in every six people on the planet a member of the 3 million co-operatives worldwide.26 In the post-­ crash period co-operatives are proving a resilient business and ownership model which increasingly appeals to the young.27 They are also profitable, with the top 300 co-operatives and mutuals reporting a total turnover of US$2.1 trillion, and sustainable, with 80 per cent of worker co-operative start-ups surviving compared to 44 per cent of those firms using a traditional business model.28 Yet the privileging of the business character of the co-operative model, by presenting it solely as an economic entity, obscures its origins as a  Co-operatives take many different forms yet what fosters commonality is how they are owned and governed by their members, that is, the people or stakeholders who buy from them or use their services (as in consumer co-operatives); who make things (producer co-operatives); who work in them (worker co-operatives) or by the people who live in them (housing co-operatives). Additionally, there are multi-stakeholder (or solidarity) co-operatives such as those that bring together a number of different types of stakeholders. 25  The principles are the following: voluntary and open membership; democratic member control; member economic participation; autonomy and independence; education, training and information; co-operation among co-operatives and concern for community. 26  World Co-operative Monitor, 2017. 27  See CICOPA. 2018. Global Study on Youth Co-operative Entrepreneurship. Geneva: ICA; Roelants, B., et al. 2012. The Resilience of the Cooperative Model: How Worker Cooperatives, Social Cooperatives and Other Worker-Owned Enterprises Respond to the Crisis and Its Consequences. CECOP, CICOPA; Webster, T., et al., eds. 2016. Mainstreaming Co-operation. Manchester: MUP. 28  Co-operatives UK, 2018 Review. 24

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r­adical social movement and response to exploitation and industrialization which, according to ‘Law First’ of the objects of the Rochdale Co-operative Society, would help to change the world: That as soon as is practicable, this Society shall proceed to arrange the powers of production, distribution, education, and government, or in other words to establish a self-supporting home-colony of united interests, or assist other societies in establishing such colonies.29

The context in which this early political and solidarity education flourished was one of considerable disruption when values-driven grass-roots movements ‘self-educated’ in the pub, chapel, factory and store, a collective answer to the individuated working-class autodidact traditions.30 Nurtured by notions of self-improvement, a belief that ‘knowledge is power’ and with no access to formal education, co-operators and trade unionists knew that education not only empowered the individual but was fundamental to building movements that would secure change. The Rochdale Pioneers fully understood the role education would play in developing co-operative skills, character and a new economic and social order that would challenge capitalism.31 It is upon this tradition that CHE draws.

The Neoliberal University and its Crises The field of critical university studies has, for the main part, focused on critiques of the neoliberal university. First identified by Williams in 2012, the field has concentrated on the problems produced by changes in how Higher Education is managed as a result of government policies.32 These  Law First, The Rochdale Pioneers, 1844, Colony to the Pioneers refers to countries, or places within the Co-operative Commonwealth. 30  See Lovett, T., ed. 1988. Radical Approaches to Adult Education: A Reader. London: Routledge. 31  Woodin, T. 2011. Co-operative Education in Britain During the Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries: Context, Identity and Learning. In The Hidden Alternative, Co-operative Values, Past, Present and Future, ed. A. Webster, et al., 78–95. Manchester: MUP. 32  Williams, J. J. 2012. Deconstructing Academe: The Birth of Critical University Studies. The Chronicle. 29

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have led to managerialism, an ideological position which privileges a science of management separate to the sector, industry or profession in which it is applied. The ideological underpinnings of this are the responses to declining profits, which have led to declining maximum rates of taxation, lower levels of government services and a declining state. The security of the post-war settlement now seems impossible, with the rise of the consolidation state seeking only to provide long-term security to debt holders and financial markets.33 Here, the term neoliberal is used to describe the set of practices and government policies which have come in response to declining returns on capital. In the pursuit of profits, public services and institutions have been under increasing attack, with pressure to reduce the size of the state and to provide more ‘efficient’ public services. The full intellectual genealogy of the term is explored thoroughly elsewhere.34 The NPM agenda, which became dominant in the 1980s and 1990s in the Anglo-Saxon world, sought to shrink the state by privatization and competitive tendering for reduced levels of public service. An agenda of risk transfer and marketized governance through competition has led to precarious working conditions, high costs to the public purse, and in some cases private-sector profits. Looking at what has happened to public health care systems, schools and prisons in the UK and the US gives some indication of what is in store for universities if the sector fails to defend itself. In the UK, these agendas have been pursued as utilities, transport and other services have been privatized. For example, the National Health Service (NHS) was divided into different trusts so that internal competition could take place, and then external parties admitted: the overture, perhaps, to outright privatization. Marketized governance includes the explicit provision that some will succeed and others will fail, if work cannot be won and books cannot be balanced. Similar processes have seen schools converted to academies—in the process removing Local Education Authority control, alienating public assets as premises are handed over to new trusts typically with corporate sponsors, and private bodies spend  Streeck, W. How Will Capitalism End?, passim 117–41. London: Verso.  A recent history of neoliberalism’s genesis in the ruins of the Habsburg Empire is found in Slobodian, Q. 2018. Globalists: The End of Empire and the Birth of Neoliberalism. Harvard: HUP. 33 34

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large amounts of funds. The professional status of teachers has been undermined by lower pay, longer hours, and the admission of those to teaching without Qualified Teacher Status to classroom jobs.35 These reforms, almost universal cuts and reductions, are presented under the guise of providing ‘value’, ‘excellence’ and ‘accountability’ in public services, when in reality they introduce costly competition and administrative burdens which are highly wasteful. From within and without, the university is in crisis. Externally, neoliberalism is replacing the notion of education as a public good, and in its place seeks to generate private goods: profits, securitizable debt and individual career benefits.36 Universities built up with decades, or even centuries, of public money remain nominally public, but in reality have been privatized, their function usurped. Three government policies support this asset-stripping, which can be seen as the twenty-first century analogue of enclosure.37 Firstly, private providers are actively seeking to build new universities whose sole raison d’être is to make a profit, so privileging the notion universities must yield returns.38 For Busch, Higher Education has become the search for the highest-paid job, and the Lifelong Learning discourse extends this to adults, encouraged to seek social mobility rather than build solidarity, engage in social purpose education or follow intellectual pursuits.39 The initial attempts were largely unsuccessful; under the 2017 HERA, the regulatory landscape has been altered to achieve this policy objective of for-profit provision.40 Secondly, since 2012, the government has designated humanities teaching to be a private good after it

 On problems of governance in academies, and on the solutions offered by co-operative institutions, see Allen, A. 2007. Empowered Participatory Governance? A Case Study Inquiry into a Co-operative Academy Model. Unpublished DBA thesis, Teesside University. 36  Graeber, D. 2015. The Utopia of Rules: On Technology, Stupidity, and the Secret Joys of Bureaucracy, 23–4. Brooklyn: Melville House. 37  This was the conversion of common fields to private property, at the expense of the common good, in particular in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century England. 38  Collini, S. 2017. Speaking of Universities. London: Verso. 39  Busch, L. 2017. Knowledge for Sale: The Neoliberal Takeover of Higher Education. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, xvii; Bowl, M. 2017. Adult Education in Neoliberal Times, x. Basingstoke: Palgrave. 40  Higher Education and Research (Act) 2017, c.29; Collini, S. 2017. Speaking of Universities, 2. London: Verso. 35

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ceased to support it, passing on the full cost of teaching to students.41 Thirdly, banks have been advising the government on how to securitize and sell some of the student loan book, starting with £4 billion of securities, despite providing a bad deal for the taxpayer.42 As a Financial Times editorial put it: ‘the move makes no sense’, for state, students or society.43 At the same time as students become encumbered with mounting debt, struggling to repay their loans, as in the US, the social mobility advantage traditionally promised by education has been undermined by what Blacker and others have termed the neoliberal endgame: the decline in the number of high-quality jobs and the erosion of middle-class living standards.44 Lower rates of payback prompted the government to consider ending income-contingency so making it a legal obligation to pay back these loans within a specified time. Whilst this plan was hastily reconsidered, it seems likely that in the near future student debt in the UK will look very much like that in the US: that which cannot be discharged by default, being charged at market rates of interest.45 Indeed, the 2004 UK Higher Education Act ‘[r]emoved any right to have SLC [Student Loan Company] loans cancelled in the event of bankruptcy’.46 Reform of the Higher Education ‘sector’ is thus driven by the pursuit of profits, and the creation of securitizable debt, as students are treated as customers in transactional relationships. Together these policies are reshaping institutions, their functions, and priorities.  Collini, S. 2017. Speaking of Universities, 2. London: Verso.  Warrell, H., and T. Hale. 2017. UK to Sell Record £4bn of Student Loans to Investors. Financial Times, February 6. https://www.ft.com/content/2b66bfaa-ec7a-11e6-930f-061b01e23655. Accessed 1 May 2017. 43  Financial Times. 2017. FT View: Selling Off Student Loans Makes Next to No Sense. Financial Times, February 8. https://www.ft.com/content/ab80561e-edfc-11e6-930f-061b01e23655. Accessed 1 May 2017. 44  Goodnight, G. T., D. Hingstman, and S. Green. 2015. The Student Debt Bubble. Journal of Cultural Economy 8: 75–100; Blacker, D. J. 2013. The Falling Rate of Learning and the Neoliberal Endgame, 89, 96. Alresford: Zero Books. 45  F. Perraudin, and R. Adams. 2016. UK Student Loans: ‘We Will Trace and Prosecute Borrowers Who Don’t Pay’. Guardian, February 12. https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/feb/12/ student-loans-we-will-trace-prosecute-borrowers-dont-pay. Accessed 1 May 2017. 46  Wise, G. 2016. Higher Education Bills We’ve Known and Loved. Wonk HE, May 19. http:// wonkhe.com/blogs/analysis-bills-known-and-loved/. Accessed 1 May 2017; Graeber, D. 2015. The Utopia of Rules: On Technology, Stupidity, and the Secret Joys of Bureaucracy, 134. Brooklyn: Melville House. 41 42

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Within universities, the triumph of managerialism and a well-heeled but essentially unproductive professional class sits in stark contrast to the proletarianization of academic labour, through casualization, precarity and zero hours contracts.47 The advent of nine-month and ten-month teaching-only positions reflects an agenda of privatizing research; early career researchers, in particular, are expected to write and publish in unpaid time, often at weekends or late at night, whilst only employed to teach. Unlike the nineteenth-century Parisian artisans, academics may no longer enjoy ‘the well-earned quietude of their night’ but are instead obliged to mark essays and write the articles on which career progression hinges.48 Restructuring around Research Excellence Framework (REF) changed the kind of work academics produce, leading to shorter books and articles pitched not in terms of lasting contributions to scholarship, but to star ratings and impact, and publications which can be counted towards institutional submissions. These practices have driven some towards plurality of publications, where one full-size article is split into several less thorough ones, solely in order to bolster REF submissions.49 What of small, quiet contributions to human knowledge and tombstone-­ sized definitive books on topics honed over many years? Academic careers are based on surviving the next REF cycle, and epistemology is subjugated to this expediency. The Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF) is already reshaping pedagogical practices. Shifting student expectations in the context of an increasingly consumerized relationship and ‘massification’ leads towards simplification and ‘the temptation to present material that is more accessible’, whilst the depth of material available for any given topic leads

 Shear, B. W., and A. I. Zontine. 2010. Reading Neoliberalism at University. Learning and Teaching 3: 32–62; Geyser, N., and M. Weiss. 2012. Introduction: Left Intellectuals and the Neoliberal University. American Quarterly 64: 787–93; Ka, H. M. 2010. When State Centralism Meets Neo-Liberalism: Managing University Governance Change in Singapore and Malaysia. Higher Education 60: 419–40; Lyon-Callo, V. 2010. To Market, to Market to Buy a Middle-Class Life? Insecurity, Anxiety, and Neoliberal Education in Michigan. Learning and Teaching 3: 63–90. 48  Rancière, J. 2012. Proletarian Nights: The Workers’ Dream in Nineteenth-Century France. London: Verso, 16; Crary, J. 2013. 24/7: Late Capitalism and the Ends of Sleep. London: Verso. 49  Busch, L. 2017. Knowledge for Sale: The Neoliberal Takeover of Higher Education, 66–7. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. 47

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towards superficial treatment.50 Busch argues this has led to increased pressure on students to plagiarize.51 In turn, this has had an impact on curricula: for example, strong criticisms have been made of the kind of economics taught within universities.52 These powerful forces therefore threaten to consume the social value traditionally created by epistemology and pedagogy. The creation of high-quality non-exploitative academic employment, the restructuring of managerial classes, and a response to ever-higher fees are urgent tasks for those who believe in universities and university education as a public good. The neoliberal university’s discontents stem from a governance crisis, which has seen traditional control usurped. Where once universities were, at least in theory, self-governing communities of scholars, now they are run by a technocratic managerial elite, whose generous pension entitlements, large expense accounts and six-figure salaries stand in stark contrast to those doing teaching, increasingly paid on fractional or zero hours contracts, or transferred to agencies in attempts to prevent individuals from gaining the rights attendant upon employment. These ideologies have not only motivated those undermining university governance, but also challenged the interlinked areas of pedagogical, epistemological, and context of production within Higher Education. The learning which takes places has also been fundamentally altered. Students are motivated by the pursuit of career progression: they study in the expectation of good jobs after graduation. As Blacker has noted, these jobs increasingly do not exist due to structural changes in the labour market. Nonetheless, students choose programmes and modules which they expect to secure them the kind of jobs they seek; universities, assessed through the Destination of Leavers of Higher Education survey, on the extent to which they are successful. Degrees are increasingly marketed to prospective students on the basis of what it will do for careers and lifetime earnings, and reforms see the OfS paying increasing attention to  Conradie, E. M. 2011. Knowledge for Sale? The Impact of a Consumerist Hermeneutics on Learning Habits and Teaching Practices in Higher Education. Koers 76: 441. 51  Busch, L. 2017. Knowledge for Sale: The Neoliberal Takeover of Higher Education, 61. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. 52  Harman, C. 2010. Zombie Capitalism: Global Crisis and the Relevance of Marx, 9. Chicago, IL: Haymarket Books. 50

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and even measuring these results. As a result of these changes, and the increasing pressure as loans fail to cover realistic cost of living, perhaps not covering all accommodation costs, students take on greater amounts of paid employment in term time. Under all this pressure, it is hardly surprising that increasing numbers of students plagiarize in various ways; only an ounce of empathy is required to understand why a student might turn to an essay mill in such pressurized contexts. Academic discretion has been so greatly removed that it is often impossible for teachers to allow extensions for work to be completed because of such pressures. Increasingly, the student is seen as a customer, with the rights and expectations framed by this. The kind of students drawn to universities has changed too: after decades of talk of lifelong learning, and not inconsiderable funding, often from the European Union, the reality is that part-time adult education may be in terminal decline, as numbers of participants dwindle. The agenda is lifelong learning for the sake of skilling of the workforce and career earnings; the idea of adult education for its own sake seems an increasingly luxurious idea.53 In short, the employability agenda has served neither students nor society well. In some cases, students have shown frustration with this, perhaps best illustrated by the Manchester economics students complaining about the unsatisfactory nature of the curriculum they were offered. Unsated by the conventional offering of neoclassical and neoliberal economics, students demanded a more diverse programme, but the curriculum response to this was modest. The quality of teaching remains crucial. Of course many within universities care deeply and work hard to improve their academic practice. Yet many are struggling with the consequences of massification; the large numbers of students going to university come with varied preparation, and many require a more intensive, individual approach, which adjunct staff and those with enormous teaching loads are unable to meet. At the highest level, university management has followed the TEF agenda. This quasi-­ market governance is deeply problematic, attempting to measure by numbers and competition. The expensive exercise assesses and compares  Johnson, R. 1988. “Really Useful Knowledge” 1790–1850: Memories for Education in the 1980s. In Radical Approaches to Adult Education: A Reader, ed. T. Lovett. London: Routledge. 53

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the quality of teaching in institutions—or at least whatever it is that is measured by such scores, rating institutions bronze, silver or gold. Yet these kinds of assessments are essentially nonsense and are highly loaded exercises. Universities may respond by ‘gaming’ the system, seeking to manipulate submissions in order to secure outcomes, rather than concentrating on improving pedagogies. These are fundamentally cynical calculations. Equally cynical has been the REF, which has fundamentally reshaped the kind of work academics do. Everything is measured and assessed, yet, as Busch has it: ‘those measured adjust their behaviour in ways that (at least potentially) undermine the very metric employed’.54 If academics are obliged by their employers, through performance management or otherwise, to have published two eligible articles or one book, staff will ensure they do this, in many cases at the cost of scholarship. In the manner noted above, this has led to shorter books, for example, with a word count designed to meet the minimum extent of a book; articles might be sub-divided into two, to create the requisite number of publications. Undoubtedly, some topics warrant the short-monograph treatment, but not all do. This process is at its most pernicious in the hard sciences, where the imperative to publish sees experiments performed which may repeat; such cynicism is unethical and immoral on the parts of all involved where it involves animal experiments.55 Indeed, this is not the only way in which the research function of the university has also been usurped by the neoliberal agenda. We might expound ad nauseam here, but that is not the purpose of this volume; it does not seek to repeat the complaints and analysis offered by critical university studies.56 Instead, we point to other ways of doing  Busch, L. 2017. Knowledge for Sale: The Neoliberal Takeover of Higher Education, 46. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. 55  Glenna, L., S. Shortall, and B. Brandl. 2015. Neoliberalism, the University, Public Goods and Agricultural Innovation. Sociologia Ruralis 55: 438–59. 56  The term begins with Williams, J. K. 2012. Deconstructing Academe: The Birth of Critical University Studies. The Chronicle, online at https://www.chronicle.com/article/An-EmergingField-Deconstructs/130791. We would suggest that Busch offers a good starting point for the uninitiated, especially to readers coming to this volume through an interest in co-operation rather than universities. Other volumes in this present series offer a range of perspectives on the neoliberal university. Watts, R. 2017. Public Universities, Managerialism and the Value of Higher Education. Cham: Palgrave; Smyth, J. 2017. The Toxic University: Zombie Leadership, Academic Rock Stars and Neoliberal Ideology. Cham: Palgrave; Thomas, R. 2018. Questioning the Assessment of Research 54

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things, to reclaim Higher Education as a public good. After Adorno, our contributors show that this is a thing which is happening; it is vital that those seeking a newer world follow suit. The message this volume offers is not despair or critique. We push against the capitalist realism of the neoliberals, and instead show that it is not too late to seek a newer world; we are not nostalgic for the old university world, which was far from perfect, and certainly not inclusive. Instead, we show a way to do things differently, which is adaptable, scalable and replicable.

 pproaching Alternatives: The Themes A of the Book This volume raises descriptive questions about what CHE is and might be, as well as normative ones of what it should be. Perhaps the first and most obvious question is: what kind of education CHE can provide and for whom? The answers given in the following chapters are very clear that the range is broad: in some cases, such as Leicester Vaughan College (LVC), the courses are entirely conventional and might be found in any existing HEI; elsewhere, such as in RED, they meet the needs of the Trades Union movement and non-governmental organizations; the work in Govan around Theory U written about by Anne Winther, Valerie Jackman and Keira Oliver, and the Centre for Human Ecology, by Anne Winther, Luke Devlin and Svenja Meyerick, seek nothing less than an absolute transformation of humanity and its relationship with the environment. At the Co-operative College in Manchester, discussed primarily in the final chapter, the answer has traditionally been the education required by the co-operative movement—though there is much greater attention Impact: Illusions, Myths and Marginal Sectors. Cham: Palgrave; Gupta, S., J. Habjan, and H. Tutek, eds. 2016. Academic Labour, Unemployment and Global Higher Education Neoliberal Policies of Funding and Management. Such is the scope of such a young field, it is impractical to offer a comprehensive survey. A critique located at the intersection of co-operative studies and critical university studies, the literature on CHE can be surveyed through a comprehensive bibliography provided by Winn, J. 2013. Co-operative Universities: A Bibliography. https://josswinn.org/2013/11/21/cooperative-universities-a-bibliography/. At time of writing, Winn updates this regularly.

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paid now to how we define and understand not only the existing but also the new and emerging co-operative movement. As the Co-operative College looks with great ambition to enabling a broad range of federated Higher Education co-operatives, it is time to discuss what exactly that link should be. Yet clearly CHE speaks to a much broader constituency than active members of the co-operative movement, and many of those writing have only very limited, or recent, links to co-operation, but rather in it they find the kind of answer to the problems of the neoliberal university, or however they would term the problems faced by Higher Education. Yet everything has to be paid for: the co-operative ideal may be for a utopian commonweal, but it starts in Mahagonny, where you can have any kind of education you like as long as you pay for it, as Brecht never quite put it.57 Questions of livelihood are the fundamental division in CHE and the examples in this volume. Some, such as LVC, seek to provide meaningful livelihoods for their members through fees or consultancy work; others, such as the Social Science Centre (SSC) in Lincoln have operated with voluntary labour and extremely modest running costs. Editorially, we are agnostic in our collation of the volume but have no hesitation in saying that the production of good living is a perfectly acceptable moral imperative for any organization, that CHE must not be HE on the cheap, and must not undermine the already suppressed wages in the sector. At the same time we recognize the value of initiatives: it seems unlikely that CHE would exist were it not for some of the voluntary experiments such as the SSC. One of the most under-researched elements of CHE is the place of research within it. Perhaps because many CHE practitioners come from adult education where precarious staff are rarely given the resource benefits of research-active status, and where their research work is yet more unpaid labour in marginal time, it has tended not to be privileged. It is notable that those writing about research in this volume are arguably less strongly  In Brecht’s allegorical dystopian utopia, Mahagonny, the city is founded as a place of joy: ‘being allowed to do anything’ provided it can be paid for (scene 1, p. 6). And so Paul Ackermann is sentenced to death when he is unable to pay for three bottles of whisky and a curtain rod: ‘For having no money/Which is the most heinous crime that/We can encounter in our world. Wild applause. Nobody will pay his bill and save his life’ (scene 18, pp. 52–3). Brecht, B. 2007. The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny, Trans. and Ed. S. Giles. London: Methuen. 57

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grounded in adult education. Thomas Swann’s broad chapter looks at the potential of co-operation to meet the needs of research, particularly platform co-operation and other technological solutions. In the chapter on Theory U, Anne Winther, Valerie Jackman and Keira Oliver look at the potential of a MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) for providing transformative education. All of these experiments and futures are at least partly open-access. This has sat at the core of much of old-­fashioned adult education provision and if these new forms of adult education are to provide the social justice they seek, then it rightly remains at the heart of the approach taken. Historically, we seek to place these examples in context. Tom Woodin’s chapter provides the history of CHE in the UK, which is longer and more complex than readers new to the topic might assume. Writing for publication in 2019, we are acutely aware that the realization of the co-­operative university is tantalizingly close. If the idea of a co-operative university to serve the needs of the co-operative movement, and as part of a co-operative, anti-capitalist ecosystem has its origins in the UK, particularly England, it is vital that the CHE phenomenon is understood not only in the context of the UK tradition, which Saunders provides, but also in its international context. Amanda Benson and Cilla Ross take us down not only the relatively well-trodden path to Mondragon, but also to Tanzania and Kenya, where cooperative universities are well established. This volume is not primarily concerned with pedagogy, but all chapters make at least some consideration of it. Pablo Perez and Mike Shaw’s chapter provides not only a clear student voice in this collection, but a worked example of the cooperative itself as a site of pedagogy: what is learned by doing things differently? The Edinburgh Student Housing Co-op (ESHC) provides not only a solution to an area of acute crisis for many students—the cost of accommodation which, privatized and commercialized, is no longer a cost centre for universities as part of their core services, but a profit centre for those involved in providing it, but also an important site of learning. In the process of actively participating in the management of this ambitious venture, students gain the broad range of skills they need for a post-capitalist economy. Similar engagement in a cooperative university, particularly the federated model being pursued by

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the Co-operative College, requires high levels of student involvement and participation, rather than the hollow ‘engagement’ of the managerial university. Hannah Bland’s discussion is of the experience of the co-­operators in CHE as understood through arts-based inquiry. Fundamentally, these examples and reflexions show how CHE offers a scalable, reproducible alternative to the neoliberal university; in place of managerialism, self-governing scholarly communities of teachers and students work alongside each other. For learners frustrated by the education offered as part of the ‘student experience’, for academics and those in professional services exploited and miserable in existing universities, and for those who realize the essential public goods provided by universities, CHE offers an alternative. It is not a magic solution, but it is a positive step against what Franco ‘Bifo’ Berardi called ‘the “slow cancellation of the future”’.58

 Quoted in Fisher, M. 2014. The Slow Cancellation of the Future. In Ghosts of My Life: Writings on Depression, Hauntology and Lost Futures, 6–8. Alresford: Zero books. 58

2 Useable Pasts for a Co-operative University: As Different as Light from Darkness? Tom Woodin

Higher education has been a troubling presence for the consumer co-­ operative movement throughout its history. The university held a fascination for co-operators whose plans for a co-operative commonwealth encapsulated a wide range of dreams and desires. Co-operatives contributed to British universities by developing close working relations with academic staff and this stimulated curricula and organisational innovation. Although some co-operators eschewed the snobbery of universities, which felt like a different world from everyday working-class life, this reaction could also generate new educational ideas and practices. For instance, the movement established its own initiatives in higher learning based upon the unique nature of co-operatives. The renewed interest in the co-operative university has been a stimulant for historical exploration and the recovery of ‘useable pasts’ to illuminate new perspectives on the present. Such an exploration offers a means of historicising present-day projects that may have deeper historical roots

T. Woodin (*) UCL Institute of Education, London, UK e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s) 2019 M. Noble, C. Ross (eds.), Reclaiming the University for the Public Good, Palgrave Critical University Studies, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-21625-2_2

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than first appearances would suggest. Long-term historical trends infuse debates among proponents of the co-operative university and a recent conference on the subject unearthed myriad historical references.1 This approach reflects a growing trend among historians to examine critically the contemporary significance of the past.2 Indeed, an understanding of previous co-operative educational initiatives can inform the co-operative university today. Historically, ‘higher education’ and ‘university’ have proved to be slippery concepts that elude clear-cut definitions because they have been imbricated within social and political change. Recent decades have witnessed a narrowing of the parameters of higher education and the dominance of one notion of the university.3 The fluid meaning of tertiary education, which once encompassed colleges of higher education, polytechnics and training institutes, has given way to a hierarchy of universities which struggle for position in an unequal market.4 Yet rapid social change has stimulated widespread debate over the nature of the university which continues to be marked by considerable complexity.5 In the past, the educational hierarchies and disciplinary boundaries of the university  Voinea, A. 2017. Setting a Vision for a Co-operative University. Co-operative News, November 27. https://www.thenews.coop/124550/topic/setting-vision-co-operative-university/. Accessed 20 November 2018. 2  Tosh, J. 2008. Why History Matters. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. See also History and Policy Website, http://www.historyandpolicy.org/. Accessed 15 December 2018; Woodin, T., M. Gary, and S. Cowan. 2013. Secondary Education and the Raising of the School Leaving Age: Coming of Age? New York: Palgrave Macmillan. 3  Shattock, M. 2012. Making Policy in British Higher Education, 1945–2011. Maidenhead: Open University Press; Shattock, M. 2014. University Governance in the UK: Bending the Traditional Model. In International Trends in University Governance: Autonomy, Self-Government and the Distribution of Authority, ed. M. Shattock, 127–44. London: Routledge. 4  Woodin, T. 2018. Co-operative Approaches to Leading and Learning: Ideas for Innovation from the UK and Beyond. In Exploring Consensual Leadership in Higher Education: Co-operation, Collaboration and Partnership, ed. L. Gornall, B. Thomas, and L. Sweetman, 71–88. London: Bloomsbury. 5  McGettigan, A. 2013. The Great University Gamble: Money, Markets and the Future of Higher Education. London: Pluto; Yeo, S. 2015. The Co-operative University? Transforming Higher Education. In Co-operation, Learning and Co-operative Values, ed. T. Woodin, 131–46. London: Routledge; Neary, M., and J. Winn. 2017. Beyond Public and Private: A Framework for Co-operative Higher Education. Open Library of Humanities 3 (2): 1–36; Collini, Stefan. 2017. Speaking of Universities. London: Verso; Barnett, R. 2016. Understanding the University: Institution, Idea, Possibility. London: Routledge. 1

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were thorny issues for co-operators.6 Marginal and adult education movements have long struggled with ‘higher’ education, standards and quality. Prior to the onset of secondary education for all, following the 1944 Education Act, ‘higher’ often referred to any form of post-­elementary education in recognition of the fact that secondary and university education were both well out of reach for most working-class families. While the idea of a co-operative university has a long pedigree stretching back into the nineteenth century, recent social changes have helped to make it a realistic possibility.7 Dan Cook suggested three methods of creating a co-operative university: to reorganise part of a university into a co-operative that might involve a department or faculty working co-­ operatively; to transform an existing university into a co-operative in which stakeholder groups might share governance; and to create a new university.8 A further concern has been to integrate the study of, and teaching about, co-operatives into the curriculum of universities, nesting ‘co-operative studies’ within and between the dominant disciplinary boundaries of higher education.9 An opportunity arose with the 2017 Higher Education Act which is attempting to ‘open up’ higher education by allowing a range of providers to apply for degree-awarding powers. The Co-operative University has been one of the unexpected front runners. It promises a new form of higher education but also raises problematic issues for co-operatives and co-operators.10 It appeals to the Statement

 Woodin, T., and L. Shaw, eds. 2019. Learning for a Co-operative World: Education, Social Change and the Co-operative College. London: Trentham/UCL Press. 7  Neary, M., and J. Winn. 2019. The Co-operative University Now! In Woodin and Shaw, Learning for a Co-operative World…, 169–86. 8  Cook, D. 2013. Realising the Co-operative University: A Consultancy Report for the Co-operative College. Manchester: Co-operative College. 9  MacPherson, I., and E. McLaughlin-Jenkins, eds. 2008. Integrating Diversities Within a Complex Heritage: Essays in the Field of Co-operative Studies. Victoria: New Rochdale Press; MacPherson, I. 2015. Mainstreaming Some Lacunae: Developing Co-operative Studies as an Interdisciplinary, International Field of Enquiry. In Woodin, Co-operation, Learning and Co-operative Values, 177–94. 10  Ross, C., J. Winn, M. Neary, and S. Parkinson. 2017. Co-operative Universities: A Chance to Reimagine Higher Education? Co-operative Party blog, https://party.coop/2016/09/01/co-operative-universities-time-for-a-radical-re-think-of-higher-education/. Accessed 20 June 2017. 6

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on Co-operative Identity of the International Co-operative Alliance (ICA) which includes values of democracy, equality, equity, solidarity, self-help and self-responsibility while the principles emphasise democratic control by members among other things.11 The definitions leave a lot of scope for the ways in which the values and principles will be applied in practice. They also help us to chart historical patterns which reverberate today.

Utopian Visions? From the inception of the co-operative movement, educational initiatives were viewed as central to the success of the movement. In the early nineteenth century, radicals problematised emerging capitalist relations that were displacing older assumptions about work, welfare and family and it was hoped that more supportive alternatives could be built. Education was viewed as essential to any future state of society. For instance, partly under the influence of Robert Owen and Owenism, the Rochdale Pioneers aimed to ‘arrange the powers of production, distribution, education and government, or in other words, to establish a self-supporting home colony of united interests, or assist other societies in establishing such colonies’.12 Education was considered one of four fundamental areas of a social system and was mutually interdependent with government, production and distribution. Given the concern for widespread change, it is unsurprising to find that calls for a co-operative university and college were present in the imagination of early and mid-nineteenth century co-operators who invoked the ‘universal’ implications inherent in the idea of a university.13 In his history of co-operative education, H. J. Twigg reported the desire for a ‘school or college’ for co-operators that was proposed by Charles Fry

 ICA. 2018. Statement on Co-operative Identity. https://www.ica.coop/en/cooperatives/cooperative-identity. Accessed 20 November 2018. 12  Rochdale Pioneers. 1844. Law the First. See https://www.rochdalepioneersmuseum.coop/aboutus/1844-rule-book/. Accessed 20 October 2018. 13  Woodin, Co-operative Approaches… 11

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of the Liverpool Co-operative Wholesale Purchasing Agency in 1830.14 Similar impulses arose from the Co-operator in Brighton organised by Dr William King as they did elsewhere around the country.15 The desire for education and learning also implied transformation rather than simple extension.16 The Owenite Henry Travis was convinced that co-operative education should be ‘as different from the system of education hitherto practised, as the Economics of the Co-operative System are from those of the competitive state of things, and as light is from darkness…’.17 Early nineteenth-century radicals worked at a time when industrial capitalism was only partly established and compulsory schooling and age grading had not been set in stone. Good childhood education was a prerequisite and Robert Owen’s pioneering nursery school at New Lanark would be an important example of this. Yet education was conceived as more of a continuous process that blurred the distinctions between ages and levels. Rather Owenites highlighted the connections across the life course and the potential solidarities in a mutual movement, evident in the names of initiatives such as the Association of All Classes of All Nations that aspired to embrace everything.18 An additional element of early co-operation related more directly to the nature of knowledge. A key feature of Owenite ‘social science’ was to reincorporate the moral realm which had been drained from the ‘dismal science’ of political economy.19 In 1863, George Vasey addressed a  Twigg, H. J. 1924. An Outline History of Co-operative Education. Manchester: Co-operative Union.  Mercer, T. W. 1947. Co-operation’s Prophet: The Life and Letters of Dr. William King of Brighton. Manchester: Co-operative Union. 16  Williams, R. 1965. The Long Revolution. Harmondsworth: Penguin. 17  Travis, H. 1871. The Co-operative System According to Robert Owen, with the Fundamental Correction Which It Requires, Co-operative Congress 1871, Birmingham, 83. Manchester: Co-operative Union. 18  Johnson, R. 1979. ‘Really Useful Knowledge’: Radical Education and Working Class Culture, 1790–1848. In Working Class Culture: Studies in History and Theory, ed. J. Clarke, J. Critcher, and Richard Johnson, 75–102. London: Hutchinson; Yeo, Stephen. 2010. Education for Association: Re-membering for a New Moral World. In Remaking Adult Learning, ed. Jay Derrick, et al. London: Institute of Education and NIACE; also E. P. Thompson. 1968. The Making of the English Working Class. Harmondsworth: Penguin. 19  Janes Yeo, Eileen. 1996. The Contest for Social Science: Relations and Representations of Gender and Class. London: Rivers Oram Press. 14

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c­ o-­operative tea party in Eston, Yorkshire, where he prioritised the need for physical comforts and welfare but held that there should be a simultaneous education along moral and spiritual lines: the glorious principles of Co-operation must inevitably ascend through every grade of moral, intellectual, and spiritual progress, until it reaches the highest state of elevation and refinement of which humanity is susceptible.20

Education implied a process without limits. Alongside the moral and spiritual sphere, co-operators aimed to integrate vocational and liberal ideas of learning. The Owenite, William Pare, recommended the construction of ‘industrial colleges’ in collaboration with new communities and ‘associated homes’ where children of both sexes would be sent ‘for training in really good and virtuous habits, and instruction … not only in literary and scientific pursuits, according the ordinary scholastic routine, but in useful trades and occupations, by which they might be fitted at maturity for a far higher sphere of usefulness and happiness than that filled or enjoyed by any class of society at present’.21 Indeed, Pare envisaged that education would improve upon any known system of education and provide ‘a better knowledge of science and art that do now the children of the middle and upper classes…’.22 The co-operative movement would continue to be marked by the repeated effervescence of utopian and Owenite philosophies.23 Utopianism arose directly out of the attempt to build the new moral world in the here and now. It infused daily organising with a wider purpose—that it was contributing to a ‘peaceful revolution’24 which would encroach upon and ultimately alter profoundly the nature of higher education. The ubiquitous and all-enveloping conception of education nurtured the idea of the  Vasey, G. 1863. Quoted in The Co-operator, July 24.  Pare, W. 1871. Co-operative Industrial Colleges Combined with Agriculture and Manufactures, Co-operative Congress 1871, Birmingham, 40. 22  Ibid., 43. 23  Compare, Pollard, S. 1961. Nineteenth Century Co-operation: From Community Building to Shopkeeping. In Essays in Labour History, ed. A. Briggs, and J. Saville, 74–112. London: Macmillan. 24  Webb, C. 1921. Industrial Co-operation: The Story of a Peaceful Revolution. Manchester: Co-operative Union. 20 21

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co-operative commonwealth which necessarily embraced all forms of education: in 1919, co-operators were still arguing that ‘Co-operation is a mode of life; a vital principle which we desire to see adopted in every phase of social life’.25

 niversity Extension and Workers’ U Universities? The persistent strand of utopianism was in part facilitated by the extraordinary growth of consumer co-operatives from the mid-century point. Co-operators at Rochdale and elsewhere were keen to gain knowledge at a moment when the ancient universities were seen as out of touch with social changes. One outcome was the university extension movement. It facilitated lecture tours, particularly of northern industrial areas, by university staff and attracted co-operators as well as many women. The Rochdale Pioneers, looking for ways to use the 2.5 per cent of profits that they devoted to education, requested lectures. The politician, scientist and educator, James Stuart, widely credited as the key figure in the emergence of university extension, averred that the idea of having a class in connection with university extension originated with the Pioneers and its inquisitive members who were of ‘high views and exalted principles’.26 Stuart was so impressed by the Rochdale society that he urged other societies to ‘take the lead, to engage a group of teachers of the highest class, and to utilise these as peripatetic professors of a Co-operative University’ which might be extended on a ‘national basis’.27 The Pioneers would be one of four organisations to write a memorial in support of university extension. Co-operators were incredibly interested in political and social changes. Their interaction with the ancient universities would be an issue at the heart of the emergence of democracy in Britain and beyond. The incremental extension of the franchise to working people gave rise to much  Hayward, F. Inaugural Address, Co-operative Congress 1919, 96. Manchester: Co-operative Union. 26  Stuart, J. 1911. Reminiscences, 165. London: Chiswick Press. 27  Ibid., 167, 169. 25

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debate. The expansion of democracy involved a new approach to civil society which affected all major institutions. Although the 1867 Reform Act was limited in its scope, it symbolised the inclusion of working men in the nation and empire which generated both hope and fear. To the middle classes, co-operatives provided reassuring evidence of responsibility, character and improvement among newly enfranchised groups. In appealing to these audiences on the eve of the Reform Bill, Lloyd Jones and J. M. Ludlow wrote about the ‘progress’ of the working class. They affirmed that ‘No form of association … proves so much in favour of the moral and intellectual progress of the working people as Co-operation’.28 It was hoped that giving the working classes responsibilities would help to align them with nation and empire. For instance, Hudson Shaw, a prolific extension lecturer, explicitly grouped these strands together in an address to co-operators: ‘The future of our country is in the hands of the working class; upon their wisdom and knowledge and patriotism the vastest Empire the world has known … rests for its safety and continuance’.29 He viewed co-operatives as key agencies in forging citizenship: In alliance with the Universities we can cover half of England in a few years with a network of teaching centres, where every Englishman may study his own national record: the deep questions of history which underlie the problems of to-day; the principles of good government and successful rule; the whole philosophy of national well-being; the best that has been thought and said upon the possibilities of human life on this planet.30

University extension lecturers found willing audiences among co-­ operative societies. Shaw considered the involvement of co-­operative societies to be crucial to the success of lectures which facilitated direct contact with working people.31 In addition, Oxford summer schools made space for co-operators where new ideas gestated and were ideal for  Ludlow, J. M., and L. Jones. 1867. The Progress of the Working Classes. In Questions for a Reformed Parliament, 278. London: Macmillan and co. 29  Hudson Shaw, W. nd. Co-operation and Education: To the Working Men Co-operators of Great Britain, 8. Manchester: Co-operative Union. 30  Ibid., 9–10. 31  Ibid., 9. Also, Co-operative Union. 1898. Report of Central Board, Co-operative Congress 1898, Peterborough, 16. Manchester: Co-operative Union. 28

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‘bringing co-operators into touch with the higher phases of educational developments…’.32 University extension gave rise to interesting and intense relationships which belies the claim that it simply represented a form of class control.33 Mutual learning between lecturer and audience could be significant. Yet even though co-operation brought people together, co-operators were wary of those who viewed the movement as a place where other agendas could be pursued, a feeling heightened by the fact that, formally, the universities retained control of the educational process. As a result, there were class tensions over how vibrant democratic aspirations were to be met. It mirrored class discord within the co-operative movement between idealists and Christian Socialists, who supported co-operation while attempting to channel it in certain directions, and working-class co-­ operators who were cautious about being co-opted to ulterior purposes. In the early 1880s, the co-operator, Ben Jones, resisted the injunctions of liberal politician and educationist A. H. D. Acland and the campaigner and historian, Arnold Toynbee, who spoke about the education of the citizen in a way which Jones feared might squeeze out the specific needs of co-operators: They were not going to do the bidding of university dons, but think for themselves, develop their own faculties, and instruct their members and children in a thorough knowledge of the principles of co-operation. They must not overshoot the mark in aiming at a university. The kernel of the system must be education in co-operation.34

Being in awe of the university might divert co-operators from their core purpose which, in educational terms, was to cultivate what became known as ‘co-operative character’ based upon mutual working  Co-operative Union. 1898. Report of Central Board, Co-operative Congress 1898, 15. Manchester: Co-operative Union. 33  Rowbotham, S. 1999. Travellers in a Strange Country: Responses of Working Class Students to the University Extension Movement 1873–1910. In Threads Through Time, ed. S. Rowbotham, 260–301. London: Penguin; Goldman, L. 1995. Dons and Workers: Oxford and Adult Education Since 1850. Oxford: Clarendon Press. 34  Jones, B. 1883. Contribution to Co-operative Congress 1883, 40. Manchester: Co-operative Union. 32

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r­ elationships and co-operative understanding. Yet, such friction could be channelled in productive ways and Jones would collaborate with Acland on a handbook, first published in 1884, Working Men Co-operators.35 Nonetheless, the memory and legacy of key middle-class figures, who had helped the movement immensely, stimulated ambiguous feelings. In 1921, Rae recalled that Christian Socialists such as EV Neale and Thomas Hughes set up scholarships in their names so that children of co-operators could study at Oxbridge. Over time, it was argued that such schemes did not serve the movement well but rather acted as ladders of social mobility into the middle class rather than ways of strengthening the movement.36

Rae argued that the Oxbridge syllabus took scholars from working families and ‘dragged them out of their class and filled them with a desire to earn their living with their pens or by preaching’.37 Co-operatives were tied in with a tradition of adult and radical education which aimed to improve people and communities and not simply foster social mobility, an argument which has a familiar contemporary resonance. Individual improvement had to be linked to collective gains and the gradual extension of the co-operative commonwealth. R. H. Tawney had also encouraged co-operative societies to involve themselves in higher education and related ideas about social mobility would appear in his classic 1931 book, Equality.

Workers’ Education In the early twentieth century, similar contradictions were to feed into the emergence of the Workers’ Educational Association (WEA) and university tutorial classes. Once again, the co-operative movement was in the 35  Acland, A., H. Dyke, and B. Jones. 1884. Working Men Co-operators. Manchester: Co-operative Union. 36  Rae, W. R., 1921, 7. 37  Rae, W. R. 1911. Contribution to Co-operative Congress 1911, 523. Manchester: Co-operative Union.

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midst of the action although it was to become more marginalised over time. Albert Mansbridge, widely credited as the founder of the WEA, writing in the Kingdom of the Mind, affirmed that university extension and the co-operative movement were the two significant educational forces for adults: University Extension … has recognised to the full democratic needs, and has consistently rendered its high teaching acceptable to working men. On the other hand, the Co-operative movement has rendered to education … a greater measure of tribute than any other democratic movement. It has … set upon foot a system of class teaching in industrial history, economics, and citizenship. Moreover, it has entered already into a working alliance with University Extension.38

The great skill of Mansbridge was that he fused ‘the ideals of the Co-operative and Trade Union movements with those of the universities’.39 He built bridges across the languages of co-operation, social class, citizenship, social purpose and Christianity. By blending working class control with the priorities of the universities, Mansbridge managed to bring together traditions that were ostensibly in the same family but were constantly bickering. Idealist philosophers, Christian socialists and Fabians, while celebrating the progress of the working class, could be critical of what they perceived to be the pure materialism and earthiness of the working class who they portrayed as too focused upon the living wage, the dividend and basic necessities of life.40 Conversely, co-operators had been critical of the middle classes who interfered and tampered with their democratic movements while demanding devotion to an intangible higher spirit. Mansbridge was fluent in both languages. He adeptly 38  Mansbridge, A. 1946. Co-operation, Trade Unionism, and University Extension. In The Kingdom of the Mind: Essays and Addresses of Albert Mansbridge, ed. L. Clark, 4. Manchester: Meridian. 39  Clark, L. 1946. Introduction. In Ibid. 40  Yeo, S. 1987. Three Socialisms: Statism, Collectivism, Associationism. In Social Criticism and Social Theory, ed. W. Outhwaite and M. Mulkay, 83–113. Oxford: Blackwell; Gurney, P. 1996. Co-operative Culture and the Politics of Consumption in England 1870–1930. Manchester: Manchester University Press; Woodin, T. 2011. Co-operative Education in the Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries: Context, Identity and Learning. In The Hidden Alternative: Co-operative Values, Past, Present and Future, ed. A. Webster, et al., 78–95. Manchester: Manchester University Press and United Nations University Press.

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­ andled class suspicions and chided co-operators for ‘an unpardonable h suspicion of the university, often flavoured with contempt…’41 Co-operators could indeed have an adverse reaction to purveyors of theoretical ideas which could not be put to immediate use. Mansbridge would not settle for second best and was critical of elementary education which only placed a veneer of knowledge upon the young mind and instead he called for deeper meaningful learning. He argued that the ‘idea of a gospel of education’ was familiar to working class people and that the ideas of the co-operative movement have been ‘shot through and through with educational desire’, which revealed his appreciation of the utopian aspect of co-operation and an unfulfilled longing for an educated society.42 He grasped the fact that workers had not taken kindly to top-down educational schemes and it was the cooperative movement that provided him with the model for a new type of workers’ university: Everything pointed to the fact that educational supply, even if devised by excellent and devoted people, was almost entirely useless unless there was co-operation with those who were to be attracted to use it. In the development of working class education the scholar and administrator must sit side by side with the adult student, at the same table, in perfect freedom. The initiative must lie with the students. They must say how, why, what, or when they wish to study. It is the business of their colleagues the scholars and administrators to help them to obtain the satisfaction of their desires. This means that scholar, administrator, and working man must act together, and fortunately there are, and always have been in England, many organizations of labour and scholarship in a mood to do so in their corporate capacity.43

Co-operative desire and democracy were crucial ingredients in the construction of Mansbridge’s educational network. Yet it was to have mixed blessings for the co-operative movement which did not always  Mansbridge, A. 1946. Co-operation, Trade Unionism, University Extension. In Clark, Kingdom of the Mind…, 5–6. 42  Mansbridge, Adventure…, xviii 43  Ibid., xviii 41

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reap the rewards of such innovation. For instance, a survey of the co-­ operative movement during the First World War reflected ruefully that ‘educational zeal’, which should rightfully have been retained by the cooperative movement, was finding other outlets.44 Once again, co-operators would look to themselves for educational growth.

The Co-operative College From the late nineteenth century, there had been increasing calls for a co-operative university that would eventuate with the formation of the Co-operative College in 1919.45 In the 1870s, Nicholas Baline, a Russian co-operator, had called for a co-operative university to enable the movement, including women, to respond to social changes. By the early twentieth century, calls for action were intensifying and both Edward Owen Greening and W.  R. Rae would advocate a co-operative university. Co-operators also attended meetings with universities and the 1910 Congress passed a resolution that universities should ‘become national institutions equally in touch with all sections of the community’.46 The following year, a co-operative deputation met with the President of the Board of Education, Walter Runciman, MP, and they argued that the free universities, such as Manchester Victoria, were too much under the influence of commercial classes whereas the ancient universities were in need of ‘democratisation’ whereby all social classes would play a role in their administration. Adding her influential voice was Margaret Macmillan who called on the movement to create a ‘great rural co-operative university’ where the ‘best scholars’ would be ‘willing and able to support you’  See Co-operative Union. 1919. Appendix, General Co-operative Survey. Manchester: Co-operative Union. 45  See Woodin, T., K. Vernon, and L. Shaw. 2020, forthcoming. The Co-operative College and a Century of Social Change. London: Palgrave. 46  Baline, N. 1872. Propaganda: A Suggestion for a Co-operative University, Co-operative Congress 1872, 80. Manchester: Co-operative Union; Greening, E. O. 1904. Inaugural address, Co-operative Congress 1904, 41–3. Manchester: Co-operative Union; Rae, W. R. 1911. Inaugural Address, Co-operative Congress 1911, 29. Manchester: Co-operative Union. See also Neary and Winn, Co-operative University Now!; and Congress Resolutions, Co-operative Congress 1910. Manchester: Co-operative Union. 44

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and she speculated that such a move would ‘go far to change the whole future of England’.47 The Co-operative College was to be a higher form of education for the movement that embraced teaching, research and promotion of co-­ operatives. The movement was facing intense commercial competition as well as political attacks. The president of the 1918 Co-operative Congress, Thomas Killon, observed that new forms of co-operation represented by business trusts and state action were significant threats: ‘our principle has been stolen to bolster up vested interests…’.48 Part of the answer lay in the formation of the Co-operative Party as well as new educational initiatives: ‘If we are to make co-operation not merely part of the State, or a State within a State, but the State itself, we shall require the highest education…’. Fred Hall, the first principal of the College, argued that the relationship of the proposed college to the universities had not been properly thought out but it was being proposed because ‘the other colleges did not approach education from the same point of view as co-­operators did’.49 In forming the College, they were ‘endeavouring to build up a complete system of education for cooperators’ and to direct the ‘educational machinery’ of the movement as a whole.50 The College was probably the first specifically co-operative college in the world and would have a wide impact as other European countries established similar institutions during the interwar period, adding to the diversity of higher learning. Hall recognised that weekend and summer schools attracted a new ‘type of person’ who might also come to the College. A new curriculum was to link

 Macmillan, M. 1911. Public Meeting on Education – Future of Our Young People, Co-operative Congress 1911, 523. Manchester: Co-operative Union. 48  Killon, T. 1918. Inaugural address, Co-operative Congress 1918, 81. Manchester: Co-operative Union. 49  Ibid., 84; Hall, F. 1919. Reply to Education Conference, Co-operative Congress 1919, 79. Manchester: Co-operative Union. 50  Hayward, A. 1919. Introduction to Inaugural Address, Co-operative Congress 1919, 94. Manchester: Co-operative Union. 47

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our education more with everyday subjects, like co-operation in relation to reconstruction, social problems, politics, economics, internationalism, etc. We want to give a knowledge, too, of the history of subjects and movements and theories to show how they have grown and changed, so that students know something about causes. On the other hand, we shall teach business organization, commercial knowledge, co-operative and commercial law, management, salesmanship, and all that is necessary for the advancement of co-operative commerce on efficient lines.51

Propagating both focused co-operative education as well as engaging with broader knowledge and issues from a co-operative perspective, proved to be problematic yet indispensable. Attempts at educating in social science and vocational skills faced obstacles in terms of time available but it was to be an enduring aspect of College work. For example, the principal of the College during the post-war years, Robert Marshall, felt that the residential aspect was conducive to the education of the ‘whole man’ via vocational learning.52 The College contributed to debates about relations with existing universities and the potential for a university of labour. Although it was expected that the College should be within ‘Easy reach of an established University…’,53 some co-operators felt that the movement was isolating itself from both labour and the universities. For instance, the remarkable growth of working class movements in the early twentieth century made it possible to think about forming a general workers’ university. Lilian Dawson was critical of the ‘tendency for each section of the labour movement to confine its educational work strictly within the limits of its own views … this produced a limited outlook, some waste, and serious overlapping’. Co-operation, trade unions and the Labour Party should be bound together by common aims and ideals. Dawson speculated that, in time, various elements of the labour movement might create ‘one common Labour College… This association might at first take the form of  H., J. 1919. The Man of the Month: Professor F. Hall, M.A. The Producer, July 21, 226 article 225–6. 52  Marshall, R. 1948. The Co-operative College. Adult Education 20 (3): 131. 53  Co-operative Union. 1944. The British Co-operative College: Through Knowledge to Service 1919– 1944, 11. Manchester: Co-operative Union. 51

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interchange of students and lecturers and, where possible and desirable, joint courses. Eventually the college might be federated or affiliated in what would, in effect, be a Labour University’.54 Co-operative education was too restrictive, according to Dawson, and she urged co-operators to connect with broader social and educational developments: The Movement is an industrial system of a revolutionary kind when compared with the ordinary capitalist system. The Co-operative Commonwealth, which is its ultimate end, would imply a very drastic alteration in the whole constitution of society. The beliefs of the convinced co-operator, and his problems and the problems which in fact beset the Movement, wander very far afield and become entangled in questions which cannot possibly be included in a strict interpretation of ‘the history and principles of co-­ operation’. If the Movement is to consist of members having the knowledge necessary for the understanding of these wider issues and problems – and if it does not, co-operation will become stagnant – it must give to its members the opportunity of acquiring such knowledge. Such education would touch not only political science, economics, sociology, but the whole science and art of citizenship, and must necessarily become involved in the dangerous ground of current controversial politics.55

This was a step too far for many co-operators who did not want to lose the benefits of having their own institutions. The all-encompassing perception of the co-operative commonwealth was not always in tune with the co-operative movement in the here and now. In any case, some of these distinctions were to be reformulated in the post-war period by an expanding welfare state which changed the rules of the game for the co-­operative movement.

Post-War The Co-operative College was fortified after the Second World War with the purchase of a stately home, Stanford Hall, in Leicestershire. This was a symbolic moment of growth, a coming of age for the movement which  Dawson, L. 1923. Co-operative Education, 13–4. Manchester: Co-operative Union.  Ibid., 12

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saw itself as building a new Jerusalem. But, despite the general excitement about peace and the future, there was also a hardening of educational distinctions across the board which restricted the scope of the co-operative movement. For much of the post-war period, the College provided education and training to managerial staff, co-operative secretaries, social studies students as well as future co-operative leaders from across the colonies and commonwealth. In total they numbered just over 100 each year. Although it was conceived as a form of higher training, there was also an acceptance that the College was a ‘residential adult education college’ which occupied a separate role to universities. Marshall exuded a mix of radical co-operativism and a conservative acceptance of the new status quo. At the 1948 Edinburgh Co-operative Congress, he declared that ‘the objective of co-operative education as no less than that of educating the ruling class for the discharge of effective power. The ruling class to-day was the working and industrial class, and education should be given not only in social and political science but in business organization and administrative training’.56 At a time when adult educators were debating the standards of adult education, he argued that the College should be a ‘higher centre’ of learning but, as principal, he had to deal with the internecine and complex politics of the consumer movement which made life difficult. Co-operative societies had to accept that they should not control who they sent to the College irrespective of educational capacity; they had to be willing to release students from their existing work; and they also had to offer effective learning and subsequently employment opportunities for College students.57 Such internal wrangling could act as a break on innovation. In addition, the post-war world would witness a prolonged period of decline in consumer co-operation, especially from the 1960s although the warning signs had been there for longer.58 One aspect of this was the way the movement could not adequately respond to the expansion of  Marshall, R. 1948. Quoted in Co-operative Review, May 22, 5: 96.  Marshall, R. 1947. Prospectus and Prospects. Co-operative Review, August 21, 8: 162–3. 58  For instance, Walton, J. 2009. The Post-war Decline of the British Retail Co-operative Movement: Nature, Causes and Consequences. In Consumerism and the Co-operative Movement in Modern British History, ed. L. Black and N. Robertson, 13–32. Manchester: Manchester University Press. 56 57

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educational opportunities which provided escape routes for able working-­ class children. As a result, co-operators became more inward looking and leaders held on to their positions in societies, which were struggling to survive. The co-operative educator who had actively campaigned for educational legislation, now faced a new predicament: Traditionally Co-operative Societies have recruited at the minimum school leaving age and relied on finding within such recruitment the quality which would later show itself capable of management responsibilities. Now, however, much of the ability which 30 years ago would have left school at 14 and come into Co-operative service is going on to grammar schools and to Universities and if we want to attract that ability we have to look for it there.59

The idea of educating your own leaders within a democratic movement began to appear archaic. This was a significant cultural shift for co-operators who were unfamiliar with having to catch up with the commercial world. In addition, the recruitment needs of co-operatives lent some credence to widespread beliefs in a ‘pool of ability’ and could set in motion the lowering of expectations about co-operative members and working class people in general. Interestingly, Marshall was guarded about plans for an Open University and he questioned the views of Hilary Perraton who had argued that the new university of the air would be relevant to everyone. Marshall was sceptical If this means anything, it must be that everyone is capable of engaging with study of a University quality – and frankly I do not think this is true. It is no discredit to anyone to say that he or she is not capable of study of that quality, but a simple acknowledgement of the human condition.60

 Marshall, R. 1967. Draft (not in final version) for Management Development Scheme. In Trends in the Services for Youth, ed. W. A. J. Farndale and J. A. Leicester. Oxford: Pergamon. Bishopsgate Institute, Robert Marshall papers, box 2. 60  Marshall, R. 1968. An Open Question? A Note on the “Open University” (unpublished). Bishopsgate Institute. Robert Marshall Archive. Articles written by the principal, January 1960Box 2, folder 2, Articles written by the principal, January 1957–December 1968. 59

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Marshall was out of touch with the times when comprehensive education and ideas of equal educability were making ground.61 However, while the gains of a post-war new Jerusalem had involved the diminution of the co-operative sphere of activity within the social and economic settlement, co-operators continued to make radical claims for economic democracy and the flame of the co-operative commonwealth was not extinguished.

Managing Futures The engagement of co-operators with higher education has been a continuous process of asserting rights of access, developing separate provision, fostering mutual learning and reworking educational relationships. A deep educational yearning and a desire for social change stretched back to Owenism and the Rochdale Pioneers. Building an economic system on co-operative principles required an awareness of the alternative futures that their work implied as well as the skills to start working towards it. The co-existence of practical action to sustain an economic enterprise and utopian democratic visions fuelled critiques of the university at moments when new possibilities flared up in the co-operative imagination. In turn, the material growth of the movement provided a foundation for democratic ideals which extended to higher education and beyond. Co-operative encounters with the university have both challenged and reproduced hierarchies and divisions—between co-operatives and other adult education movements and between universities and adult education. Class, gender and race inequalities have been implicit in these debates. In terms of curriculum, co-operatives valued both liberal and vocational forms of learning which to some extent set them apart from the humanistic tradition of adult education in Britain. A distinctive co-­ operative curriculum gave strength and purpose to the movement but also isolated it from adult and university education which tended to shun vocational learning. Thus, co-operators advocated vocational education,

 For instance, Simon, B. 1953. Intelligence Testing and the Comprehensive School. London: Lawrence and Wishart. 61

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liberal learning and learning for social change as three streams that flowed together and diverged at different times.62 Co-operators saw themselves as very practical people who were chary of theory and knowledge that was not immediately useful. This could limit experimentation. A general inertia among some co-operators, as well as practical obstacles, prevented the expansion of educational projects. There was a continuing body of co-operators who did not particularly see the movement as an educational force although these tended to be the least active members. The embrace of the university was also replete with danger—that co-operators might be diverted from their core purpose and become allied to other agendas. For this reason, they defended their independence. Moreover, keeping the idea of a co-operative university alive has not been a continuous process and educational traditions could wane. For example, a contributor to the Co-operative Review in 1936 felt that there existed a ‘prejudice’ against universities and proposed that societies should make themselves amenable to university extension lectures, apparently unaware that the historical ties between the two movements appeared to have been severed.63 However, traditions are rarely extinguished entirely; rather they resurface sporadically in new contexts. The dilemmas surrounding previous attempts to construct Co-operative Higher Education have a contemporary echo. The nascent co-operative university in 2019 is attempting to rethink the nature of the university and manage contradictions which have a long historical pedigree. There is a desire to fill the space that has been left in the wake of the decimation of adult education over the past few decades. Campaign groups have emerged after losing funding and constituencies have formed around educational, environmental and political purposes; each of them has found expression in the proposals for a co-operative university.64 The desire for practical learning, as part of co-­ operative and social movements, is one area which could be fruitfully developed, comprising both research and teaching. Indeed, the new uni Woodin, T. 2019. Recovering Co-operative Education. In In Woodin and Shaw, Learning for a Co-operative World... 63  Anon. 1936. Co-operative Review, October 10, 10: 313. 64  Neary and Winn, Co-operative University Now! 62

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versity will want to contribute to existing co-operative movements while initiating original research. Constructing coherent and sustainable degree programmes from the ground up will pose a further challenge. In establishing a university, the numbers have to add up and providing distinctive courses will depend upon recruiting an adequate number of students, not least from within the ranks of the co-operative movement. Standards and quality are likely to be perennial items for discussion as are the competing claims of vocational learning, liberal education and directly fostering social change. Managing these tensions and experimenting with democratic forms raises the possibility of constructing new co-operative futures that build upon historical traditions.

3 Establishing and Sustaining Co-operative Universities and Co-operative Higher Education in International Contexts: Challenges and Possibilities Amanda Benson and Cilla Ross

Co-operative Higher Education (CHE) and the establishment of a co-­ operative university were called for by the UK co-operative movement throughout the nineteenth century, culminating in the founding of the Co-operative College in 1919.1 As part of wider social movement aspirations to re-purpose Higher Education for ‘really useful knowledge’, the co-operative movement had further ambitions for a model of Higher Education which fluctuated between the practical and the utopian with aims to develop co-operative skills for entrepreneurship; deepen and expand co-operative identity, active membership and democratic  See contributions in Woodin, T. 2011. Co-operative Education in Britain During the Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries: Context, Identity and Learning. In The Hidden Alternative, Co-operative Values, Past, Present and Future, ed. A. Webster, et al., 78–95. Manchester: MUP; and Woodin, T., ed. 2015. Co-operation, Learning and Co-operative Values. London: Routledge. 1

A. Benson (*) • C. Ross Co-operative College, Manchester, UK e-mail: [email protected]; [email protected] © The Author(s) 2019 M. Noble, C. Ross (eds.), Reclaiming the University for the Public Good, Palgrave Critical University Studies, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-21625-2_3

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g­ overnance; and build a global co-operative commonwealth.2 The massification of compulsory education, widening participation into Higher Education and changes within the traditional co-operative movement have tempered these educational aspirations, yet ideas around CHE have recently gathered momentum due to a number of intersecting factors. These include the development of co-operative schools, changes to Higher Education legislation and the alienating and increasingly mendacious experience of Higher Education practice described elsewhere in this volume.3 At the time of writing there are plans to establish a distinctive co-operative university in the UK and a number of pedagogically innovative CHE initiatives are flourishing and functioning beyond a formal co-­ operative university model.4 In both literature and practice, UK educators and researchers inevitably draw upon ‘local’, that is, UK educational experiences and landscapes when considering the possibilities and potential of developing CHE, but this neglects the lessons that can be learnt from international examples.5 This chapter seeks to make a contribution to addressing this knowledge  See Johnson, R. 1988. “Really Useful Knowledge” 1790–1850. In Radical Approaches to Adult Education: A Reader, ed. T. Lovett. London: Routledge; and Yeo, S. 2015. The Co-operative University? In Co-operation, Learning and Co-operative Values, ed. T. Woodin. London: Routledge; Woodin, T. 2011. Co-operative Education in Britain During the Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries: Context, Identity and Learning. In The Hidden Alternative, Co-operative Values, Past, Present and Future, ed. A. Webster, et al., 78–95. Manchester: MUP. 3  We use terms Co-operative Higher Education (CHE) and co-operative university (CU) interchangeably. CHE might take an institutional form, for example, be an Institute of Co-operative Higher Education as well as indicate an educational level and pedagogical approach. A CU, likewise, is more than bricks and but a flexible offer which uses different learning spaces in communities; Facer, K., J. Thorpe, and L. Shaw. 2011. Co-operative Education and Schools: An Old Idea for New Times? The BERA Conference, September 6, 2011, London, UK; the recent Higher Education and Research Act (HERA) (Parliament 2017) may be seen as the latest iteration of longterm trends of marketization, consumerization, private substitution and commodification of Higher Education. It creates a single gateway of entry to the Higher Education sector and a single new regulator, the Office for Students (OfS). Also see Brown, R. 2013. Everything for Sale? The Marketization of UK Higher Education. London: Routledge; see Collini, S. 2017. Speaking of Universities. London: Verso and http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2017/29/contents/enacted 4  In the UK, the three models of transitioning to co-operative Higher Education/a co-operative university can be conceptualized as ‘conversion’, ‘dissolution’ and ‘creation’ and are discussed by Cook, 2013 and Neary, M., and J. Winn. 2017. Beyond Public and Private: A Framework for Co-operative Higher Education. Open Library of Humanities 3 (2), July 1. 5  See Cook, D. 2013. Realising the Co-operative University. Manchester: Co-operative College. 2

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gap by discussing a number of international examples of CHE and co-­ operative universities. Of particular interest to those of us keen to capitalize on the turn towards CHE in the UK is a consideration of the journey these institutions have taken. Co-operative universities in each of our examples are outliers to mainstream national Higher Education; so what motivated them to begin, what challenges have they faced and how have they prospered? The chapter also explores how and in what ways these universities are co-operative through looking briefly at governance, pedagogy, research, curricula and member and/or student engagement. We ask how such universities and models of CHE differ from the mainstream, what we can learn from them and the extent to which they are recognizable as co-operative entities in the light of contemporary understanding of both co-operative education and the emerging CHE model in the UK. Only a small number of universities globally, approximately eight, self-­ identify as co-operative and the three we focus on in this chapter were targeted primarily because of their relationship with the UK Co-operative College. However, the three examples have diverse backgrounds and motivations for becoming co-operative universities and for developing their CHE offer. They are also each distinctive in their current iterations. In both the Kenyan and Tanzanian examples the universities were originally co-operative colleges which emerged during the closing years of the British colonial period or immediately following independence. Whilst some in-country co-operative training had been available throughout the years of British rule, the UK Co-operative College played an important part in shaping the colonial co-operative agenda by providing residential courses for overseas co-operative officials at Stanford Hall, Loughborough, from 1947 onwards.6 Co-operatives in British colonies obviously followed the ‘Rochdale’ model and co-operators were inducted into the management of this alien, colonial import.7

 Shaw, L. 2011. International Co-operative Education. In The Hidden Alternative, Co-operative Values, Past, Present and Future, ed. A. Webster, et al., 68. Manchester: MUP. 7  The Rochdale model was devised by the Rochdale Society of Equitable Pioneers, founded in 1844 in the UK. This was an early consumer co-operative and one of the first to pay a patronage dividend, forming the basis for the modern co-operative movement. Zeleza, T. 1990. The Development 6

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The remit of the new co-operative colleges, therefore, was to deliver training to farmers and local government administrations concerned with the implementation of planned economies, post-independence, which would remain heavily dependent on the co-operative model. However, the way in which national co-operative movements were subsequently controlled by the state throughout the 1960s and 1970s did not endear co-operation to local populations as the movement was often dominated by local elites and subject to party political interests.8 The 1980s and 1990s also proved problematic and damaging for the co-operative movement, and Tanzania’s public sector infrastructure more generally, as structural adjustment and privatization programmes were demanded by the World Bank in a trade-off for loans. Co-operatives fell into disfavour with governments keen to secure overseas investment for neoliberal economic restructuring.9 Yet in the last 20 years those co-operatives that survived this period have demonstrated some resilience with Shaw correctly describing this as a period of relative co-operative renewal with co-operatives remaining “one of the most common forms of farmer and village level organizations across Africa”.10 There are tensions, for example, around co-operative governance failure and democratic deficit as well as challenges to co-­ operatives from the private microfinance sector which leaves many of the poor in escalating debt.11 However, some progress is being made with the emergence and growth of co-operative models which focus on local economic needs. For example, Savings and Credit Co-operative Societies (SACCOS)—a type of credit union—help to challenge the financial

of the Co-operative Movement in Kenya Since Independence. Journal of Eastern African Research & Development 20: 68–94. 8  Simmons, R., and J. Birchall. 2008. The Role of Co-operatives in Poverty Reduction: Network Perspectives. Journal of Socio-Economics 37: 2. 9  Wanyama, F., P. Develtere, and I. Pollet. 2009. Reinventing the Wheel? African Cooperatives in a Liberalized Economic Environment. Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics 80 (3). Geneva: International Labour Organization. 10  Develtere, P., I. Pollet. and F. Wanyama. 2008. Co-operating Out of Poverty: The Renaissance of the African Co-operative Movement. Geneva: ILO; Shaw, L. 2011., ibid., 70. 11  See ICA. 2017. Africa Co-operative Development Strategy 2017–2020. Nairobi: The Alliance, Africa.

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exploitation of farmers by small private loan companies.12 Governments are also once again taking notice of co-operatives in their strategic planning; education is playing an important part in co-operative governance projects and international bodies, such as the United Nations, have finally recognized co-operatives as development actors, key to delivering the Sustainable Development Goals.13 In recent years, as discussed below, and as part of the Department for International Development funded CoopAfrica initiative, both colleges re-engaged once more with the UK Co-operative College in transnational networking arrangements whilst concurrently changing their educational status and seeking increased autonomy from government.14 The third example chosen for this research is Mondragon University in the Basque region of Spain, arguably the world’s first co-operative university and one with close working relationships with the Co-operative College and the emerging UK Co-operative University. Whilst Mondragon has received some considerable English-language scholarly attention, it is revisited in this chapter because it is comprised of a series of co-operatives, and in part resembles the federated co-operative model which seems likely to be pursued in the UK. In the African examples, purposeful sampling was used to identify respondents who had been closely involved in the process that saw each college take its first exploratory steps to becoming a co-operative university. Past and present college principals were interviewed by Skype. In the case of Mondragon, the current vice rector was able to reflect on how the university had emerged and become sustainable since its inception in 1997. In addition to this, a wide-ranging grey and academic literature  SACCOS operate “according to the co-operative identity, values and principles, including honesty, openness, social responsibility and caring for others. SACCOSs were formed to alleviate poverty by empowering the poor with training in how to utilize limited resources”. See: https:// tanzaniasaccos.wordpress.com/what-is-a-saccos/ 13  ICA, ILO. 2017. Cooperatives and the Sustainable Development Goals: A Contribution to the Post2015 Development Debate. Geneva: ILO. 14  CoopAfrica was principally funded by the UK Department for International Development (DFID). The Programme is also funded by the and was a partnership between the International Co-operative Alliance (ICA), UK Co-operative College; African Union Secretariat, the Committee for the Promotion and Advancement of Cooperatives (COPAC) and the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC). 12

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was accessed, supported by insights gained from UK co-operative educators who had worked with both the African colleges when they were transitioning to co-operative university status, or with Mondragon on projects and student exchanges. Key informants in all of the existing co-operative university examples were interviewed using a semi-structured interview approach and further informal conversations were held in order to check and develop data. Fundamental to the approach here is the use of networks, but in a way which is grounded in values of inter-co-operation and co-production. Mondragon University is a non-profit second-tier co-operative which was first conceptualized in the 1970s by one of the Mondragon Corporation’s founding technical colleges and finally recognized as a university by the Basque Parliament in 1997.15 To some extent the formation of the university was opportunistic, facilitated by legislative changes similar to those in the UK as prior to the mid-1990s, it had only been possible for the state or the Catholic church to legally run a university. However, other factors drove the imperative towards forming a co-operative university. Following the economic crisis of the late 1990s the Mondragon co-­ operative ecosystem found itself facing a context of rapid technological innovation described by an interviewee as, “a paradigm shift towards a knowledge based and social and solidarity economy”. The three co-­ operative technical colleges which eventually formed the University were already part of the Mondragon Corporation of federated worker co-­ operatives but they lacked autonomy because of their connections with existing public universities.16 This, combined by a need to act with greater agility and be more focussed on the needs of co-operative enterprise, prompted Mondragon Corporation and the technical co-operatives to form a university and acquire degree awarding powers which are now regulated by the Spanish National Agency of Quality Assessment  This refers to a co-operative that unifies and provides services for individual/primary co-operatives (rather like an umbrella organization). Malina, F., and J. K. Walton. 2011. An Alternative Co-operative Tradition: The Basque Co-operatives of Mondragon. In The Hidden Alternative, Co-operative Values, Past, Present and Future, ed. A. Webster, et al. Manchester: MUP. 16  The Mondragon Corporation is a corporation and federation of worker co-operatives based in the Basque region of Spain. It was founded in the town of Mondragon in 1956 by graduates of a local technical college. Its first product was paraffin heaters. 15

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and Accreditation. There are four faculties, Humanities and Education, Business Studies, Engineering and the more recent Gastronomic Sciences—Basque Culinary Center. The University has a federated model teaching almost 5000 students from Bachelor’s to PhD levels. The original Co-operative College (CCM) in Moshi, Tanzania, dated from independence in 1961 and was a specialist government institution within the Ministry of Agriculture. It became Moshi University College of Co-operative and Business Studies (MUCCoBS) in 2004 and Moshi Co-operative University (MCU) in 2014. One motivation for the formation of both MUCCoBS and then the University was to help to modernize and renew the co-operative sector. Co-operative institutions in both Tanzania and Kenya have enjoyed periods of relatively rapid growth resulting in the need for a more highly skilled workforce. At other times, the sector was moribund with training becoming minimal. The start of the new century however was a period of growth. As one respondent remembers: At that time 1999–2001, when you are a specialised institution [which we were] you cannot be a university, so to get higher levels of training you had to transform to be a university. You must do that for the movement.

The decision to change to university status was also prompted by a concern that the co-operative movement was failing to attract people qualified to drive a modernization agenda across the co-operative sector: One of the basic arguments was if we want professionals to work in co-ops and the co-operative movement we need degree level/Masters level – we needed to upgrade qualifications level. We didn’t have that.

The link between the need for a modern co-operative movement to ensure that co-operators, workers and members are appropriately qualified and supported to access Higher Education is clearly articulated in this example and is a useful lesson for the UK co-operative movement. Whilst fundamentally focussed upon business and management studies, MCU has 13 regional centres which offer community outreach programmes on capacity building in co-operative and community rural

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development. These are decentralized units which prioritize member— often farmer—education. Based on his own experience of the UK, one interviewee described the decentralized approach as similar to that of the Open University, which had shown how to operate: across a range of different sites and to minister to the needs of different types of students by using a practical approach to adapt to the realities of people’s own economic life.

Since becoming a university Moshi has also created a Centre for Co-operative Entrepreneurship and Innovation so that, according to one interviewee, “conversations can be continued between co-operative practitioners and leaders as well as students”. Moshi has roughly the same number of students as Mondragon and delivers undergraduate to postgraduate education accredited by the Tanzania University Commission. MCU also runs extensive continuing education and professional development programmes using blended learning and residential programmes. The policy has been to build the university through collaborating with a few strong partners, to start small and to grow slowly. The Co-operative College of Kenya (CCK) was founded in 1967 and became a fully independent Co-operative University of Kenya (CUK) in 2016. Similar to Tanzania, the original college was managed under the auspices of the Ministry of Agriculture, Co-operatives and Environment (MoACE) and carried a strong colonial legacy—the first Kenyan co-­ operative was founded by the British in 1908. Yet co-operators and educators were keen to make the college independent from government and this became possible following an Act of Parliament in 1995. After that time CCK was able to operate as a semi-autonomous government agency with the freedom to define its own teaching programmes. Yet despite being able to offer diplomas to graduates, the co-operative movement in Kenya was expanding in both breadth and complexity which, as in Tanzania, resulted in the need to train co-operators at Higher Education levels and hence develop a university. Accreditation at CUK is conducted by the Regulator of University Education and whilst largely business-­ studies orientated, the university also offers Higher Diplomas in

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Community Development and Social Work. CUK has a student body of roughly 6000 students with a stated mission to: Provide Education, Training, Research and Consultancy in Order To Produce Leaders in the Fields of Co-operative Development, Community Development, Rural Transformation, Business, Applied Sciences, Information and Communication Technology for Development.17

One of the main motivations for the Tanzanian and Kenyan co-­ operative colleges becoming co-operative universities was clearly based on improving their status so as to meet the changing needs of national co-operative movements and national economies. However, there were also sound educational reasons for developing distinctive co-operative universities. The close alignment between state and co-operative movement meant in practice that the colleges were often staffed by civil servants who had little or no knowledge of co-operatives or even appropriate academic qualifications. As civil servants staff could be moved or transferred out of posts with little notice and the colleges in turn often had to accommodate staff foisted upon them by the government. This was of concern for the colleges and so seeking greater autonomy was important, not only to increase the quality of education, but also to establish national and international co-operative research and teaching communities.18 In order to secure CHE and co-operative university status all three organizations faced challenges. Despite the early accommodation of co-­ operatives within the national economies of Kenya and Tanzania post-­ independence, this changed as the countries faced World Bank structural adjustment programmes. Large scale privatization programmes and greater liberalization resulted in co-operative educators in Tanzania, according to one interviewee, having to convince governments in the 1990s of the extent to which:

 https://www.cuk.ac.ke/about/mission-vision-and-values/  It is important to note that the co-operative movements in, for example, many sub-Saharan African countries remain, many would say, overly close to national and local governments with Ministers and Department of Co-operatives proliferating. 17 18

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Co-operatives were important and that co-operative enterprise continued to be important to the development of agriculture, fishing, minerals, forestry, finances and [they therefore had to have a sound argument as to] why [there was a need to have] a co-operative education.

Thus co-operative educators found themselves having to ‘prove’ their relevance and quality to the state, their indigenous co-operative movements (many of whom preferred the specialist institutes) and to mainstream Higher Education concurrently. In Tanzania, the co-operative movement was also seriously divided, with some co-operative societies strongly objecting to the college becoming a university or teaching a more formal mode of CHE. They felt that this would not serve the needs of local people.19 In order to convince this constituent group, it was necessary to approach the annual general meeting (AGM) of the Tanzanian co-operative apex body to make the case about the future needs of the co-operative movement in terms of professionalization and a need to increase professional capacity. A further major concern was there not being enough adequately qualified staff in the College to run a university. The ex-Principal remembers how he had a “Master’s degree and 160 teaching staff, but few others had [formal] qualifications”. Masters level qualifications were accepted for lecturers, but in order to operate as a university, key staff were required to be qualified to PhD level. The low qualifications starting point however meant that the College, the Ministry of Education and the co-operative movement agreed an incremental approach, with the College being affiliated to an existing agricultural university, and then eventually the College becoming a fullfledged university. The issue of upgrading university facilities—such as libraries and IT infrastructures—has required substantial financial investment as has support to develop existing and recruit new staff able to work at a level commensurate with the university ambitions held by the College. A further, final challenge for the African co-operative universities is the perception, amongst young people, of the status of co-operatives and their own future within them. Many, according to one interviewee, “don’t necessarily want to go and work in co-operatives in rural areas once they have a degree…. [some think co-operatives are dying and old fashioned]”  As discussed in an informal conversation with the ex-Principal of MUCCoBS.

19

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and there is a disconnect between the universities and the co-operative movement whereby the co-operatives in rural areas struggle to find staff with appropriate qualifications. It seems, according to interviewees from both Tanzania and Kenya, that the focus of many students is on acquiring a degree, rather than attending a university because it is a co-operative—this might be broadly aligned in terms of the career-progression agenda of lifelong learning, rather than the broader, richer conception of adult education. This can be understood in part because of historical reputational damage when the co-operative movement was closely state aligned but also because of its lack of modernity. As a result, the curricula in both African universities discussed here draw on a much wider subject field than that of co-­ operative studies alone and aims to attract any business student. However this is not straightforward and some young people, who often occupy a precarious socio-economic position and who are forced to work in the informal economy, are engaging in co-operatives but forging new areas of co-operation, for example, transport and distribution co-operatives in urban settings.20 Convincing its stakeholders of the need for CHE and a co-operative university was far less challenging for Mondragon because of the centrality of knowledge and innovation in its strategy for global competitiveness. It was always assumed that education was central to growth and to meeting the paradigm shift of agile and knowledge-based working. Also Mondragon established CHE in the modern period outside of Rochdale or indeed other European co-operative traditions. Its co-operation is home grown with a powerful identity—a product of both Catholicism and Basque nationalism. Mondragon is also a successful corporation, the largest in the Basque country, associated with over 260 worker co-­ operatives and employing over 80,000 people.21 It has a strong and compelling identity and students at the University receive attractive benefits such as access to part-time employment during their study; a return on

 Hartley, S. 2011. A New Space for a New Generation: The Rise of Co-operatives Amongst Young People in Africa. Manchester: Co-operative College. 21  Heales, C., et al. 2017. Humanity at Work. London: The Young Foundation. 20

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some of their fees on graduation and a curricula designed to appeal to students seeking general as well as co-operative enterprise skills.22 It can be seen then that Mondragon CHE enjoyed a greater immediate legitimacy than did the Kenyan and Tanzanian examples where a number of barriers made seeking university status and delivering CHE problematic. Yet Mondragon faced other challenges such as that of establishing co-operative governance which originally proved to be a test for the new university. Implementing co-operative governance is difficult for all co-­ operatives who have to balance member engagement and democratic control with the strategic management of a business. Whilst co-­operatives globally sign-up to the International Co-operative Alliance Statement on Co-operative Identity, in practice, especially when organizations become large, this can create enormous tensions as this agreement is in no way legally binding.23 For example, from its inception Mondragon had to balance the collective with the autonomy of the federated or partner co-operatives—a similar discussion to that which is currently taking place within the UK. In the words of Mondragon’s Vice Rector, Jon Altuna: The biggest contested point was in whether to be a single co-operative or retain a structure with three independent co-operatives…. [This was very sensitive and had to be balanced. There were some issues about balancing the power].

In the event, Mondragon was bold. There were originally some tensions associated with the idea of creating one single co-operative with generic rules and policies, despite federation being the organizational form. In the words of Jon Altuna, “there were fears that autonomy would be lost and perhaps some has”. What this strategy enabled however was a clear business model for the University and a standardized approach to curricula and CHE.  Some concerns remain, for example, whilst Mondragon’s approach is based on a non-profit philosophy. It is also a self-sustaining managerial model and this can result in tensions such as  https://www.mondragon.edu/en/home. Accessed 24 March 2019.  See https://www.uk.coop/the-hive/sites/default/files/uploads/attachments/the-key-elements-ofgovernance_0.pdf 22 23

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around fee and pay structures. However all major decisions are reflected upon and made by a General Assembly and whilst this inevitably privileges some views over others, it is a collective governance approach which continues to hold firm. In Mondragon, “it took ten years to get everyone to a place of mutual understanding on co-operative university governance”. The first phase focused on seeking common ground between different co-operatives and creating a model that could bring them together and create the right balance between faculty and university. The second phase was concerned with developing the organizational culture by building up the transparency of the governance structures and improving the self-management mechanisms. Each of the four university faculties is based on self-organization and self-governance and the same governance structure which is comprised of a democratically elected General Assembly and a Governing Board.24 Each of these is made up of one third workers, one third students and one third collaborative members; day-to-day operations are carried out by the Executive Board, which reports to the Governing Board. The same governance structure is repeated at university level with each faculty feeding in to that. It is not obvious how the governance of the two African universities considered here is meaningfully co-operative. For example, there is little democratic practice and engagement demonstrated in either. Neither have student members in their governance structures nor do they have democratically elected councils. At MCU, the governance structure operates through the University Council and a variety of technical committees that oversee academic and administrative activities and advises on policy-making, governance and control of the University activities. CUK, in turn, is governed by a vice chancellor and three deputy vice chancellors who oversee administration, academic affairs and co-operative development and innovation. They work with a council of ten members, one of whom represents the co-operative movement and who is appointed by the Cabinet Secretary at the Ministry of Education through a competitive interview. One interviewee argued that it is important that the  These are the Faculty of Humanities and Education Sciences; the Faculty of Business Studies; the Faculty of Engineering and the Faculty of Gastronomic Sciences. 24

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c­ o-­operative sector “sees that one of its numbers is involved in the council because many in the Kenyan co-operative movement considered that their College had been taken over by the University when the existing principal was transferred and replaced by a new Vice Chancellor”. The presence of a Council member from the co-operative sector does signal that the sector is able to have some representative role in the development of both the curriculum and the universities but there are no students or other co-operative members involved in governance. The federated Mondragon model therefore has a governance structure that would most closely approximate to the various CHE models being discussed currently in the UK and in this volume. In addition, however, UK CHE is likely to engage with non-co-operators, including other educators and community stakeholders, to take an open approach and to offer non-accredited co-created learning initiatives. Engaged membership is critical and members play an increasingly important role in the governance of the UK co-operative sector more widely, even in the large retail societies. This has not always been the case but is an outcome of a number of high-profile co-operative governance failures in recent decades when members were disengaged and directors were not held to account. It is well recorded in the research literature that malfunctions in governance are the most likely cause of failures in the sustainability of co-operatives.25 A further area of investigation and one critically important to CHE in the UK is the role of co-operative teaching, research and curricula. Pedagogy along with governance is seen as one of the two distinguishing features in a co-operative university from a UK perspective and the importance of a radical pedagogy is outlined in the contributions throughout this volume. The Mondragon university model aims to involve local companies and institutions in order to offer students an opportunity to combine work  See Birchall, J. 2014. Innovation in the Governance of Large Co-operative Businesses: The Alarming Case of UK Co-operative Group. In Cooperatives’ Power to Innovate: Texts Selected from the International Call for Papers, under the direction of L. Hammond Ketilson, and M.-P. Robichaud Villettaz, 87–97. Lévis: International Summit of Cooperatives; and Johnson, H., and L. Shaw. 2014. Rethinking Rural Co-operatives in Development: Introduction to the Policy Arena. Journal of International Development 26 (5): 668–82. 25

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and study which, it is claimed, ensures the development of innovative (practice-based) research in non-academic settings. Mondragon also has a framework contract with the Basque regional government in the form of a four-year structural funding plan whereby they are given 9% of university funding based on the objectives of creating new scientific innovations, technologies and increasing levels of internationalization. Research therefore is seen as important to innovation and the whole university project. This educational innovation is also designed to improve student outcomes in the form of higher employment rates and grades, greater numbers of international exchanges, an increase in the development of international programmes and the setting up of further partnerships with other companies in industry and business. The arrangement at Mondragon also allows students to earn a part-time wage and thus contribute financially to their own fees. In addition to this, each faculty has a financial aid package to support students with economic needs through a financial contract they agree in the first year of studies and then pay back once they have completed their course.26 Whilst the curricula are relatively conventional, the participatory approaches used in the classroom are distinctive. One Mondragon education project—Mendeberri—has produced a learning model with six anchors which identify the objectives which all Mondragon graduates should strive to achieve. These are to be: • • • • •

a citizen of the world, a flexible learner, an active learner, a co-operative person, and a communicator and facilitator of communication.

 Students are eligible for public grants, but this only covers the equivalent of what a student would receive at a public university, that is, €1800 EU a year, which is approximately equivalent to a quarter of the cost of Mondragon fees, at €6500. Mondragon makes an effort to keep fees deliberately lower by compensating with other activity that the university does, such as research and knowledge transfer, as the real cost per year per student is approximately €9000, so in effect the student and family take 60% of cost and the faculty takes on the remainder. 26

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The sixth objective is concerned with identity and personal goals and is based on personal reflection and knowledge of oneself.27 These approaches are not unfamiliar to many of the examples of CHE given in this book, but the way in which students are deemed to use their labour as producers and as members of a co-operative university enhances the relationship between student and pedagogy.28 At MCU, mixed methods—such as group work—are used in teaching, and staff have been trained in participatory methods; however, this approach is not universal across the university.29 Colleagues are familiar with notions of experiential learning and to that end are setting up a SACCO for students in order to enhance the possibility that they might ‘learn by doing’. The curriculum is a relatively conventional business studies one and one commentator described how the culture of co-operation in many ways was missing at the university and needed to be worked on. This was raised as a concern by one interviewee who described how some staff working at the university, “have the attitude that co-operatives are just like any other business, such as thinking ‘I know about auditing, it’s enough’ so there is a need for senior staff to learn about the specific requirements and operating conditions in co-operative organizations”. Currently, courses fall into the areas of co-operative management, accounting, community development, procurement and supply management as well as microfinance and enterprise development. All students however take courses in co-­operative development even if they are studying engineering and co-operative values are covered extensively in a number of starter modules. This is to ensure that all students develop a proper understanding of co-operative behaviours, culture and practice. Research is considered to be of importance within the university and there are significant research opportunities for PhD students as “there are  See https://www.mondragon.edu/en/information-of-interest/learning-model  Winn, J. 2015. The Co-operative University: Labour, Property and Pedagogy. Power & Education 7 (1): 39–55; Wright, S., D. Greenwood, and R. Boden. 2011. Report on a Field Visit to Mondragón University: A Cooperative Experience/Experiment. Learning and Teaching 4 (3), Winter: 38–56. 29  In both of the African examples, students are self-funded and funding support for students falls into two main categories; there are bursaries subject to minimum entry requirements as well as government sponsorship in the form of loans to be repaid once students are employed. 27 28

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major areas of co-operative business management, entrepreneurship and community development that are under-researched in Tanzania, particularly in the banking and major business sectors”. MCU considers itself to be closely tied to the traditional co-operative movement and thus research and curricula must, it was felt by interviewees, continuously reflect the needs of the co-operative movement. In the case of the CUK, the development of an appropriate curriculum which goes beyond traditional co-operative management and entrepreneurship to higher levels of business leadership and management has been a priority. As in Tanzania, this also meant ensuring continuing professional development for many existing staff who were not qualified to teach at university level. In the words of a respondent: Many of the staff working at CUK are not co-operative specialists and so although there is an effort to use co-operative pedagogy methods, such as participatory learning based on practical scenarios, this is not a widely accepted methodology by the CUK.

Research, as in Tanzania is highly valued and CUK runs frequent international conferences based on issues such as co-operatives and the Sustainable Development Goals. It can be seen from this brief discussion that despite the curricula being closely focussed on co-operative entrepreneurship, in the Mondragon example, the holistic experience of being a co-operative learner is also acknowledged as is the co-operative as a deep, transformational and associational learning space.30 Again, this is an understanding shared by many of the contributors to this volume. Other issues have had to be prioritized in the Kenyan and Tanzanian examples and interviewees would likely agree that there is still some way to go in terms of instilling co-operative culture and identity within the curricula and amongst the staff base. Strengths in both African examples however include the proximity of the  See MacPherson, I. 2003. Encouraging Associative Intelligence, Co-operative Learning and Responsible Citizenship in the 21st Century. Manchester: Co-operative College Working Paper 1; Mezirow, J., and Associates. 1990. Fostering Critical Reflection in Adulthood: A Guide to Transformative and Emancipatory Learning. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass; and Senge, P. M. 1990. The Fifth Discipline – The Art and Practice of the Learning Organization. London: Random House. See also Perez and Shaw in Chap. 9 of this volume. 30

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university to the co-operative movement and the commitment to values-­ based approaches. It is of vital importance to create and sustain a permanent co-operative culture in CHE, as demonstrated by the examples in this chapter, and that it remains central to current thinking around UK CHE. The vice rector from Mondragon describes culture as the most important element to consider in the development of a co-operative university, but this takes some time to establish and began in the case of Mondragon with the different institutions involved unpicking and then remaking “the existing mental frameworks and cultural beliefs about what a university is”. Our respondent described how in the Mondragon example it was understood that there needed to be a shift away from: people questioning what the university will give to them and more towards as worker members, what they will contribute to the university. […This is taking responsibility, including strategic responsibility for the future of their organization, of the co-operative university].

At Mondragon, this continues to be work in progress, but the argument is made that “new structures need to be agile and flexible enough to transcend current economic crises and create a new ecosystem”. The next steps will focus on interdisciplinarity and will be based on: consolidating the organizational structure and evaluating whether it is necessary to make changes to the governing structure of the university in the next 10 years, and whether it’s essential to conceive of another structure to cope with the increased interdisciplinarity.

MacPherson discussed the virtues that interdisciplinarity brings to co-­ operative work and education as co-operators learn to ‘do and be’ with co-operative learning for enterprise and social value drawing on a range of disciplines. Future thinking about effective co-operative educational practices must foreground and theorize interdisciplinarity as one of the

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defining strengths of co-operative pedagogy and as a contribution to the growth of the co-operative sector.31 Another observation in relation to Mondragon concerns the need for fresh cultural thinking around governance. It may be that: “younger generation have different aspirations and may not be so keen on being members of one co-operative for their whole working life… there needs to be room to create new types of co-operative models that can move with changing trends and motivations”. Cultural challenges are equally critical to the Kenyan and Tanzanian University experiences. For example, in Tanzania there are issues associated with encouraging the staff from within the co-operative movement to take part in training and educational activities. According to one interviewee, the Tanzanian government is supporting an increase in co-­ operative development as a means to increase rural development more generally but “many in the movement think this can be driven by wisdom rather than qualifications”. This is a challenge for the Co-operative University which “needs to strike the balance between practical on-the-­ ground knowledge and professional qualifications”. New initiatives include promoting co-operative start-ups with students to form their own co-operatives after they graduate, creating self-employment opportunities in consulting, agro-processing and co-operative exports. In the Kenyan case, one of the most important elements of the process of becoming a co-operative university has been in recognizing “when you are not ready to proceed and taking time to reflect and evaluate progress before returning to process”. Introducing a culture of reflection and the place of reflexive practice in CHE is part of acknowledging the long-term vision, the transformational nature and the need for sustainability of a co-operative university. Bringing people ‘onside’, to ensure all of the right stakeholders are involved from the outset, was also important to the development of CUK. Initially over 1000 co-operative leaders were invited to a conference where they discussed the extent to which they wanted to be involved in the process, their vision for the co-operative  See MacPherson, I. 2015. Mainstreaming Some Lacunae: Developing Co-operative Studies as an Interdisciplinary, International Field of Enquiry. In Co-operation, Learning and Co-operative Values, ed. T. Woodin. London: Routledge; and Repko, A. F., et al. 2013. Introduction to Interdisciplinary Studies. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications. 31

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university and their commitment to achieving it. This resulted in their making a resolution to support the formation of a university. The CUK team believes that it is important to commit significant time to ongoing stakeholder engagement to ensure levels of support are maintained and to keep the university close and relevant to the co-operative movement. One concern has been that many courses taught within CUK are not co-­ operative specific. In the future, all students, regardless of whether they are studying e-commerce or another type of business degree, are required to undertake a supplementary course that introduces them to co-­operative culture and philosophy, the history of the movement and its values and principles. One respondent said: This also helps the students become more resilient as they are made aware of the potential for setting up co-operatives as an alternative to mainstream employment and that this has been going on for a long time… [we need to ensure] the meaning and purpose of co-operatives remains in focus now that CUK has expanded and grown.

In each of the examples illustrated in this chapter, the process of becoming a co-operative university was incremental and was led by the developing needs of the co-operative movement as is discussed in both the introductory and concluding chapters of this volume in the case of Tanzania and Kenya, and by economic need and ideological drivers, coupled with opportunities presented by legislative changes, in the case of Mondragon. For the UK, the drivers appear to be more closely related to those of Mondragon in terms of being both ideological and opportunistic and less based on the needs of what might be defined as the traditional co-operative movement. Currently the UK Co-operative University project appears to have stronger (or at least equal) foundations in academia than in the co-operative movement but there are reasons for this. The long UK tradition of access to further and adult education may in some way account for this disconnect as co-operative societies have focussed their attention on training and taken their education ‘in house’, largely

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focusing on work-based training.32 Additionally, there is a strong tradition of alternative, radical, adult education which intersects with and has its provenance in, co-operative adult education, however we define it.33 What is both reassuring and evident, however, is that the pedagogy, governance and member engagement examples offered by the contributors in this volume match the narratives, views and experiences articulated by interviewees in the CHE examples discussed here.34 We can go further and say that the shape of an emerging UK CHE is both innovative and agile, as in the Mondragon aspirations, and also rooted in member needs and values as in the African examples. Additionally, UK CHE seeks to be framed by, and engendering, a social purpose and social justice paradigm which influences and engages within and without the traditional co-operative movement. The three examples considered in this brief survey of the international context of CHE raise fundamental issues for those seeking to pursue CHE in general and particularly for those with ambitions towards establishing a co-operative university in the UK. The least important consideration is the constitution of legal personalities which are co-operative; more important, we would argue, is establishing and securing a co-­ operative character to new institutions. How is this to be achieved? These examples suggest a way forward. In the introductory chapter to this volume the editors frame the problems of the neoliberal university as a crisis of governance. CHE is a viable prospect precisely because of the way in which self-governing communities of scholars—including those Oxbridge colleges—is well-suited to co-operation, and looking again to the two ancient English universities, suits a federated model. In Mondragon we see this functioning in a modern university context. Robust protections are needed to safeguard against the neoliberal takeover of a co-operative university. Student voices must sit at the heart of the co-operative  See Woodin, T. 2011. Co-operative Education in Britain During the Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries: Context, Identity and Learning. In The Hidden Alternative, Co-operative Values, Past, Present and Future, ed. A. Webster, et al., 78–95. Manchester: MUP. 33  Shaw, L. 2015. Mapping Co-operative Education in the UK. In Co-operation, Learning and Co-operative Values, ed. T. Woodin, 162. London: Routledge. 34  See Woodin, T., ed. 2015. Co-operation, Learning and Co-operative Values. London: Routledge; and Mayo, E. 2015. The Co-operative Advantage. London: New Internationalist. 32

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­ ifference in Higher Education, with generous participation at all levels d of institutions. Pedagogies and epistemologies must be framed fundamentally in co-­ operative ways, for in doing so the power of co-operative practice is met, whether as MacPherson’s ‘associative intelligence’,35 Yeo’s notion of ‘labour’s own capital’36 or United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization’s four pillars of education: learning to know, do, be and live together.37 Curriculum content must therefore be co-operative in several ways. The common modules used at MCU offer an effective way to equip students with the skills to co-operate, vital in order for them to participate in the co-operatives they have just joined, and in which they may not be experienced. Ambitions towards university title will require breadth and depth of subjects taught, and cannot be limited to liberal arts and social sciences. Clearly there is a need for education which does not just serve the co-operative movement, as too heavy a focus on this can constrain an institution. Much of this poses the question: what is the purpose of CHE? The examples which follow in this volume point to many different answers. The aspirations to build a complete, co-operative university in the UK are ambitious—almost dizzyingly so; that so much success has been enjoyed in varying legal and political contexts should give cheer, as it proves the concept and raises the prospect of an international CHE ecosystem. Inter-co-operation is ultimately at the core of effective co-operation.

 MacPherson, I. 2015. Mainstreaming Some Lacunae: Developing Co-operative Studies as an Interdisciplinary, International Field of Enquiry. In Co-operation, Learning and Co-operative Values, ed. T. Woodin. London: Routledge. 36  Yeo, S., ed. 1988. New Views of Co-operation. London: Routledge. 37  UNESCO. 1996. Learning: The Treasure Within. Geneva: UNESCO. 35

4 Prefiguring the Idea of the University: What Can Be Learned from Autonomous Learning Spaces That Have Experimented with No-Fee, Alternative Forms of Higher Education in the UK? Gary Saunders

In 2010 the UK Coalition Government announced a series of reforms to Higher Education in England which were based on the findings of the Browne Review: Independent Review of Higher Education Funding and Student Finance.1 Among these reforms were: (1) raising the cap on tuition fees to a maximum of £9000; (2) removing block grants for teaching to the arts, humanities, business, law and social sciences; and (3) changing the regulations around granting the title of university to ‘level  Browne, J. 2010. Browne Review: Independent Review of Higher Education Funding and Student Finance. Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS); Department for Business, Innovation and Skills. 2010. Securing a Sustainable Future for Higher Education: An Independent Review of Higher Education Funding and Student Finance. Gov.UK. https://assets.publishing. service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/422565/bis-101208-securing-sustainablehigher-education-browne-report.pdf. Accessed 25 Oct 2018. 1

G. Saunders (*) School of Social and Political Sciences, University of Lincoln, Lincoln, UK e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s) 2019 M. Noble, C. Ross (eds.), Reclaiming the University for the Public Good, Palgrave Critical University Studies, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-21625-2_4

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the playing field’ and encourage more ‘alternative providers’ to enter the sector.2 Rather than being viewed in isolation, these changes should be considered as part of series of reforms to Higher Education which, since the late 1970s,3 have been heavily influenced by the logic of neoliberalism.4 The imposition of this neoliberal model of Higher Education is based on the premise that embedding market principles into the sector will drive up the quality of provision and improve value-for-­money by creating an internal market to increase competition among institutions to attract students, with the latter gravitating towards the most popular, well-run courses,5 forcing less popular courses to improve the quality of their provision, reduce their fees or cease to operate.6  Members of Parliament voted to increase this cap in line with inflation (currently £9250) in 2016 and was applied in 2017 to both new and current students if universities can evidence ‘quality teaching’, which will be evaluated by the Teaching Excellence Framework. While the wording states ‘alternative providers’, the Coalition Government’s intention was to make it easier for private providers to enter the sector (McGettigan, A. 2013. The Great University Gamble, Money, Markets and the Future of Higher Education. London: Verso.). This was part of the government’s attempt to marketize the sector and reduce the price that universities charged for tuition fees. The rationale was that private providers, especially those that offered undergraduate degrees, would be able to do so more cheaply and force universities to compete with them by reducing their prices. This attempt to create a market never really worked with around 29 per cent of universities charging the maximum of £9250 and 96 per cent charging the maximum fee for some of their courses (Havergal, C. 2016. Almost All Universities Confirm £9,250 Tuition Fees for 2017–18. https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/almost-all-universities-confirmps9250-tuition-fees-2017-18. Accessed 6 Sept 2018). Department for Business, Innovation and Skills. 2010. Securing a Sustainable Future for Higher Education: An Independent Review of Higher Education Funding and Student Finance. Gov.UK. https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_ data/file/422565/bis-10-1208-securing-sustainablehigher-education-browne-report.pdf. Accessed 25 Oct 2018. McGettigan, A. 2013. The Great University Gamble, Money, Markets and the Future of Higher Education. London: Verso. 3  For example, the Jarratt Report (1985), the Croham Report (1987), the Dearing Report (1997), the Lambert Report (2003) and the Higher Education Act (2004). 4  Brown, R., and H. Carasso. 2013. Everything for Sale? The Marketisation of UK Higher Education. London/New York: Routledge. 5  Although the reason students select universities is much more complex and is based more on perceived academic and cultural fit than marketing information and league tables (Tomlinson, M. 2014. Exploring the Impact of Policy Changes on Students’ Attitudes and Approaches to Learning in Higher Education. The Higher Education Academy. https://www.heacademy.ac.uk/sites/default/files/ resources/Exploring_the_impact_of_policy_changes_student_experience.pdf. Accessed 31 Oct 2018.). 6  Callender, C., and P. Scott, eds. 2013. Browne and Beyond: Modernizing English Higher Education. London: Institute of Education Press; Thompson, J., and B. Bekhradnia. 2011. Higher Education: 2

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The thread running through these neoliberal reforms has been an attempt to reduce state expenditure on Higher Education and promote the privatization of the sector in the interests of private enterprises to accumulate profits without necessarily providing a public benefit such as social, cultural and economic needs of communities.7 This has created a situation wherein universities are forced to focus on short-term survival rather than being concerned with the long-term impact of Higher Education.8 These reforms have significantly altered the governance and organizational structures of universities as not only have many modified their management systems through the imposition of New Public Management,9 but also their strategies to cope with the new funding environments.10 This has led to a redistribution of power within universities,11 resulting in a shift away from more traditional collegiate models, often described as a form of collaborative and mutually supportive decision-­making by scholars,12 to a more centralized, hierarchical and Students at the Heart of the system – An Analysis of the Higher Education White Paper. Summary. London: HEPI. 7  Boden, R., P. Ciancanelli, and S. Wright. 2012. Trust Universities? Governance for Post Capitalist Futures. Journal of Co-operative Studies 45 (2): 16–24. 8  Pavlenko, S., and C. Bojan. 2014. Reclaiming the Idea of the University as a Possible Solution to Today’s Crisis. Centre for Educational Policy Studies Journal 4 (2): 91–104. 9  Shattock, M. 2008. The Change from Private to Public Governance of British Higher Education: Its Consequences for Higher Education Policy Making 1980–2006. Higher Education Quarterly 62 (3): 181–203; Radice, H. 2013. UK Higher Education Under Neoliberalism. ACME: An International E-Journal for Critical Geographies 12 (3): 407–418; Deem, R., O. Fulton, M. Read, and S. Watson. 2001. New Managerialism and the Management of UK Universities. End of Award Report. Swindon: Economic and Social Research Council; Deem, R., S. Hillyard, and M. Reed. 2007. Knowledge, Higher Education and the New Managerialism: The Changing Management of UK Universities. Oxford: Oxford University Press; Tapper, T., and B. Salter. 2003. Interpreting the Process of Change in Higher Education: The Case of the Research Assessment Exercises. Higher Education Quarterly 57 (1): 4–23; Scott, P. 2013. The Reform of English Higher Education: Universities in Global, National and Regional Contexts. Cambridge Journal of Regions, Economy and Society 7: 217–231. 10  Callender, C., and P. Scott, eds. 2013. Browne and Beyond: Modernizing English Higher Education. London: Institute of Education Press. 11  Lomas, L. 2005. Organisational Change and the Shifting of the Locus of Power. Paper presented at the European Conference on Educational Research, University College Dublin, 7–10 September 2005. 12  Bacon, E. 2014. Neo-Collegiality: Restoring Academic Engagement in the Managerial University. Leadership Foundation in Higher Education.

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corporate one with the control of universities moving from scholars to managers.13 For academics, the reforms appear to have led to increased and intensified workloads so as to maximize teaching and research outputs,14 an increase in precarious work, deteriorating pay and cuts to pensions despite universities receiving more funding since the new fee structure came into place in 2012.15 Consequently, as academic labour is intensified16 staff are reporting increased levels of stress and mental health problems17 and feelings of alienation within academia.18 Concomitantly, students commencing their studies since 2012 can now expect to accrue debt—circa £57,343 for a three-year degree programme;19 heightened levels of anxiety and are becoming increasingly dissatisfied with their courses.20  Boden, R., P. Ciancanelli, and S. Wright. 2012. Trust Universities? Governance for Post Capitalist Futures. Journal of Co-operative Studies 45 (2): 16–24; Callender, C., and P. Scott, eds. 2013. Browne and Beyond: Modernizing English Higher Education. London: Institute of Education Press; Halffman, W., and H. Radder. 2015. The Academic Manifesto: From an Occupied to a Public University. Minerva 53: 165–187; Shattock, M. 2008. The Change from Private to Public Governance of British Higher Education: Its Consequences for Higher Education Policy Making 1980–2006. Higher Education Quarterly 62 (3): 181–203. 14  De Angelis, M., and D. Harvie. 2009. ‘Cognitive Capitalism’ and the Rat Race: How Capital Measures Immaterial Labour in British Universities. Historical Materialism 17 (3): 3–30; Graham, T. 2015. Academic Staff Performance and Workload in Higher Education in the UK. The Conceptual Dichotomy. Journal of Further and Higher Education 39 (5): 665–679. 15  Barnett, R. 2018. The Ecological University: A Feasible Utopia. London: Routledge; UCU. 2013. Over Half of Universities and Colleges Use Lecturers on Zero Hours Contracts. UCU. http://www.ucu. org.uk/6749. Accessed 31 Oct 2018. 16  Gill, R. 2009. Breaking the Silence: The Hidden Injuries of Neo-Liberal Academia. In Secrecy and Silence in the Research Process: Feminist Reflections, ed. R. Flood and R. Gill, 228–244. London: Routledge. 17  Kinman, G., and S. Wray. 2013. Higher Stress: A Survey of Stress and Well-Being Among Staff in Higher Education. University and College Union (UCU). http://www.ucu.org.uk/media/pdf/4/5/ HE_stress_report_July_2013.pdf. Accessed 30 Mar 2018; UCU. 2013. Over Half of Universities and Colleges Use Lecturers on Zero Hours Contracts. UCU. http://www.ucu.org.uk/6749. Accessed 31 Oct 2018. 18  Hall, R. (2018) The Alienated Academic: The Struggle for the Autonomy Inside the University. London: Palgrave. 19  The Complete University Guide. 2018. University Tuition Fees. https://www.thecompleteuniversityguide.co.uk/university-tuition-fees/. Accessed 31 Oct 2018. 20  The University and College Union (UCU), the union for those working in the sector estimate, that around 54 per cent of the academic staff experience precarious working conditions either employed on fixed-term contracts or as hourly paid lecturers. UCU argue that over the last decade senior lecturers are now earning £9000 a year less than if their pay had kept pace with inflation: https://www.ucu.org.uk/article/9574/UCU-writes-to-government-calling-for-funding-to13

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 he Emergence of Autonomous Learning T Spaces Together, government reforms have been described as an attack of the idea of the public university,21 a fundamental assault on the critical and radical traditions of academic activity, and an act of vandalism against the idea of the university as a progressive sociological and political project.22 Despite advances that some would consider positive, such as Widening Participation, the sum total of these reforms has fundamentally disfigured the sector23 and left the idea of the university in ruins.24 These reforms have not gone unopposed, and in 2010 sparked a wave of protests across the UK, which included student demonstrations, union-led strikes and the occupation of university property. Out of these protests and occupations there also emerged numerous autonomous learning spaces,25 such as Tent City University, The Bank of support-pay-deal. For example, see current strike action with regards to changes to Universities Superannuation Scheme. For more detail: https://www.timeshighereducation.com/blog/uss-pension-changes-would-be-disaster-universities-they-are-preventable. This figure is based on a threeyear degree course commencing in the 2018/2019 academic year and priced at £9250 pa with a successful application for the maximum annual maintenance loan living away from parents outside of London of £8700 pa plus the accruement of £3494 of interest while studying on the course. Around 27 per cent state that they suffer from at least one mental health issue. Of this 27 per cent, 77 per cent state they suffer from depression and 74 per cent with anxiety. Around 63 per cent state that they suffer from stress that disrupts their daily lives and 77 per cent from a fear of failure. Around 71 per cent state that university work is the cause of their stress and 39 per cent worried about getting a job after university with around 18 per cent in receipt of university mental health services. A recent Office for Students report found that only 38 per cent of students believed their course offered good value for money. 21  Holmwood, J. 2016. The University, Democracy and the Public Sphere. British Journal of Education 1–13; Collini, S. 2012. What Are Universities for? London: Penguin. 22  Bailey, M., and D. Freedman. 2011. The Assualt on Universities. A Manifesto for Resistance. London: Pluto Press. 23  Warner, M. 2015. Learning My Lesson: Marina Warner on the Disfiguring of Higher Education. London Review of Book. http://www.lrb.co.uk/v37/n06/marinawarner/learning-my-lesson. Accessed 13 Oct 2018. 24  Readings, B. 1997. The University in Ruins. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. 25  Haworth, H., and J. Elmore. 2017. Out of the Ruins: The Emergence of Radical Informal Learning Spaces. Oakland: PM Press.

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Ideas and London Free University all of which have experimented with alternative models of Higher Education provision.26 To better understand these experiments with alternative models of Higher Education provision, the chapter draws upon Chatterton and Pickerill’s concept of autonomous spaces, which these autonomous learning spaces are examples of. Chatterton and Pickerill describe autonomous spaces as places of resistance and creation ‘…where there is a questioning of the laws and social norms of society and a creative desire to constitute non-capitalist, egalitarian and solidaristic forms of political, social and economic organization through a combination of resistance and creation’.27 Autonomous spaces are often based on ­Do-It-­Yourself (DIY) or ‘punk’ principles wherein people organize and run the spaces themselves, which serve as hubs for various different activities, sub-cultures, counter-politics, anti-capitalist movements and local-­campaign issues.28 While these autonomous spaces are often embryonic, ephemeral and contested, their importance is that they create places wherein people can experiment and develop alternative forms of self-organization and autonomous practices through a process of learning, trial and error.29 This process of experimenting with different forms of autonomous practice is often referred to as prefiguration which encourages people to experiment with new and different forms of social relationships, self-­  The emergence of these radical informal learning spaces is not specific to the UK but has happened across the world (Haworth, H., and J. Elmore. 2017. Out of the Ruins: The Emergence of Radical Informal Learning Spaces. Oakland: PM Press) in response to similar restructuring programmes. As part of my doctoral research I created an ‘Alternative Education Counter-Cartography’ that highlights 123 of these projects worldwide: https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer?mid=1N qScqpNo2fAa2AEAZ3cwaK7fuXw&usp=sharing. Howard cited in Playford, A., N. Howard, and ‘commonly known as don’. 2011. We are the Change: Welfare, Education and Law at the Occupy camp. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2011/nov/15/welfare-education-law-occupylondon. Accessed 31 Oct 2018; Saunders, G., and A. Ghanimi. 2013. Life-Long Learning Without Life-Long Debt. http://www.ragged-online.com/2013/09/edinburgh-brighton-britains-freealternative-higher-education-network-offers-life-long-learning-lifelong-debt-gary-saunders-ali-ghanimi/. Accessed 31 Oct 2018; Swain, H. 2013. Could the Free University Movement be the Great New Hope for Education? http://www.theguardian.com/education/2013/jan/28/free-universitymovementexcluded-learners. Accessed 31 Oct 2018. 27  Chatterton, P., and J. Pickerill. 2010. Everyday Activism and Transitions Towards Post‐capitalist Worlds. Transaction 35 (4): 475–490. 28  Alcoff, L., and J. Alcoff. 2015. Autonomism in Theory and Practice. Science & Society 79: 221–242. 29  Chatterton, P., and J. Pickerill. 2010. Everyday Activism and Transitions Towards Post‐capitalist Worlds. Transaction 35 (4): 475–490. 26

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organization and decision-making now, but which in some way reflects the future society being sought by the group.30 Prefiguration is articulated as being different to other forms of social action because it does not offer a doctrine for how society should be structured in the future or provide a coherent vision or blueprint of what an alternative society might look like. Instead, there is a focus on autonomous practices themselves, or on the means rather than the ends and often explained by the phrase, ‘be the change you want to see’.31 Using this theoretical framework, the rest of the chapter draws upon empirical research conducted as part of a doctoral thesis32 with seven autonomous learning spaces based in the UK: Birmingham Radical Education, Free University Brighton, People’s Political Economy (Oxford), Ragged University (Edinburgh), The IF Project (London), the Really Open University (Leeds) and the Social Science Centre (Lincoln). It draws upon semi-structured interviews with respondents who are founders or participants in each of the case study examples. The chapter examines what, if anything, can be learned from these autonomous learning spaces to prefigure an alternative model of a Higher Education institution. Birmingham Radical Education was based in the City of Birmingham (UK) and offered no-fee at the level of Higher Education courses, ­workshops and seminars between 2013 and 2014.33 The project was ­created by three academics who have expertise and experience of work Graeber, D. 2009. Direct Action: An Ethnography. Oakland: AK Press; Kaldor, M., and S. Selchow. 2012. The ‘Bubbling Up’ of Subterranean Politics in Europe. Report. London School of Economics and Political Science. http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/44873/1/The%20%E2%80%98bubbling%20 up%E2%80%99%20of%20subterranean%20politics%20in%20Europe(lsero).pdf. Accessed 4 July 2018; Maeckelbergh, M. 2012. Horizontal Democracy Now: From Alterglobalization to Occupation. Interface: A Journal for and About Social Movements 4 (1): 207–234; Sitrin, M. 2007. Ruptures in Imagination: Horizontalism, Autogestion and Affective Politics in Argentina. Policy and Practice: A Development Education Review. http://www.developmenteducationreview.com/ issue5-focus4. Accessed 31 Oct 2018. 31  Graeber, D. 2009. Direct Action: An Ethnography. Oakland: AK Press. 32  Saunders, G. Forthcoming. Re-imagining the Idea of the University for a Post-Capitalist Society. PhD Thesis. 33  While this informal learning space is no longer in existence, its blog page is still live; see: https:// bread4brum.wordpress.com/ 30

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ing in community education and critical pedagogical projects both inside and outside mainstream Higher Education. Those involved in the project described it as: ‘a critical response to the imposition of the current neoliberal model of Higher Education and aims to create an alternative education experience that is not consumerist, indebting, authoritarian or judging of individual worth’ (Founding Member of Birmingham Radical Education 2). A key feature of Birmingham Radical Education was the way in which it experimented with critical pedagogy in an attempt to ‘…create a space where all learning and teaching is critical by questioning the world as it is and exploring how it could be otherwise’ (Founding Member of Birmingham Radical Education 1). As part of its education provision, Birmingham Radical Education hosted a seminar by Norma Bermudez on the use of popular education with displaced Afro-Colombian and shanty town women community members as a tool of empowerment and liberation34 that was well attended, a seminar on the rise of the far-right Golden Dawn Party in Greece that was attended by over 50 people, and a short course on Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed,35 although this was only attended by five people. Birmingham Radical Education suffered several setbacks during its existence, including disagreements between members about the direction of the project, students not turning up to courses and an argument about fascism at a public event which one member of the group thought had a negative impact on people’s perception of the project: ‘…what transpired was an emotionally charged argument about fascism, monopolised by a vocal minority, which had the effect of excluding many of those who attended from participating in the discussion’ (Founding Member of Birmingham Radical Education 2). Perhaps the most important feature of these autonomous learning spaces was the bonds of friendship and trust that developed between members of the group, which kept the project going during the difficult   For more details about this event, see: https://bread4brum.wordpress.com/2012/12/24/ norma-bermudez-professor-and-womens-rights-activist-colombia-28th-march-2012/ 35  For more information about this event, see: https://bread4brum.wordpress.com/2012/12/24/ october-2012-meetings-events/ 34

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times the project faced during its existence as one member of the group commented: ‘We are friends, first and foremost, and speak to each other on a regular basis’ (Founding Member of Birmingham Radical Education 1). The project ceased to exist in 2014; however, the project was a good example of how people tried to overcome adversity in experimenting with an alternative model of Higher Education. As one respondent told me: ‘…an important thing to remember is that not all projects like this are going to be successful, but it is important to keep experimenting and to learn from these projects and to celebrate the productiveness that things do not always work because failure can be productive’ (Founding Member of Birmingham Radical Education 1). Free University Brighton36 is situated in Brighton (UK) and was set up in 2010 by five individuals: ‘We set up the Free University of Brighton as I was concerned about the cuts and creeping privatization of education. I feel strongly that everyone should have the experience and opportunities of Higher Education without getting into massive debt’ (Founding Member of Free University Brighton). The project organizes courses, workshops and education events across the city to develop an alternative education system that will benefit everyone regardless of their income and specifically targets: ‘…young people from disadvantaged backgrounds and mature students who would have traditionally studied part-time who are either unable or unwilling to take on large amounts of debt to fund studying in Higher Education’ (Founding Member of Free University Brighton). All Free University Brighton’s educational provision is provided on a no-fee basis, and whilst people can donate money to the project if they want to, there is no expectation that they will. This does raise issues; however, as while the project is run on no-fee principles it is not free as time needs to be volunteered by organizers and academics to provide workshops and courses. Moreover, Free University Brighton has had problems connecting with those people that are least likely to attend Higher Education: ‘…usually, it is the “same old suspects”, and it is often difficult to connect with those from the more deprived areas of Brighton that  More information about Free University Brighton and its education provision can be found on its website: http://freeuniversitybrighton.org/about/ 36

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would probably benefit the most from the Free University of Brighton’ (Founding Member of Free University Brighton). In 2016, Free University Brighton ran its first ‘degree level’ course, or ‘freegree’, the Social Science and Humanities degree.37 ‘This course is pitched at the level of Higher Education and is part of an attempt to offer “a genuine alternative to degrees offered by British universities”’.38 The degree is based on an ‘ethos of encouraging educational curiosity, discovery, self-development, building intellectual self-confidence, learning for pleasure and the provision of an education that is accessible for all’.39 To help the course be more inclusive and support those with different educational needs, Free University Brighton employ a variety of different teaching and learning methods, including group discussion, video clips, radio programmes as well as more traditional academic readings. The Social Science and Humanities degree covers a range of different topics and aims to ensure that those who take part will explore real-world issues through a range of disciplines such as philosophy, sociology, economics, history, and criminology. Students can choose either to simply attend without assessment or to be assessed on a pass/fail basis. Lecturers from local universities deliver the courses and volunteer their time because they support the project of providing free Higher Education. The course itself is informally validated by a panel of independent academics similarly to mainstream Higher Education through a process of peer-review by external examiners that scrutinizes the content of the course and provides academic rigour.40 In 2018, the Free University Brighton added another two degree level courses Philosophy and Feminism, Gender and Sexuality.41  For more detailed information about this course, see the course handbook: http://freeuniversitybrighton.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/Social-Science-Freegree-Modules.pdf 38  Free University Brighton. 2018. About. http://freeuniversitybrighton.org/about/. Accessed 31 Oct 2018. 39  Free University Brighton. 2018. About. http://freeuniversitybrighton.org/about/. Accessed 31 Oct 2018. 40  Free University Brighton. 2018. About. http://freeuniversitybrighton.org/about/. Accessed 31 Oct 2018. 41  For more information about these courses, see: http://freeuniversitybrighton.org/wp-content/ uploads/2018/08/Freegree-Courses-2018-19.pdf 37

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People’s Political Economy42 is based in Oxford (UK). Four people created the project in 2012 with backgrounds in academia and political activism. People’s Political Economy describes itself as a project that provides: ‘…a basic introduction to politics and economics to people in Oxford in the belief that this will strengthen the democratic process by equipping people with the knowledge and skills to think critically about the current political-economic situation and work towards creating more egalitarian alternatives’ (Founding Member of People’s Political Economy). A key feature of People’s Political Economy is their approach to teaching and learning, which they refer to as the ‘democratic classroom’ (Founding Member of People’s Political Economy) and is inspired the work of critical pedagogy, especially Freire.43 Most of People’s Political Economy’s courses have a core syllabus, but group facilitators can modify the content to fit with the nature of the participants so that ‘…learning is structured by the groups themselves in a locally-relevant fashion’ (Founding Member of People’s Political Economy). The facilitators also try to ensure that no one political or ideological view is promoted to the exclusion of any other, though because I was unable to attend any of their classes, it was difficult to know whether this was the aim rather than the reality. In preparation for delivering People’s Political Economy’s courses, new facilitators are offered ‘facilitator training’ to give them an insight into the theory and practice of critical education. However, implementing this in practice has been much more difficult as one respondent commented: ‘Developing courses has been difficult because there are two conflicting objectives with what we are trying to achieve. We are committed to the provision of democratic learning but are trying to familiarise people with key political economy ideas. This means it can be difficult to be faithful to the democratic classroom while being  Although People’s Political Economy is no longer live, a link to their inaugural report that provides an insightful overview and evaluation of the project still works: https://agentofhistory.files. wordpress.com/2015/08/ppe-report-2013.pdf 43  Freire, P. 1970. Pedagogy of the Oppressed. London: Penguin. 42

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overly prescriptive regarding content’ (Founding Member of People’s Political Economy). People’s Political Economy has worked with local organizations in Oxford, including My Life My Choice,44 secondary school students from Cheney School, Crisis Skylight Oxford45 and Restore.46 Courses have been attended by secondary school children and people from the local community, many of whom have no previous experience of Higher Education. The IF Project is based in London (UK) and was created by two people, one a former senior journalist at the Observer and the other a musician, both of whom have been involved in several community-based projects within the arts and the humanities. Like other experiments, IF was a response to the 2010 reforms to Higher Education: ‘The hinge of why we started thinking about this project was that there appeared to be a political disaster creating a marketised Higher Education landscape and that seems to be hitting the humanities subject particularly hard’ (Founding Member of the IF Project). A key feature of the IF Project is the use of London as a ‘giant lecture hall’ ‘hacking’ a range of different public and cultural spaces across the city. The IF Project’s students are either directed to attend free events or they meet a volunteer academic at these spaces, such as an exhibition in an art gallery or museum or a performance in a theatre or concert hall, who acts as a curator explaining the significance of the space and how it fits with the courses they are studying. However, the IF Project tries to limit enrolment on its courses to those who are least likely to attend formal Higher Education: ‘We did not want to provide another middle-class reading group. We wanted to provide a place for those most affected by the Coalitions’ reforms to be able to study Higher Education’ (Founding Member of the IF Project). For its first Summer School Pilot in 2014, the  My Life My Choice is a user-led self-advocacy group that provides training, employment, volunteering and social opportunities for people with learning disabilities. For more information, see: https://www.mylifemychoice.org.uk/ 45  Crisis Skylight Oxford is part of a national charity for homeless people. For more information, see: https://www.crisis.org.uk/get-help/oxford/ 46  Restore is an Oxford-based mental health charity. For more information, see: https://www. restore.org.uk/ 44

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IF Project received 75 applications and accepted 33 based on the criteria above. Of those 33, 24 registered to study and 11 completed the course. When I attended one of the IF Project’s courses in June 2014, the class consisted of young black men from Hackney (London, UK) and refugees whose political status prohibited them from studying in formal Higher Education. The IF Project has worked closely with the Southbank Centre,47 Tate Modern,48 Gresham College49 and the Courtauld Gallery50 to facilitate diverse educational activities. The IF Project has run several free Higher Education courses, which include the IF Humanities Summer School and Pilot51 in 2014, which was followed by the IF Foundations Summer School in 2015,52 A Free Introduction to Thinking in 2016,53 Thinking Without Borders: A Short History of the Present in 2017,54 and Inequality: The Brief History in 2018.55 The courses are well attended and when I visited the project in 2014 around 15 people attended a session on John Stuart Mill’s On Liberty with an interesting discussion about Mill’s comments about ‘barbarian nations’.

 For more information about the Southbank Centre, see: http://www.southbankcentre.co.uk/  For more information about the Tate Modern, see: https://www.tate.org.uk/visit/tate-modern 49  For more information about the Gresham College, see: http://www.gresham.ac.uk/ 50  For more information about the Courtauld Gallery see: https://courtauld.ac.uk/gallery 51  For more information about the IF Humanities Summer School and Pilot, see: http://www. ifproject.co.uk/blog/2014/11/17/if-summer-school-2014 52  This course provided the foundation from studying humanities and provided introductory sessions pitched at the level of Higher Education in literature, history, visual arts, sound and political philosophy. For more information about this course, see: https://static1.squarespace.com/static/ 52a72a77e4b07aa6d0d249f7/t/59a03fe9ebbd1afc60f4a857/1503674346515/IF+2015+ Summer+School+Programme.pdf 53  This course provided an introduction to analysing historical sources, presenting an argument based on evidence, thinking critically and studying independently. For more information about this course, see: https://static1.squarespace.com/static/52a72a77e4b07aa6d0d249f7/t/5899ad7ae4fcb57ac15e12f1/ 1486466426999/Thinking+AFI+Course+Outline.pdf 54  This course provided an introduction to issues of contemporary concern, such as truth, lies, power, freedom, nations, rights, culture and identity. For more information about this course, see: https:// static1.squarespace.com/static/52a72a77e4b07aa6d0d249f7/t/5899ad7ae4fcb57ac15e12f1/ 1486466426999/Thinking+AFI+Course+Outline.pdf 55  The course provided an introduction to ways in which writers, historical and contemporary, have said about inequality and creating more egalitarian societies. For more information about this course, see: http://www.ifproject.co.uk/inequality/ 47 48

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The Ragged University56 is based in the City of Edinburgh57 (UK). The Ragged University was set up in 2010 by ‘…a small group of people in response to the Global Economic Crisis of 2008 and the Coalition’s reforms to Higher Education – both of which were by seen as having the potential to reduce access to Higher Education, especially for those from deprived areas’ (Founding Member of the Ragged University). The inspiration for the Ragged University came from the Ragged Schools, which were set up in nineteenth-century Britain to provide free education, food, clothing and shelter for the poor, or the ragged, workingclass children.58 In the same spirit, the Ragged University attempts to provide a form of free education by bringing people, groups and organizations in the local community together. The project is run by two ‘janitors’ who function as caretakers and who organize education provision on behalf of those associated with the project: ‘…we take care of the project and maintain it for the benefit of others’ (Founding Member of the Ragged University). The Ragged University also has a strong internet presence which attempts to connect people to other educational, cultural and online resources and has an interactive map that shows where these events are taking place in Edinburgh.59 Moreover, the Ragged University’s website also acts as a digital archive for numerous Edinburgh University Settlement community projects,60 which were unable to continue running after falling into financial difficulties in 2011. The Edinburgh University Settlement project was, in part, an education outreach programme that attempted to link the University with the local community  For more information about the Ragged University, see: https://www.raggeduniversity.co.uk/ about/ 57  There is also a Ragged University in Manchester, but I did not visit this one. For more information about Manchester Ragged, see: https://www.raggeduniversity.co.uk/manchester-4/ 58  Roberts, R. 1997. A Ragged Schooling: Growing Up in the Classic Slum. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 59  For more details about these events and to access the map, see: https://www.raggeduniversity. co.uk/edinburgh-3/ 60  For more details and to access this digital archive, see: https://www.raggeduniversity.co.uk/?s=ed inburgh+university+settlement 56

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to improve the conditions that many people lived in.61 The Ragged University offers a range of different educational opportunities, including the Ragged Talks,62 podcasts63 and academic literature in its Ragged Libraries64 and uses several different, what it refers to as, third spaces to better connect with the local community, such as pubs and cafes.65 I attended one of the Ragged Talks in November 2013 which was attended by over 50 people and generated insightful discussion about the topics presented. The Really Open University66 was based in the city of Leeds (UK) and was active between 2009 and 2012. Those involved in the project described it as ‘…a laboratory for subversion and part of an ongoing process of transformation by those who challenge the Higher Education system and its role in society’ (Founding Member of the Really Open University 1), which is further outlined in its ‘3 Reforms’ document.67 The emphasis on transforming the university is encapsulated in its slogan ‘strike-­occupy-­transform’, which expressed the group’s desire to both resist ongoing reforms to Higher Education and transform it by imagining alternative models.  While this project no longer runs and its website is no longer available, information about the Edinburgh University Settlement project can be found on Wikipedia, which also has some useful links to information about it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edinburgh_University_Settlement 62  The Ragged Talks are a series of one-off talks that are hosted by the Ragged University across Edinburgh. Anyone can apply to give a Ragged Talk by contacting the Ragged University through its website. Speakers are provided with food and drink at the event, although they are not paid nor have their expenses covered. For more information about the Ragged Talks, see: https://www.raggeduniversity.co.uk/ragged-talks/ 63  For a list of available Ragged Podcasts, see: https://www.raggeduniversity.co.uk/ragged-podcasts/ 64  The Ragged Library is based in public spaces, such as pubs and cafés which have donated space for the books to be kept ‘in common’ for all people to use. The books have all been donated by individuals or local organizations. The library works on an honesty system with people returning books when they have finished with them. For more information about the Ragged Library and a list of books contained within it, see: https://www.raggeduniversity.co.uk/ragged-library/ 65  For a detailed list of the spaces that Ragged University has used, see: https://www.raggeduniversity.co.uk/music/local-venues/ 66  Although this informal learning space no longer exists, its website is still available: https://reallyopenuniversity.wordpress.com/what-is-the-rou/ 67  The three reforms are: Reform #1 – The Abolition of all Fees and the Institution of a Living Wage; Reform #2 – A debt jubilee for all past students; and, Reform #3 – The abolition of the Research Excellence Framework and the National Student Survey. For more information about the Really Open University’s 3 Reforms, see: https://reallyopenuniversity.wordpress.com/3-alternative-reforms/ 61

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The Really Open University hosted a high-profile event, the Reimagine the University conference in 201068 that facilitated the coming together of people involved in other educational experiments from around the UK allowing people to share ideas and experiences. What was notable about the Really Open University event was that it was not just an attempt to defend the dominant/existing model of the university but to imagine what an alternative model might look like as one of the respondents explained: ‘We were trying to challenge this idea that we wanted the ­university to stay how it was before the Coalition’s reforms because the University had always been based on a hierarchical system and we didn’t want just to defend the University of the past. We wanted to ask what education could mean and what we wanted it to mean. We wanted to open that discussion up and rather than saying that all we want as consumers is for education to be cheaper. We were trying to challenge that as the rhetoric’ (Founding Member of the Really Open University 1). The group also decided to rent an abandoned warehouse close to the city centre to create the Space Project, which was conceived of as a temporary experiment where different groups based in Leeds could set up their own courses and events and cross-pollinate ideas. The Space Project ran from October 2011 to March 2012 and was provided with short-­ term funding by an organization called Change Makers.69 The Space Project hosted a radical film festival about Italian Workerism, a local radical history group and a radical pedagogy group. It also hosted two courses entitled Crashing Through Capital: An Introduction to Economics and A Really Open Course on Crisis. Both courses intended to provide a critical understanding of economics and economic crises and included guest lectures by Dr David Harvie70 and workshops for further discussion.71  For more information about the Reimagine the University conference, see: http://josswinn.org/ wp-content/uploads/2014/10/programme-of-events1.pdf 69  For more information about the Space Project, see: https://reallyopenuniversity.wordpress.com/ the-space-project/ 70  Dr David Harvie is an Associate Professor in Finance and Political Economy at the University of Leicester. 71  For a more detailed discussion of the Space Project and its education provision, see: Pusey, A. 2017. The Space Project: Creating Cracks Within, Against, and Beyond Academic Capitalism. In 68

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The demise of the Really Open University and Space Project was largely down to the fact that the funding expired: ‘Because of the way the Space Project was funded it was only ever going to be for six months unless there could have been some more funding found, but there wasn’t any. We did quite a bit of fundraising to try and support it’ (Founding Member of the Really Open University 2). Also, those involved in organizing the project felt burnt out by the amount of the work they were doing: ‘The day-to-day running of the space starts to wear you down and the things that we were interested in doing writing courses, teaching and reading things became less and less. It was an immense stress of trying to get that done, and that makes people turn against each other’ (Founding Member of the Really Open University 1). Many of those involved in the project were PhD students and as they started to write up their theses had less time to dedicate the Space Project, so they had to scale back the project as people’s time became more pressured: relationships within the group started to become strained and as one member commented ‘… there were interpersonal problems and disagreements as there usually are in these types of groups, which led to a drop-off on in enthusiasm for the project’ (Founding Member of the Really Open University 2). The Social Science Centre72 is based in the city of Lincoln (UK) and offers no-fee Higher Education. Members can pay a donation but are not required to do so. The project was created by a small group of academics based at the University of Lincoln73 and was formally constituted as a non-incorporated co-operative in 2011.74 The Social Science Centre is collectively owned and run by its members and has adopted democratic and non-hierarchical principles that are put into practice using a form of Out of the Ruins: The Emergence of Radical Informal Learning Spaces, ed. R. Haworth and J. Elmore. Oakland: PM Press. 72  More information about the Social Science Centre can be found on its website: http:// socialsciencecentre.org.uk/ 73  Although the Social Science Centre has no formal connection with the University of Lincoln. 74  An unincorporated co-operative is a form of co-operative that is not differentiated in law from its members. While this has some benefits, such as very little, if any start-up costs are required, there is no legal requirement keep ongoing records of the organization’s activities and members’ names do not have to be kept on public records, it does mean that members are personally liable for any debt accrued by the organization and successful negligence claims brought in civil law.

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consensus decision-making that attempts to engage all members of the project in the organization’s decision-making processes. The Social Science aims to organize its education provision according to academic values of critical thinking, experimentation, debate and constructive disagreement rather than the short-term, competitive and profit-driven motives of the private (and increasingly public) sector.75 In an attempt to realize this, the Social Science Centre has experimented with a radical democratic pedagogical philosophy based on the principles of Student as Producer76 and critical pedagogy.77 This has resulted in the development of an approach to teaching and learning that attempts to challenge the traditional distinction between teacher and student, instead referring to all those that participate in its courses as scholars. The Social Science Centre has run several courses that include the Social Science Imagination,78 Co-operation and Education79 and Communities of the Future.80 However, the Social Science Centre is not without its problems. For example, some of its courses tended to focus on a limited range of theoretical perspectives at the expense of others, such as gender, ethnicity and religion, effectively side-lining them and leaving some scholars feeling alienated and devalued: I think it does more than side-step them, I think it silences them. The way it is articulated, it really silences them. That is my experience of the place, you are not allowed to say these things, and you are treated as quite stupid  Neary, M., and S. Amsler 2012. Occupy: A New Pedagogy of Space and Time? Paper Given at Bristol University, 9 March. 76  Student as Producer is an attempt to better integrate teaching and research in Higher Education by engaging students in research or research-like activities with academics (Neary, M., and J. Winn. 2009. The Student as Producer: Reinventing the Student Experience in Higher Education. In The Future of Higher Education: Policy, Pedagogy and the Student Experience, ed. L. Bell, H. Stevenson, and M. Neary, 192–210. London: Continuum). 77  Freire, P. 1970. Pedagogy of the Oppressed. London: Penguin. 78  For more information on the Social Science Imagination course, see: http://socialsciencecentre. org.uk/social-science-imagination-course/ 79  For more information about the Co-operation and Education course, see: http://socialsciencecentre.org.uk/blog/2014/01/20/co-operation-and-education-week-one/ 80  For more information about the Communities of the Future course, see: http://socialsciencecentre.org.uk/ 75

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if you say them. Other people have said they feel really devalued, like their missing something and that they felt quite stupid. (Founding Member of the Social Science Centre 1)

While these problems remain, there has been a genuine attempt by those involved in the project to question them and try to work through them. The research found that scholars do challenge others’ assumptions and, at times, narrowly focused interpretations of the problems that scholars wish to pursue, as one scholar commented: Whilst I was there I saw some interesting things going on, and it is a constant process of trying to navigate one’s power. You have got a professor; you’ve got a reader; then you’ve got PhD students, of whom I am one of them – I am surprised it didn’t fuck up instantly because that’s a lot for an everyday classroom. I think that is really something actually. (Social Science Centre Scholar 7)

Prefiguring the Idea of the University? So, what can be learned from the autonomous learning spaces in terms of prefiguring the idea of the university? The research found that in a similar way to the autonomous spaces described by Chatterton and Pickerill,81 these autonomous learning spaces functioned as places of resistance and creation. Resistance in that they provided a place for people who were unwilling or unable to pay increased tuition fees to study at the level of Higher Education.82 Creation in that they experimented with alternative forms of Higher Education provision that were based on democratic and non-hierarchical principles. The research found evidence that this experimentation was prefigurative in that people involved in these projects were

 Chatterton, P., and J. Pickerill. 2010. Everyday Activism and Transitions Towards Post‐capitalist Worlds. Transaction 35 (4): 475–490. 82  From my experience of attending the education provision provided by these alternative learning spaces, they were mostly used by mature students. A group that has been most deterred to the changes made to Higher Education in England since 2010. 81

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experimenting with autonomous practices that they hoped to see in Higher Education institutions in the future. One of the main areas of experimentation with autonomous learning spaces was with models of popular and critical pedagogies. The research found that these popular and critical pedagogies serve not only as a critique of what is perceived as the commodification of knowledge or the imposition of student as consumer model83 but also foster reimagining or prefiguring alternative pedagogical models/philosophies in ways they might not be possible within a Higher Education institution.84 Specifically, the research found that autonomous learning spaces were influenced by, or took the form of, at least four main pedagogical models/ philosophies, which included a ‘do-it-yourself ’ (DIY) philosophy to providing education that was based on the utilization of freely available resources85; a ‘skill-share’ or ‘learning-web’86 approach where people within the local community are invited to talk and share their skills/ knowledge on a particular subject; the adoption a critical pedagogy approach87; and Student as Producer philosophy.88 Another area of experimentation identified by the research was how those involved in autonomous learning spaces tended to align themselves with forms of self-organization that were underpinned by democratic and non-hierarchical principles using forms of consensus decision-­ making processes. The research found that the most influential model/philosophy of self-organization was horizontalism, which is an  Neary, M., and J. Winn. 2009. The Student as Producer: Reinventing the Student Experience in Higher Education. In The Future of Higher Education: Policy, Pedagogy and the Student Experience, ed. L. Bell, H. Stevenson, and M. Neary, 192–210. London: Continuum; Molesworth, M., E. Nixon, and R. Scullion. 2009. Having, Being and Higher Education: The Marketization of the University and the Transformation of the Student into Consumer. Teaching in Higher Education 14 (3): 277–287. 84  Thompsett, F. 2016. The University Is Kind of an Impossible Place: Universities Towards and Against Capitalism, In Anthropologies of Value: Cultures of Accumulation Across the Global North and South, ed. L.F. Angosto-Ferrández and G. Presterudstuen, 219–241. London: Pluto Press. 85  Kamenetz, A. 2010. DIY U: Edupunks, Edupreneurs, and the Coming Transformation of Higher Education. White River Junction: Chelsea Green Publishing. 86  Illich, I. 1973. Deschooling Society. Harmondsworth: Penguin. 87  Freire, P. 1970. Pedagogy of the Oppressed. London: Penguin. 88  Neary, M., G. Saunders, A. Hagyard, and D. Derricott. 2014. Student as Producer ResearchEngaged Teaching, An Institutional Strategy. York: The Higher Education Academy. 83

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approach to self-organization based on the concepts of autonomy, direct democracy, mutual aid and empowerment which seeks to challenge social inequality, oppression and power through the adoption of non-­ hierarchical, leaderless and consensus-based processes.89 These principles tended to be used informally as most of the autonomous learning spaces were run by a small group of people. The only exception to this was the Social Science Centre, which has formally adopted a co-­operative organizational form which embodied the democratic and non-­ hierarchical principles outlined above. The research also found that one of the tensions faced by autonomous learning spaces was they tended to be run on a voluntary basis with members dedicating their time for free. Using volunteers in this way is clearly problematic because it requires people to give their time for free while finding income from elsewhere meaning that the work they do is often on top of a paid job. Unsurprisingly, this meant that people were limited in the time they could dedicate to the project leading to burnout and a high turnover of people involved in projects. Moreover, the projects also existed outside of the Higher Education sector meaning they had not been legally granted university status, nor did they have degree awarding powers, although some autonomous learning spaces, such as Free University Brighton, attempted to circumvent this by offering their own informal qualifications at the ‘level of Higher Education’. Existing outside of the Higher Education sector has been beneficial in some respects as it has provided these autonomous learning spaces with the freedom to move and develop alternative models/philosophies of democratic pedagogy self-organization without having to worry about quality audits or metrics like the National Student Survey. The research also found that autonomous learning spaces tended to have good connections with the local community, often situated or occupying public spaces within their locality, which meant that they were visible and accessible to the public. Nevertheless, existing outside of the Higher Education sector means that these autonomous learning spaces are unable to offer an education provision that can compete with main Sitrin, M. 2014. Goals Without Demands: The New Movements for Real Democracy. South Atlantic Quarterly 113 (2): 245–258. 89

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stream Higher Education.90 As a result, they can be easily marginalized, or ignored, for being either too radical or not relevant (ibid.), which is evidenced by the fact that many of the education experiments that emerged circa 2010 have tended to disappear. One potential solution to these limitations is to incorporate the lessons learned from the experimentation with pedagogies and self-organization into an organizational form that would create an alternative to the current neoliberal model of Higher Education. One source for doing this is the growing academic literature around co-operative forms of Higher Education.91 While the idea of a co-operative university is not new, there are very few existing examples of this model around the world (see Mondragon  University in the Basque Region of Northern Spain and UNICOOP which is a co-operative university in Mexico as examples). More recent efforts to develop a co-operative university in the UK have been supported by the Co-operative College through the Co-operative University Working group, which hosted the Making the Co-operative University Conference92 in 2017 out of which has emerged the Co-operative Higher Education Network.93 The Co-operative College submitted its application for degree awarding powers to the Office for Students in August 2018. However, whether the ethos of these autonomous learning spaces, especially with regards to forms of self-organization and popular and critical pedagogies underpinned by non-hierarchical  Saunders, G. 2017. Somewhere Between Reform and Revolution; Alternative Higher Education and ‘The Unfinished. In Mass Intellectuality and Democratic Leadership in HE, ed. Joss Winn and Richard Hall. London: Bloomsbury. 91  Cook, D. 2013. Realising the Cooperative University. Manchester: The Cooperative College; Matthews, D. 2013. Inside a Co-operative University. Times Higher Education. https://www. timeshighereducation.com/features/inside-a-cooperativeuniversity/2006776.article. Accessed 30 Mar 2018; Somerville, P., and G. Saunders 2013. Beyond Public and Private: The Transformation of Higher Education. University of Lincoln. http://josswinn.org/wpcontent/uploads/2013/11/ Somerville-and-Saunders-2013-Beyondpublic-and-private.pdf. Accessed 31 Oct 2018; Sperlinger, T. 2014. Is a Co-operative University Model a Sustainable Alternative? Guardian. Available at: https:// www.theguardian.com/higher-educationnetwork/blog/2014/mar/26/free-university-cooperativemodel-sustainablealternative. Accessed 31 Oct 2018; Winn, J. 2015. The Co-operative University: Labour, Property and Pedagogy. Power and Education 7 (1): 39–55. 92  For more information about the Making the Co-operative University Conference, see: http:// josswinn.org/2017/07/27/making-the-co-operative-university-conference/ 93  For more information about the Co-operative Higher Education Network, see: http://josswinn. org/tag/co-operative-university/ 90

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and democratic principles developed within them, can be achieved, or even prioritized, in any future co-­operative university remains to be and will be of interest to those who have been involved in the struggle against the neoliberalization of Higher Education and the autonomous learning spaces that emerged out of it.

5 The Social Science Centre, Lincoln: Free, Co-operative Higher Education Members of the SSC

Marketisation. Neoliberalism. Capitalism Masquerading as natural phenomena, these are processes and ideologies that have come to dominate Higher Education. As discussed in the introduction, this is a governmentality1 rooted in universalising the principle of competition—reducing as many spheres of human endeavour as possible to this logic.2 In the academy, this forces debt onto students, commodifies the learning process and corporatises the campus, leaving students, staff and knowledge production in far worse shape. The Social

 Byrne, C. 2017. Neoliberalism as an Object of Political Analysis: An Ideology, a Mode of Regulation or a Governmentality? Policy & Politics 45 (3): 343–60. 2  For example, see: Biebricher, T. 2015. Neoliberalism and Democracy. Constellations 22 (2): 255– 66; Brown, W. 2005. Neo-liberalism and the End of Liberal Democracy. Theory & Event 7 (1); Dardot, P., and C. Laval. 2013. The New Way of the World: On Neoliberal Society. London: Verso Books; Harvey, D. 2007. A Brief History of Neoliberalism. USA: Oxford University Press; and Gilbert, J. 2013. What Kind of Thing Is Neoliberalism? New Formations 80 (80): 7–22. 1

Members of the SSC (*) Lincoln, UK © The Author(s) 2019 M. Noble, C. Ross (eds.), Reclaiming the University for the Public Good, Palgrave Critical University Studies, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-21625-2_5

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Science Centre (SSC), Lincoln believes there are other ways to organise education and the wider society and is an attempt to create an autonomous learning space negating and resisting these dominant systems. The SSC was created in response to the withdrawal of government funding for the teaching of social sciences and the raising of student fees, the instigation of the latest and arguably most direct phase of marketisation in Higher Education, and offers Higher Education on a voluntary contribution basis, free for those who need it. In response to the increasing hierarchies and power relations in Higher Education, we chose a democratic structure for the SSC: it is constituted and registered as a co-operative. All members can have an equal say in the running of the co-operative, using consensus decision-making. In response to the repositioning of students as consumers, and the degree as a private investment, scholars at the SSC are working on a pedagogy that develops our co-operative strengths and resources by learning through shared tasks and collective projects. This is the inherent work of the SSC. This chapter is authored primarily by two scholars, Laura and Bradley, and is deliberately shaped by the conversations, writing and feedback of the wider group. Bradley is a PhD student at the University of Lincoln and has been involved with the SSC for three years; Laura is bringing up children alongside various part-time work and has been a scholar at SSC since its first course in 2011. This open, inclusive and collaborative approach to co-writing is characteristic of, and an essential aspect to, the SSC intellectual project.

 n Alternative: Free, Co-operative Higher A Education On our website we describe ourselves as offering: opportunities to engage in a co-operative experience of [H]igher [E]ducation. Run as a not-for-profit co-operative, the SSC is organised on the basis

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of democratic, non-hierarchical principles, with, in theory, all members having equal involvement in the life and work of the SSC.3

We were inspired by other movements, including Social Centres and Transition Towns. The Social Centre movement, born in 1970s Italy and being revitalised at this time, including in the UK, creates ‘political projects grounded in their communities; they are comfortable with politics which was messy and impure; they want to build strong relationships between people; the way they organise them is experimental and promotes self-management; and they develop political strategies which attempt to break outside the activist ghetto… they create something like an “urban commons” (like the village commons) which is self-managed and open to all who respect it’.4 Drawing on this philosophy, we opted for a co-operative form of organising which reflected our values of democratic, consensual forms of decision-making, and the co-production of knowledge.5 The Transition Town movement, initiated by a group of permaculture students with Rob Hopkins in Kinsale, Ireland, in 2005, and now a global movement, envisions a more just and equitable future in response to the climate crisis and acts through local, community-scale organising.6 For some members, the SSC was a way to participate in a broader activist movement. Unlike these other movements, however, the intensified neoliberalisation of UK Higher Education, expressed in the tripling of university tuition fees in 2010, catalysed the first scholars of the SSC to create a place to move beyond protest towards what founding scholar Sarah Amsler called, ‘something new in freedom’.7  Members of the SSC. 2011. Social Science Centre—About Us. The Social Science Centre. Available from http://socialsciencecentre.org.uk/about/. Accessed 10 May 2018. 4  Chatterton, P. 2012. Autonomous Spaces and Social Centres: So What Does It Mean to Be AntiCapitalist? Libcom.org Shift Magazine. Available from https://libcom.org/library/autonomousspaces-social-centres-so-what-does-it-mean-be-anti-capitalist. Accessed 21 August 2018. 5  Neary, M., and J. Winn. 2017. The Social Science Centre, Lincoln: The theory and Practice of a Radical Idea. RT. A Journal on Research Policy and Evaluation 5 (1). 6  See https://transitionnetwork.org/ 7  Bonnett, A. 2013. Something New in Freedom. Times Higher Education, May 23. Available from https://www.timeshighereducation.com/features/something-new-in-freedom/2003930.article. Accessed 11 May 2018. 3

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Such work had already been in progress since 2007 in the locality, in attempts to foster collaborative learning and a democratic campus at the University of Lincoln.8 This process was based on a university-wide curriculum development project, entitled Student as Producer, organised around the concept of research-engaged teaching. Student as Producer recognises and promotes the involvement of students in the production of knowledge across the university by designing research-type activities into all aspects of teaching and learning at Lincoln. Student as Producer is political as well as pedagogical in that it seeks to democratise the relationship between academics and students to transform the institution as a whole in a collegiate, collaborative and co-­ operative manner. This more democratic approach to knowledge and its production was developed to offer an alternative to the neoliberal university. Student as Producer did create an alternative discourse within which academics and students could articulate a critical response to the neoliberalisation of Higher Education through their professional practice, but its effect on the democratisation of the university was limited.9 The intensification of the neoliberal project at Lincoln and other Higher Education providers led to the creation of a form of Student as Producer outside of the University of Lincoln with no formal connection to that or any other university. The aim, in creating the Social Science Centre, was to further realise Student as Producer’s radical and critical potential. One of our scholars, Professor Mike Neary—who was involved with Student as Producer and became a founding member of the SSC—describes how he conceptualised the SSC: The SSC is not a demand for the state to provide Higher Education, but a recognition that revolutionary education cannot be provided by the capitalist state; and, therefore, we have no other option but to establish our  Neary, M., and J. Winn. 2017. The Social Science Centre, Lincoln: The theory and Practice of a Radical Idea. RT. A Journal on Research Policy and Evaluation 5 (1). 9  Neary, M., and G. Saunders. 2016. Student as Producer and the Politics of Abolition: Remaking a New Form of Dissident Institution? Critical Education 5. Available from http://ices.library.ubc. ca/index.php/criticaled/article/view/186127. Accessed 20 August 2018; Neary, M., G. Saunders, A. Hagyard, and D. Derricott. 2015. Student as Producer: Research-Engaged Teaching - An Institutional Strategy. The Higher Education Academy. Available from http://ices.library.ubc.ca/ index.php/criticaled/article/view/186127. Accessed 20 August 2018. 8

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own necessary revolutionary alternative form of Higher Education. The Social Science Centre is not in competition with the capitalist university, but is the critical and necessary form that emerges out of the contradictions of capitalist Higher Education.10

The SSC emerged from the university; its founding scholars are university academics, and it brings together students and academics who work in universities with those who learn outside the institutions for example, those who are excluded from university (e.g. due to cost, inability or unwillingness to burden themselves or their family with debt, or full-time caring responsibilities) but who would like to be learning at a university level nonetheless. Writing with this chapter in mind, scholars have described the SSC as, on one hand, a political project that creates a space that the marketization cannot touch—that denies its all-encompassing reach. Practically, too, it constantly forces me to rethink my approaches to activism within the neoliberal university. (Bradley, SSC scholar and university PhD student)

For another scholar, the SSC provides ‘the opportunity to have an intellectual life which I would not necessarily have otherwise, as I am economically excluded from traditional [H]igher [E]ducation’ (Lucy, SSC scholar and local council employee). The involvement and contributions of people working in the university, as well as those who are not, is a key characteristic of the SSC; it would be a different organisation if either were missing. However, in practice this dichotomy is not particularly visible; it is not so much a partnership of academics and non-­ academics, as a group of people with different backgrounds and experiences mixing in together. It requires everyone—those used to teaching and those used to being taught—to work out how to be in an educational space differently. Our official membership list has increased steadily since 2011, to 70 in 2018, but participation at any one time has fluctuated. Scholars’  CWU. 2013. Occupying the City with the Social Science Centre – An Interview with Mike Neary. Class War University. Available from https://classwaru.org/2013/09/02/occupying-the-city-withthe-social-science-centre/. Accessed 11 May 2018. 10

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­ otivations for being involved in the SSC are diverse, from being ‘an old m man’s alternative to protest and occupation’ (Phil, SSC scholar and university student) to a place of ‘friendship and a refuge from my worries’ (Alan, SSC scholar and university student) to a space for being ‘keen, despite my extreme part-time-ness, to be doing “real”—robust, rigorous, useful—academic work’ (Laura, SSC scholar, part-time Teaching Assistant and mother). The SSC attracts working and retired academics, university students, would-be students who are excluded from the university, other curious members of the public, and supporters who may not live in the city but who identify with our work and participate by following email discussions and news. Yet this diversity, which is in many ways a strength, is also a challenge. We write this chapter around the SSC’s seventh birthday, at a moment of reflection occasioned by crisis within the co-operative. In 2017, we ran a series of talks by guest speakers and scholars, most of whom did not participate in preceding or subsequent sessions. In the previous year, declining interest in organising and low attendance had created strain on a then small group of organisers, who decided to facilitate public learning in a less labour-intensive way. These traditional lecture formats attracted a wider audience, engaged more people in the SSC and generated challenging and important discussions. However, long-term scholars felt that it led to a loss of our shared, co-operative organising structure and learning style, a disjointedness of intellectual and political concern, and less opportunity for the kind of deep, connected learning that had characterised the SSC in the past. The cost of organising Higher Education in a more familiar (individualist, non-co-operative) form has been for us to lose sight of some of what makes the SSC distinctive and, for many of us, worthwhile. At the same time, we recognise that for some students who come in search of education, the co-operative aspect is un-important or even immaterial. This requires those coming from the neoliberal university to recognise their (our!) privilege in wishing to de-prioritise the education and teaching aspect in favour of the co-operative processes, particularly when operating in a context where Higher Education for some is inaccessible. And yet perhaps this difference—the unfamiliarity of processes, practices and structures—ended up excluding people: being

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­ nrecognisable can sometimes seem unwelcoming and alienating. This u chapter is written in the context of our current, collective self-reflection. Putting ideals into practice while navigating all the other challenges and responsibilities in our lives can be difficult and demanding. We fall short of our aspirations; descriptions of how we operate—here and elsewhere—may represent us at our best, not how we always function. We believe that it is vital to discuss, openly and honestly, the problems we face in running the SSC, to give an insight into the practicalities of co-­ operative ways of learning and organising, and to share a full and realistic picture with others who might want to learn from our experience confident that none of these challenges are permanent or insurmountable.

Free The SSC sits in sharp contrast to the neoliberal, capitalist university in several ways. One way in which it does is size: the SSC is small. There are currently 12 scholars in Lincoln, supported by a further 10 associate scholars who do not live in Lincoln but who self-identify as members. A total of 70 people have registered as members over the past seven years, not all of whom have spent time in the classroom. Perhaps a more important distinction, however, is our relationship to profit. There is no requirement for anyone to pay anything to engage with the SSC: our sole interest is in collaborative, liberating education. We are funded by members’ contributions, and as a guideline, we suggest that those who can contribute pay the equivalent to one hour of their net salary per month but this is not a condition of being a scholar with the SSC. In that sense we can say the SSC is free. We do not run as a business. Our self-funding model is possible because we have relatively low costs. Just as no one pays, no one is paid. Our largest cost is room hire, especially for Annual General Meetings (AGMs) and special events. Other expenses include memberships of larger organisations, insurance and guest expenses. In some cases, we have had reciprocal relationships, for example, a local organisation that works with people who are homeless provided us space for meetings and workshops, while members of the SSC ran a photography project with residents.

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We have met at various sites across the city, including community centres, museums and cafes, for both our fortnightly course sessions and monthly planning meetings; currently we are using free space at a new community arts centre. While relatively simple, this funding model has at times been complicated when projects about or with the SSC have received external funding. For example, scholars who held university positions received funding for a participatory action research project, ‘Beyond public and private: A framework for co-operative Higher Education’,11 and another scholar’s research project into children’s home reading (unpublished) was funded by an education development trust (the Centre for British Teachers) and done in partnership with a local school. This is not necessarily a model that was deliberately chosen, but rather one that was practical in those specific cases. This raises questions about our sources of funding and how they align with our values, particularly when the sources are the neoliberal university or an academy chain, that we are set up as an alternative to. This is an ongoing debate within the SSC. People outside of the county of Lincolnshire sometimes come and visit and offer to contribute a talk on their own work or present a paper. Guest speakers at SSC have included Darcy Leigh (Edinburgh University) on Decolonising universities in the Canadian Arctic; Aniko Horvath (King’s College London and Central University of Budapest) on the Reproduction of poverty; Bob Cannell (Suma Wholefoods) on A workers’ co-operative; and Linden West (Canterbury Christ Church University) on Racism, fundamentalism and a psychosocial imagination. We cover expenses where needed, and we have often benefited from the generosity of our guests. Aside from these infrequent guest lectures, the majority of talks and workshops are led by SSC scholars. Some are formal and prepared, with topics including the following: social innovation & the Dutch concept of Kennisland; Seeing power; the sociological imagination; the Black Panthers; Neoliberalism; Marxism; Homelessness; and Pro-sociality. Other sessions are taught less from the front and take the form of facilitated

 Neary, M., and J. Winn. 2017. Beyond Public and Private: A Framework for Co-operative Higher Education. Open Library of Humanities 3 (2): 2. DOI: https://doi.org/10.16995/olh.195 11

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(and sometimes unfacilitated) discussions around an agreed topic or text, usually available online. The matter of pay and livelihoods poses an interesting challenge to the SSC, where scholars are volunteers as well as students. Early visions of the SSC included paying workers—recognising the need for all of us to earn a living—and the impossibility of doing unpaid academic work on top of other commitments has excluded some scholars. The SSC has not developed on a scale where creating paid roles would be conceivable, and members work at the SSC in addition to their full-time jobs, limiting illness or disability, and/or care responsibilities. One challenge for the SSC is to enable a depth of study given that scholars’ time can be very limited; another challenge is to enable involvement and learning that is meaningful, relevant and useful for all our members amid differences in academic qualifications, life experiences, and work. How intellectual capital is valued within SSC is another ongoing question. There are challenges in how an organisation based on non-­ hierarchical, collaborative learning approaches differences in the skills and knowledge that scholars bring to an individual topic. On the one hand, it benefits no one to ignore the resources scholars bring, but on the other, we want to avoid putting them on a pedestal. The solution for us, one we do not always manage to achieve, is in utilising the skills and knowledge of individual scholars in a way that empowers the whole group, not just deifies the individual. Rather than privileging academic forms of knowledge, the SSC recognises this as one form of knowledge alongside other forms of practical, experiential, embodied and tacit forms of knowledge. This free access to education removes an immediate, material barrier, and on a psychological level it also means students engage with the SSC in a scholar-to-scholar relationship, not as passive consumers or customers receiving a service, nor as students with little knowledge simply there to absorb whatever the teacher decides is important. While individual sessions and even courses may have facilitators or teachers that provide information and structure, on a fundamental level, what is learnt, and how it is learnt, is a collaborative, community project, with everyone who wishes to, contributing to and shaping the learning process.

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Co-operative This brings us to another distinction between the SSC and the neoliberal university: non-hierarchy. Most universities are managerialist and hierarchical, with many of the most important decisions being made by a handful of senior—often white, male and highly paid—managers. The flat structure of the SSC means that members are constitutionally able to have an equal say in the decision-making process. This takes place through the monthly planning meetings in which courses, curricula and activities are designed as well as at the Annual General Meeting where the constitution (SSC is a legal co-operative) is reviewed and people elected to carry out essential organisational functions—secretary, treasurer and other roles as needed—using a model of consensus-based decision-making. The people in these positions may arguably have more influence over the SS than others, not least due to the commitment and continuity of involvement implicit in holding one of these roles, but their power is limited both by our decision-making processes and by the distribution of these responsibilities amongst members; for example, we recently increased the number of roles in order to distribute work more widely, and allocated two members to each role. Before SSC opened in 2011, founding scholars joined the local Transition Town group in doing training with Seeds for Change (a workers’ co-op that provides training to activist groups in consensus decision-­ making and facilitating participatory processes). Consensus decision-making means that all members must agree for a decision to go forward, and each member ultimately holds the right to veto, though in practice this right is rarely used. For the sake of practicality, consent is normally gained from everyone participating in a meeting rather than every single member—most members are not active all the time—unless individuals who are not present are known to have a particular need, interest or involvement in the issue being discussed. Members may choose to stand aside from a decision—that is, members who dissent can allow a decision to pass, having been properly heard and their concerns and suggestions discussed fully and open-mindedly.

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The processes of consensus decision-making demand that all points of view in a meeting or group are given serious and thoughtful consideration; they require discussion, open-mindedness and shared reflection— things which are often lost in a managerial feedback model or in majority-based democratic decision-making. Departing from these currently familiar forms, it can at times still feel alien to actively make sure that everyone can be heard and contribute equally to decisions. A willingness to bring attention to how language is used and how it might exclude others enables scholars of different ages, knowledge landscapes and prior experiences, to learn and participate together. Our commitment to non-­ hierarchical processes is difficult, demanding and imperfect. It is a process that requires constant self-reflection. Who ‘we’ are—the identity and ethos of the co-operative—has been a matter for recurring discussion. We keep an open membership in line with our co-operative principles and strive to be non-discriminatory and as inclusive as possible. The SSC succeeds in making Higher Education possible for certain groups who would otherwise be excluded from universities on economic grounds, and in terms of their availability for traditional modes of study. For example, at times we have accommodated scholars’ children, including recently, a baby—making education more accessible to those with childcare responsibilities. We are intergenerational, from one high school student, through every age group to retired adults. However, we admit that after seven years, certain demographics have not accessed the SSC and we have not succeeded in acting on problems of silencing, repression and exclusion, even though we have, at times, named these problems. We have thus reproduced certain inequalities. We have not yet adequately addressed how we recognise and attend to (dis)ability, physical and mental health, or sexualities. So far, our group has included relatively few young people, people of colour or those with English as an additional language. White, able-bodied men have been disproportionately represented among our guest speakers. How we can respond to issues of inclusion and exclusion, and how we might attend to power relations over time, are matters that we continue to discuss. Recognising our failure to be as inclusive as we aspire to be, we are currently allocating more time for longer and more careful discussion—

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aimed at widening our ‘we’ to include more people in minority or disadvantaged groups.

Pedagogy Non-hierarchy is also integral to our pedagogy, and should be evident in the way that teaching and conversation flows in the classroom. The SSC’s pedagogical approach… attempts to fix the dysfunctional relationship between teaching and research that constitutes the core of Higher Education. We want to find ways to reconnect research and teaching, while at the same time removing the distinction between students and academics, seeing them both instead as scholars in the pursuit of creating new knowledge. We decided early on to refer to all members of the Centre as ‘scholars’ in an attempt to trouble the traditional relations of power between academics and students. Our experience within the SSC has confirmed our belief that teachers and students have much to learn from each other, and that calling these roles into question allows people to become aware of their position of privilege and/or subordination, and thus begins to open up possibilities to build more critically transformative learning relationships.12

However, despite our co-operative values, structures and explicit pedagogy, and despite workshops in 2011–2013 on structurelessness, gender and multiple ways of knowing, we have not effectively or consistently discussed and collectively reflected on actual power relationships within the group—and the unspoken, informal structures that inevitably manifest themselves. Ironically, the deliberate blurring of roles through the term ‘scholar’ has at times masked informal roles and expectations about who has the authority to teach, and obscured the different weight unconsciously given to different scholars’ questioning and critiquing. Our less structured sessions have, at times, contributed to making us vulnerable to the tyranny of structurelessness.13 We have become aware that discussing  Members of the SSC. 2013. An Experiment in Free, Co-operative. Radical Philosophy 182.  Freeman, J. 1970. The Tyranny of Structurelessness. JoFreeman.com. Available from http://www. jofreeman.com/joreen/tyranny.htm. Accessed 13 May 2018. 12 13

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informal power structures can be a difficult thing to do and have repeatedly shied away from it because of how personal it can be. It requires sensitivity and openness, and a strong, shared commitment to inclusion. There is much more to do but we continue to work on it, and hope that over time, we—as individuals and as a group—will develop the skills and sensitivities of greater co-operation. The SSC is at its best when all scholars are involved in teaching and facilitating, which are in themselves powerful learning processes in the democratisation of knowledge. In day-to-day practice, this might involve partnering less academically experienced scholars with academics to prepare a session together, or preceding a session with an introductory hour of shared reading to support those new to a concept or text. We also deliberately build in variety to our sessions, recognising different ways of learning, and include activities that would not conventionally fit into an academic space. Examples have included a picnic on the Lincoln’s ‘West Common’ (with discussions on the commons), a guided history tour of St Giles (a residential area of Lincoln), a photography project involving people in temporary accommodation, creating a series of podcasts, and economic role-playing games, for example, The Landlord’s Game—an early version of Monopoly to illustrate the concept of Land Value Tax, as suggested by Kate Raworth.14 There are certain recurring themes in our teaching and learning: in our seven years, we have twice run a course on The Sociological Imagination,15 based on the book by C.  Wright Mills, and twice taken Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed16 as a starting point—although each of these courses took on its own direction and played out differently depending on the discussions arising and interests of the scholars involved. Other courses have included themes such as co-operation and education, inclusive research methods, social cybernetics, and housing and the built environment.

 Raworth, K. Doughnut Economics: Seven Ways to Think Like a 21st Century Economist. UK: Cornerstone. 15  Wright Mills, C. 1959. The Sociological Imagination. London: Oxford University Press. 16  Freire, P. 2000/1970. Pedagogy of the Oppressed. New York: Continuum. 14

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At the time of writing we have become acutely aware that during the past year’s relatively popular (in terms of attendance) programme of unconnected lectures, arranged by just a few individuals, we ended up replicating some of the issues with neoliberal Higher Education, providing (this word itself is problematic) a more traditional, one-way mode of learning where one person ‘gifts’ knowledge to a listening audience directly or by inviting in a guest lecturer, rather than co-producing it with them. This was not done deliberately, and was often an attempt to second-­ guess or please the group, but without insight from and democratic participation by the SSC community. In particular, the influx of new individuals arriving, engaging and even critiquing has felt at times like the relationship between a consumer and a service provider does not foster agency and a shared ownership of the project. We have, in mid-­2018, embarked on a deliberate programme of attempting to generate discussion about co-operative, democratic, participatory values and pedagogy, and how we want our organisation to run in the future. Key to this process is creating a culture within the organisation where a wider group of scholars feel able and willing to contribute to running sessions, making decisions and shaping the future of the group. The extent to which we keep co-operative and consensus principles at the heart of the SSC, communicate them to newcomers, and how easy we make full engagement possible within those structures—alien and unfamiliar as they still feel to all of us at times—will be the linchpin of our success.

Outcomes Another departure from the neoliberal university is that we do not offer accreditation. A clear intention from the early days of SSC was a commitment to providing recognition for work done that would be equivalent to university qualifications. However this has not come to fruition and there has never been a particular push from members to develop this capacity. We currently meet for a few hours a fortnight, so it would take an infeasible amount of time to complete anything but the shortest module or collaborative assignment. Moreover, the experimentality and open-­ endedness of our courses convey many benefits in terms of freedom,

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c­ reativity, relevance and interest, and our openness to new people to drop in or join at any time has expanded our ability to be inclusive. However this is not conducive to generating bodies of completed work, or work suited to systematic assessment—though in principle there is no reason why this would not be possible if or when scholars choose to design a course in this way. The emphasis of the SSC is on shared personal and collective education and development both as an end in itself and as a means to a more socially just society. Our de-prioritisation of deliberate career advancement and the attainment of qualifications reflect our departure from the employability agenda so ubiquitous in the neoliberal university. Aside from the discussion around qualifications, it has always been a stated intention to produce collaborative writing arising from our learning, but this tends to be the exception rather than the norm (this work you are reading now is one of those exceptions!), and published work has hitherto been carried out primarily by university academics. We take turns to document notes on our discussions, which allows a range of voices to describe our work, and it is interesting and revealing in itself to re-read another scholar’s take on a session. We have at times prepared short, individually written items for a course—for example, autobiographical writing as an introduction to our Sociological Imagination courses—or an autobiography of our values, when we wanted to try and describe ourselves without reference to our jobs or career identities!— which has been generative and reflective. Nonetheless, much more is written about us (overwhelmingly by university academics, including some SSC scholars) than we write together—inclusively, collaboratively and co-operatively—as an integral part of our shared learning. The existence of the SSC—with our co-operative structures and radical intentions—is valuable in itself: a site for education outside the market mentality; an alternative space for learning; the realisation of both hope and struggle; a gesturing towards a more just future. But we have to be more than a symbolic set of structures and intentions. Perhaps the creation of collectively produced work that documents and expands our shared learning and experience—and that goes beyond individual or collective autobiography—will be good evidence that we are starting to mature.

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Conclusion The future of the SSC will depend upon those of us engaged in the project being able to navigate the issues described—resistance, inclusion, co-­ operation—and no doubt others besides, creating spaces that are accessible, democratic and collaborative and not simply a reproduction of neoliberal forms so common elsewhere, while also continuing to engage new members, many of whom arrive with little understanding of co-­ operative values. At our recent AGM, and a subsequent residential weekend, we were able to create a space to reflect on many of the issues discussed here, and how we wanted the SSC to develop. There was a strong commitment to maintaining our co-operative values, and a new wave of scholars came forward to help drive the group forward. As neoliberalisation of the university continues unabated to limit access, depth of learning and human relations in Higher Education, the result for a generation is toxic, leaving damage to staff, students and society in their wake. The need for real, practical alternatives is greater than ever. Our experience on the ground of attempting to create and maintain such an alternative is a real struggle—we frequently fail in our endeavours, and at times the organisation has bordered on crisis. Nonetheless, the vision and intentions of the SSC remain a source of hope and inspiration to people in Lincoln and beyond. We continue to meet anew our personal and collective limitations, and navigate the challenges we face: the need and longing to learn, relate and organise differently, co-­ operatively, continues to propel us. As long as there are those willing to challenge, spaces that can be alternatives to neoliberal education have a chance at existing, and maybe even flourishing. But the ravages of neoliberalism have not stopped at the university gates. Globally, and in an increasing number of spheres of life, neoliberal mentality has inflicted harm. As a species we face a planetary crisis, deep inequalities, economies that serve their citizens badly and divide societies. An education that challenges and liberates, and through its very processes offers a way forward, is vital in this context. One of the inspirations for the Student as Producer project out of which the SSC emerged was

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Walter Benjamin’s ‘The Author as Producer’.17 In this paper Benjamin asked ‘How do radical intellectuals act in a moment of crisis?’ At its best, the SSC broadens this question to one that is collaboratively discussed, wrestled with, and, just maybe, one day, will be answered. The SSC itself was a partial answer to this question, in a time of crisis (still ongoing) for Higher Education, but the challenge of neoliberalism requires more. So we ask you: How do we act in this moment of crisis?

 Benjamin, W. 1978/1934. Author as Producer. In Reflections: Walter Benjamin - Essay, Aphorisms and Autobiographical Writings, ed. P. Demetz, 220–38. Schocken Books: New York. 17

6 The RED Learning Co-operative: Research, Education and Development for Social Change Fenella Porter and Tracy Walsh

Introduction The RED Learning Co-operative (Research, Education and Development for Social Change) has emerged from the tradition of radical trade union (TU) education. This tradition takes as its starting point, that critical and engaged study is an integral part of how the labour movement, and other allied social movements, can face the challenges of the current political landscape, as well as grasp the opportunities that are emerging. It is a counter-hegemonic approach, which both draws on the historical tradition of radical trade union education and reimagines how radical education will need to be modelled to enable not just the e­ ducation of activists, but also the reshaping of spaces in which they operate—to contribute to the renewal of the movements themselves. F. Porter Independent, Oxford, UK e-mail: [email protected] T. Walsh (*) University of Hertfordshire, Oxford, UK © The Author(s) 2019 M. Noble, C. Ross (eds.), Reclaiming the University for the Public Good, Palgrave Critical University Studies, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-21625-2_6

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The approach that we have taken is also a response to the neoliberalisation of education and the narrow instrumentalist focus around employability which is currently dominating the Higher Education (HE) landscape and shaping the relationship of academics and tutors with HE students, which is covered elsewhere in this volume. However, the specifically co-operative approach to HE has, for us, been at least partly opportunistic, and just very practical: the co-operative is a model that enables our values base and ways of working to offer a real alternative that will disrupt and challenge the commercialisation of education. The opportunity to be involved in the UK Co-operative College’s Co-operative University Working Group has enabled us to see how our work will sit alongside others in a broader co-operative educational landscape. This gives us hope and inspiration, and a practical support base as we develop our courses and our understanding of our student and academic body, with the relationship with students and research participants at the core of our understanding of the educational and research experience. The constituency of RED Learning Co-operative are those who see the need for education to go beyond the skills training of the mainstream, and to provide a space for engaged dialogue and learning. We have started our educational co-operative by building a base of training courses and through these, establishing our relationships with trade unions. These relationships are the heart of what we do, as they allow us to engage with the membership of different trade unions and encourage a thirst for critical learning and reflection. The principles of activist education are central to how we understand educational provision, and we extend these to all social movements and to the co-operative movement as well.1 We believe, from our previous experience of running BA and MA courses in International Labour and Trade Union Studies (ILTUS), that this approach to education as ‘activist learning’ is one that can ­produce high level critical analysis that is crucial to the strengthening of social movements, as well as the activists themselves.2 In this chapter we will tell the story of the RED Learning Co-operative— the tensions and the obstacles, but also the core beliefs that we have put  See Choudry, A. 2015. Learning Activism: The Intellectual Life of Contemporary Social Movements. University of Toronto Press. 2  See Manborde, I. 2018. Learning, Knowledge and Trade Union Renewal: An Analysis of the Student Experience of the MA in International Labour and Trade Union Studies, Ruskin College, Oxford 2006–2016. Doctoral thesis, submitted at London Metropolitan University. 1

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at the heart of our educational offer, and at the centre of the way that we work together. It is this core commitment to work and teach, and ­ultimately know differently that we believe will challenge the neoliberal model of education and provide a new radical space in which movements for social change can learn and thrive. As researchers and educators, we would normally base our analysis on a body of literature and evidence. However, this chapter is about us and about our co-operative. We are therefore basing our analysis on our own experience, drawing on some key literature, but without a clear basis in primary research. It is what we encourage our students to do and we value the opportunity to tell our story. We see this as a contribution to a broader set of conversations— both on co-operative HE, and on activist education, and on the role of education in social movement building and renewal.

A Brief History of RED The RED Learning Co-operative was founded in July 2017 by a group of educators from Ruskin College, Oxford,3 with the support of a colleague from the Co-operative College in Manchester. The origins of the RED Learning Co-operative were therefore firmly rooted in a history of radical approaches to education and valuing the lived experience as a basis of knowledge. This approach was encapsulated by the ILTUS programme at Ruskin College, which included both BA and MA courses. These courses were built on a belief that the link between social movement learning and HE qualifications could (and indeed did) produce both practical and theoretical insight, as a contribution to the renewal of the trade union movement and as a contribution to academic knowledge and practice. One of the cornerstones of our approach to education was to ensure the recognition of positionality in knowledge production. It is important therefore that we reflect that in our own writing and educational practice—who are we and why do we care about radical educational practice? As well as a professional identity as educators, the founders of the RED Learning Co-operative are also activists with a background in the trade  Ruskin College was founded in Oxford in 1899 specifically to provide educational opportunities for working-class men, who were denied access to university. 3

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union movement, and in allied social movements such as the women’s movement, the anti-racist movement and international development. We experienced first-hand, how the commercialisation of education has corrupted the principles of adult learning and knowledge production that were established at Ruskin, and the commodification and financialisation of Higher Education more broadly. We began to explore ways of reimagining the space that we had created for learning that was rooted in student experience and the acknowledgement of the fundamental role that this kind of ‘prior knowledge’ plays in the pedagogy we used. In some respects, establishing a co-operative model was initially an opportunistic route, offering us a way to continue to work together as educators. However, as we became more linked to the co-operative movement, we found that the model is rooted in principles and values which offer opportunities to challenge and change this trend.

Who We Are The RED Learning Co-operative brings together practitioners and activists with many years of experience of working with trade unions, non-­ governmental organisations, social enterprises, charities, community groups and the co-operative movement. The education we offer is based on principles of working collaboratively to develop critically reflective, radical education. We aim to provide research, training and education that respond to the needs and interests of the learners and research partners, and in which the relationship with students and research participants is at the core of the educational and research experience.

Theoretical Approach Our approach to education is rooted in Freirean ‘critical’ pedagogy and practice.4 However, in our experience, this model was never explicitly recognised, even though it is used widely in social movement education. We have wondered why this might be and as a result of this,  Freire, P. 1997. Pedagogy of the Oppressed. New York: Continuum International Publishing Group Ltd. 4

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we have made a point of being explicit in our research, development and delivery, about the approach we use and why. For example, using methods such as small groups, participatory activities and encouraging the development of a shared space for learning and reflection, enabled students to bring their own experiences and prior knowledge both in the classroom and in written and presentational work. We explained to them that this approach is planned in order to counter some of the more oppressive teaching practices that exist in mainstream Higher Education. In acknowledging the explicitly political origins of the approach we were taking, we wanted to also acknowledge the link between knowledge and power and enable our education practice to challenge the existing power structures. Freirean pedagogy and praxis express the relationship between knowledge and social change: For Freire, the educational process is never neutral. People can be passive recipients of knowledge — whatever the content — or they can engage in a ‘problem-posing’ approach in which they become active participants. As part of this approach, it is essential that people link knowledge to action so that they actively work to change their societies at a local level and beyond.5

We believe, as educators, that we have a responsibility to challenge the prescribed curriculum and engage in pedagogical practices that recognise the opportunity for education to be a space of resistance. It was Emma Goldman who once said ‘the ideal of the average pedagogist is not a complete, well-rounded, original being; rather does he (sic) seek that the result of his art of pedagogy shall be automatons of flesh and blood, to best fit into the treadmill of society and the emptiness and dullness of our lives’.6 However, in our approach to education, we have also drawn on other theorists and ideas such as Gramsci’s understanding of knowledge as power,

 Taken from the Freire Institute website: https://www.freire.org/paulo-freire. Accessed 21 February 2019; Freire, P. 1997. Pedagogy of the Oppressed. New York: Continuum International Publishing Group Ltd. 6  See Goldman, in Haworth, R. H. 2012. Anarchist Pedagogies: Collective Actions, Theories, and Critical Reflection on Education, 2. Oakland, CA: PM Press. 5

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and Choudry’s writing on activist education.7 These have added further layers of understanding which have allowed us to build an even closer relationship with the social movements and activists we work with. For example, the theory of the ‘embodied activist’ has contributed insight to how trade union activists and officers are able to gain such depth of insight from their relationship with the movement, which is predicated on them ‘being there’. Gramsci’s understanding of praxis has also been fundamental to the approach we have taken to learning, challenging the privilege that has emerged in knowledge based on assumptions of expertise that are founded in scientific and rationalistic ideas of objectivity and rationality. This is not to undermine the value of these knowledge bases, but for us it has always been important to locate the knowledge that exists subjectively and to enable people to connect what they know from their life experiences with a consciousness of this as knowledge and expertise. For us it is important that people know that they know. This is what Choudry has called the ‘social character of all knowledge production’. The building of an interactive, participative, student-centred model through which the co-production of knowledge can be undertaken has become the central pillar of learning and of broader change for the RED Learning Co-operative.

Learning from Doing Central to our work in trade union studies has been to expand the idea of TU and activist education beyond training. Despite historical roots in political education, TU education is now more often about training union representatives to carry out their functions as a workplace representative (rep). So, it is limited in scope. Although it is important for reps  Gramsci, A. 2003. Selections from the Prison Notebooks of Antonio Gramsci, Trans. and Ed. Q. Hoare and G. Nowell Smith. London: Lawrence and Wishart; Choudry, A. 2015. Learning Activism: The Intellectual Life of Contemporary Social Movements. University of Toronto Press; Manborde, I. (forthcoming). Learning, Knowledge and Trade Union Renewal: An Analysis of the Student Experience of the MA in International Labour and Trade Union Studies, Ruskin College, Oxford (2006–2016), Thesis for Professional Doctorate in Researching Work, London Metropolitan University. 7

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to feel confident and be able to undertake duties of representation, this is often driven by process, and constrained by a legislative environment that consistently erodes the ability of unions to engage with workplaces on a more strategic level. Trade unions will often run campaigns addressing issues such as workload, but even engaging with these campaigns does not allow reps to theorise or understand why the things they are facing in their workplaces are taking place.8 It is limited to dealing with the symptoms rather than the cause. The approach of ILTUS was to look behind the issues such as workload, and think about why they keep reoccurring in workplaces, and how trade unions can be part of challenging and changing the political conditions that underpin the labour relationship, as well as offering practical solutions to the stress induced by, for example, excessive workload. In this way we were putting Choudry’s ideas into practice. The aim of the BA and MA programmes in ILTUS was to create the space for TU representatives/activists to theorise their experiences in the workplace and make sense of their role in the wider context of neoliberal capitalism and how work has been shaped by that ideology. This is an approach that is addressed by Simms and Holgate in their article ‘Organising for What?’, where they examine the need to understand the underlying political dynamics of trade union organising.9 There is a clear need to develop the links between TU activism and other social movements. For us, this has offered an opportunity to understand learning in a broader context of activism. It has also provided even greater insight into the value of activist learning for the renewal of the trade union movement. The decline in trade union popularity has often been attributed to its perceived irrelevance, particularly for workers whose employment relationship is isolated and precarious, which is a challenge to the mainstream trade union recruitment and organising model.10 For example, workers, who are often on zero hours contracts and may not  UCU, https://www.ucu.org.uk/workloadcampaign. Accessed 21 February 2019.  Simms, M., and J. Holgate. 2010. Organising for What? Where Is the Debate on the Politics of Organising? Work, Employment and Society. Sage. 10  For example, Williams, G., and M. Quinn. 2017. Do the Young Still Need Trade Unions and Do Trade Unions Want Them? In Routledge Handbook of Youth and Young Adulthood, 2nd ed. Abingdon: Routledge. 8 9

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have a workplace as a base, find it difficult to engage with traditional organising tactics and are unlikely to have a strong relationship with a trade union. This is well illustrated by Wills et al. in their study of migrant workers in London and by Yilmaz and Ledwith in their study of migrant domestic workers in Istanbul, Berlin and London.11 However, campaigns organised from the grassroots by workers and their communities have challenged the more traditional ‘from above’ trade union model of campaigning.12 There are many recent examples of organising taking place outside of the mainstream structures, where those involved identify areas of commonality. In 2012, cleaners, many of them migrant workers, subcontracted by John Lewis to a cleaning company, organised for a living wage with the support of the London Living Wage Campaign and London Citizens, and set up an Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) Cleaners Branch, whilst ‘traditional’ unions were fighting over whose responsibility it was to organise them. However, the commonality of interests is not always as obvious as in the case of the John Lewis cleaners, and solidarity can come from those that you may least expect. In the Grunwick dispute of 1976–1978, the predominantly Gujarati women workers at the Grunwick film processing plants in Willesden, who had arrived in the UK from East Africa, decided they would no longer put up with the oppressive working conditions and took to the streets in a long battle for better conditions and union recognition. The National Union of Mineworkers and the Union of Post Office Workers showed spontaneous and long-term solidarity with the Grunwick strikers (even though they were highly unionised, mainly white, male workers) demonstrating the solidarity of the working class, even in the context of the failure of the leadership of the trade unions involved in the dispute.13 What both these cases ultimately give us is an understanding of

 Wills, J., K. Datta, Y. Evans, and J. Herbert. Global Cities at Work: New Migrant Divisions of Labour; Yilmaz, G., and S. Ledwith. 2017. Migration and Domestic Work: The Collective Organization of Women and Their Voices from the City. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. 12  See Holgate, J. 2013. Community Organising in the UK: A ‘New’ Approach for Trade Unions? Economic and Industrial Democracy. https://doi.org/10.1177/0143831X13511275 13  Sundari, A., and R. Pearson. 2018. Striking Women: Struggles and Strategies of South Asian Women Workers from Grunwick to Gate Gourmet. London: Lawrence and Wishart. 11

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the agency and the knowledge of workers—particularly workers whose activism emerges from a political analysis of their lived experiences. The approach to education that we have developed in the RED learning co-op is therefore to understand the experience of activism itself as a site of learning and knowledge. It is from this starting point that we are able to build relationships with our students, and undertake a process of mutual learning and development, clearly rooted in a shared agenda of change and transformation. For us, research is also a political process, and in the ILTUS programmes students were supported to build on the idea of the ‘radical intellectual’ and the role of the activist in opening the horizons of knowledge and understanding—for example, the relational knowledge of and with people and communities which often lies at the centre of successful organising strategies. Research methodologies such as feminist research and action research have been used to great effect by students and in our own research.14 This is of course relevant to the trade union movement, but more broadly it is about how change needs to be underpinned by a collective sense of engagement and mutuality.

Why a Co-operative? How then can a co-operative model of learning help us to develop this approach to teaching and research? A co-operative model of learning is based on co-operative values. For the RED learning co-operative this means being true to values such as democracy, equality and solidarity. The learning process, for us, is a shared one, where everyone brings ‘knowledge’, rather than ‘knowledge’ being owned by the ‘teachers’ and ‘given’ to the ‘students’. These values permeate everything we do: who we work with, how we put courses together, how we evaluate them, and how we use the knowledge that is produced—particularly when we are ­undertaking research work. Our approach is to provide the space for the  See Maynard, M., and J. Purvis. 1994. Researching Women’s Lives from a Feminist Perspective. London: Taylor & Francis; Letherby, G. 2003. Feminist Research in Theory and Practice. Buckingham: OUP; Stringer, E. T. 2014. Action Research. Australia: Curtin University of Technology. 14

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development of peoples’ agency and voice. This is what gives us the basis for thinking about how a co-op might contribute to an agenda of activism, both within the academy and in establishing links between labour movement and co-operatives. When we are able to ground our approach within these co-operative values, it brings to life the principles which have driven our work and approach (see Chap. 1 for discussion of cooperative principles). The RED Learning Co-operative is owned by the researchers and educators who participate in the educational offer that we have developed. In our official structure, it is this group that sits at the heart of the co-­ operative and will drive the development of the work. However, for us it is also about our relationships with students, with the ‘Academy’ and more broadly with the movements we seek to strengthen. In the traditional university there are many assumptions made about the power relationship that exists between students and teachers—as a co-operative we set out to challenge this from the beginning, including questioning the assumptions that are often made that students come with no or very little knowledge and experience—for example, the idea of ‘empty vessels’ is challenged by Freire.15 As we develop our courses, beginning with trade union training courses, we are convinced that there is an increasing need for a different approach to knowledge and knowledge production. As seen in the recent Occupy movements across the world, alternative learning spaces have been created to challenge the neoliberal models in schools, colleges and universities, where often the teachers lack any autonomy to deviate from an enforced, standardised curriculum and are constantly challenged on quantitative outcomes.16 There is also another element of the power/knowledge axis that relates to how knowledge is communicated, and the disciplinary rules and boundaries of academic knowledge. In our approach we understand that peoples’ experiences are not limited by academic boundaries and that therefore our understanding of their experiences and our responses to

15  See Freire, P. 1997. Pedagogy of the Oppressed. New York: Continuum International Publishing Group Ltd. 16  Chomsky, N. 2012. Occupy. London: Penguin Books.

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them should not be limited by any notion of boundaries.17 If we are thinking about how to respond to the discriminatory practices of the labour market for migrant or young women workers, then this must be informed by thinking that is not defined as ‘sociology’ or ‘economics’, but by thinking that makes sense of peoples’ lives and is therefore drawn from multiple sources, across disciplinary boundaries. The discipline of knowledge is also challenged by Foucault, on whose ideas we also draw.18 The RED Learning Co-operative does not locate its education and research within one disciplinary area or offer to provide academic legitimacy which is drawn from a specific ‘canon’ within an academic discipline. Instead we actively work, with others, to challenge these boundaries and the limitations they pose to understanding the real lives and experiences of people. Interdisciplinarity is also core to the idea of co-operative research and education and as framed by MacPherson.19 Our co-operative values also sit alongside our activism and our relationship with the movements from which we have emerged and in which we remain rooted. Whilst the direction of our work and the independence of our approach are drawn from our central body of researchers and educators, we feel that our usefulness must also be measured by how much we are contributing to the underlying strength of the movements with which we are associated. It is from this relationship that we draw the credibility of our knowledge and expertise. It is this credibility that allows us to build our relationship with the ‘market’ of education, and on which our research can be based. We have found then, that as well as being an opportunity to configure ourselves and continue to undertake work that we believe in, the co-­ operative principles have given us a shape on which we are able to base our broader relationships with students and social movements, and to position ourselves within the ‘market’ of education and research. We  See Pinta, S. 2012. Educate, Organize, Emancipate: The Work People’s College and The Industrial Workers of the World. In Anarchist Pedagogies: Collective Actions, Theories, and Critical Reflections on Education, ed. R. H. Haworth, 47–68. Oakland, CA: PM Press. 18  Foucault, M. 1994. Michel Foucault: Power – Essential Works of Foucault 1954–1984, vol. 3, ed. J. D. Faubion. London: Penguin Books. 19  See MacPherson, I. One Path to Co-operative Studies – A Selection of Papers and Presentations. New Rochdale Press: British Columbia Institute for Co-operative Studies. 17

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believe that our relationship with other co-operatives and particularly with other educational co-operatives will also further root us in the co-­ operative landscape. However, establishing these relationships has not been without tension, and these are likely to sharpen as we develop our approach within this landscape.

Tensions and Challenges Although there have been many benefits to building on an established base of work, this has also thrown up some challenges. At a practical level, we have had to fit a co-operative around an already existing body of teaching and research. We have already acknowledged that to begin with the co-operative model was a convenient framework for something that already existed, and we have had to adapt to a landscape in which we are not a part of Ruskin College, and do not have the associated history and institutional support. For example, our courses were dependent on block residential teaching weekends in the beautiful grounds of the college. This is no longer possible, so we have had to find other ways and opportunities to build relationships with students, predominantly by undertaking training in their own buildings. As we develop our educational offer as a co-operative, this independent identity will become more substantial, and the historical roots of our offer will settle into being just that: historical roots. But in the transition phase, many of our relationships, particularly within the labour movement for whom Ruskin College is an iconic part of the educational landscape, need to be rebuilt. As we have already outlined, this educational offer challenges much of existing trade union education by going beyond the technical educational offer of reps training and developing a much more critical approach in which the position of the labour movement within the broader neoliberal landscape is analysed and reimagined. This builds on many other academics’ and activists’ work, but it nevertheless has meant that we have had to renegotiate our relationship with the labour movement and re-­ establish trust in our educational offer. There have been other moments of tension, for example, there is not a well-defined relationship between the co-operative movement and the

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labour movement. Our focus and approach have therefore challenged some of the underlying values of co-operative working, which is often less focused on political activism and change. At the same time, the co-­ operative model has also challenged the trade union movement, which has often seen the co-operative model as stepping into spaces which should be occupied by the state, and in some ways legitimising the ­privatisation agenda of neoliberal capitalism.20 However, we see this as a huge opportunity for RED Learning Co-operative to build a bridge between the two movements which we know already have existing links and the potential to work much more closely together for mutual benefit. As an independent co-operative, we have also had to come to terms with the business of education. Internally amongst ourselves as members, we have negotiated the tension between our expressed principles of activist-­rooted, independent and responsive education, and the need to engage with neoliberal models of education which are based on agreed outcomes and markers of (for example) employability, in order to become established. We have found that however difficult these conversations, the key to reaching agreement and being able to operate effectively has been to make explicit the compromises, in order to progress a business model. But in our discussions, we have agreed where there are red-lines, such as ensuring a flat pay structure, and where we cannot enter into partnerships because there is the potential of compromising our values and therefore undermining our integrity. However, also associated with the business of education has been the huge reality check of developing a workable financial model. Currently, we are not financially viable as an autonomous co-op. We seek external funding in order to finance us whilst we build our infrastructure (including a website, etc.) and begin to invest in a marketing strategy. There are also significant practical problems associated with starting up a co-­ operative, including the initial investment of unpaid time by all members  Monaco, M., and L. Pastorelli. nd. Trade Unions and Worker Cooperatives in Europe: A Win–Win Relationship. Maximizing Social and Economic Potential in Worker Cooperatives. International Labour Organization. https://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/%2D%2D-ed_dialogue/%2D%2Dactrav/documents/meetingdocument/wcms_234169.pdf. Accessed 1 March 2019.

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and building a business that is opposed to the accumulation of capital, whilst sustaining the livelihoods of co-operative members. We still have a long way to travel on this road and we are grateful for the support of fellow co-operators who offer advice and sound counsel. Currently two (of five) members are able to sustain a livelihood from the co-operative, and others continue to engage whilst also undertaking full-time work ­elsewhere. We are hopeful that we will all soon be able to sustain our livelihoods through the RED Learning Co-operative. A further tension for all those involved in Co-operative education models is how to negotiate the relationship between co-operative values and the current neoliberal educational system that we have to navigate in order to become established as a viable organisation. These issues have formed the basis of many discussions within RED: do we offer non-­ accredited courses to students, so we do not have to engage with the bureaucratic validation system, or do we look for an organisation with similar values to our own to validate Further Education and HE courses? As a new co-­operative are we in a position to turn down work from organisations that do not fit completely with our values, such as private education providers? This is a dilemma for those who feel strongly about public education but also must earn money to sustain livelihoods, whilst opposing the accumulation of capital.

Concluding Analysis As we reflect on our first year working together and putting in place the first building blocks for the RED Learning Co-operative, it is important to appreciate the progress we have made conceptually, as well as practically. In many ways our co-operative could have been a consultancy network, or each of us independently could have continued to work within the movements in which we are rooted. That we have chosen to walk this path together is about a vision: a vision of education and research that not only draws on the radical roots from which we all draw our teaching practice, but also a vision of working to strengthen the movements and relationships of solidarity that we believe are central to bringing about the transformational change that is needed in our society. Our work has not

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just been to continue doing what we were doing previously, but also to build a vision of something better, something more radical that can look to the future with confidence and bring positive energy to the relationships we have engaged with. We return to our theoretical roots frequently and continue to draw inspiration from writers such as Freire (1997), Gramsci (2003), Choudry (2015), Holgate (2013), Yilmaz and Ledwith (2017), Colgan and Ledwith (2002) and others.21 However, we also draw inspiration from our students and other activists with whom we still work, both as educators and as fellow activists and campaigners. It is crucial for us that our endeavour speaks to these relationships and enables a space in which people can build knowledge for change. It is also crucial that our cooperative and our model of education contribute towards the relationship between the different movements of trade unions, co-operatives and other allied social movements. But in doing this we also acknowledge that bridges are often structurally flawed. We cannot solve the tensions between movements, but we can provide the space in which people can co-create knowledge and understanding both of each other and of themselves. Looking to the future we feel privileged to be part of a Co-operative University Working Group. Participation in this project will enable us to build up our educational offer, eventually to BA level. We will be able to promote the knowledge and understanding that is created within movements and amplify the voices of activists as academics. The sense of legitimacy and confidence that comes with academic achievement enables our students to take their place as change agents within their own movements, who can build the strength of their movement and its role in chal Freire, P. 1997. Pedagogy of the Oppressed. New York: Continuum International Publishing Group Ltd; Gramsci, A. 2003. Selections from the Prison Notebooks of Antonio Gramsci. Trans. and Ed. Q. Hoare and G. Nowell Smith. London: Lawrence and Wishart; Choudry, A. 2015. Learning Activism: The Intellectual Life of Contemporary Social Movements. University of Toronto Press; Holgate, J. 2013. Community Organising in the UK: A ‘New’ Approach for Trade Unions? Economic and Industrial Democracy https://doi.org/10.1177/0143831X13511275; Yilmaz, G., and S. Ledwith. 2017. Migration and Domestic Work: The Collective Organisation of Women and Their Voices from the City. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan; Colgan, F., and S. Ledwith, eds. 2002. Gender and Diversity in Trade Unions: International Perspectives. Routledge: London and New York. 21

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lenging and changing the landscape of rights and dignity for workers, women, migrants, young people and many others who suffer daily discrimination and inequality. The RED Learning Co-operative began as an accidental co-operative, seeking to continue a tradition of radical education; the future will combine historical roots with co-operative principles, which go far beyond our structure to shape our relationships and the connections between individual activists and movements.

7 Phoenix from the Ashes: The Origins and Development of Leicester Vaughan College Lucy Faire and Miriam Gill

Introduction Leicester Vaughan College is a Community Benefit Society (CBS) co-­ operative which is working towards becoming a Higher Education (HE) institution. The College (hereafter LVC) is a re-establishment of a 150-year-old adult education college, closed in 2013. The opening sentence of LVC’s objects states: ‘we believe in education as a public good.’1 This expresses the conviction of the College’s founders that it will rise like a ‘phoenix’ and once again provide part-time, adult Higher Education in  Rules of Leicester Vaughan College Ltd., Section 4: Objects (hereafter ‘Objects’).

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L. Faire (*) • M. Gill Leicester Vaughan College, Leicester, UK e-mail: [email protected]; [email protected] © The Author(s) 2019 M. Noble, C. Ross (eds.), Reclaiming the University for the Public Good, Palgrave Critical University Studies, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-21625-2_7

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Leicester and its region.2 Like a phoenix, both recognisably the same and renewed in form and strength, it hopes to continue to enable self-­ improvement, mutual-improvement and civic participation for those unable to study for full-time degrees. This chapter explains the background, development and future plans of LVC. The first section traces the origins of LVC through the history of Leicester’s Vaughan College (1862–2013), the Vaughan Centre for Lifelong Learning (hereafter VCLL) and the Save Vaughan Campaign of summer 2016. The second examines how the problems faced by students and tutors in VCLL and its eventual fate exemplify the consequences of governmental funding changes and neoliberal culture on university adult education provision and their disproportionately toxic impact on this specialist sector. The third section recounts the establishment of LVC describing the choices made in its creation, the anticipated advantages of the co-operative model and its current state. As a pioneering project, this new form of Higher Education institution (HEI) aims to offer a replicable, scalable and adaptable alternative to the prevailing neoliberal model with its catastrophic impact on university-level adult education provision.

 Brief History of Vaughan College A and the Vaughan Centre for Lifelong Learning Vaughan College can trace its origins back to 1862 and to a scheme to open a working men’s college.3 This venture was the outcome of the meeting called by the vicar of St Martin’s parish, David Vaughan, which was deliberately held in the evening to enable as many working-class men as possible to attend.4 A woman’s department was added in 1880 and, in 1908, the College was able to build its own dedicated building. This was a considerable achievement not least because the college, renamed the  Sally Birch, Vaughan student and campaigner, first used this term when interviewed by Radio Leicester, 16 September 2016. 3  Brown, C. 2012. A Blessing to the Town: 150 Years of Vaughan College, Leicester, 16. Leicester: Leicester University Institute of Lifelong Learning. 4  Atkins, E. 1912. Birth and Early Years. In The Vaughan Working Men’s College, Leicester. 1862– 1912, ed. Edward Atkins, 45–54, 46. London: Adams Bros and Shardlow. 2

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Vaughan Working Men’s College, was the only provincial working men’s college to survive into the twentieth century.5 From 1929, the College became the extramural department of University College, Leicester (now Leicester University) to meet the requirements of the 1919 Adult Education Report that adult education provision be a ‘normal and necessary part’ of the functions of a University.6 After Leicester University was awarded its Charter in 1957, it continued to recognise the importance of having a dedicated building in the centre of the City, so that when the 1908 building was demolished to build a ring road in 1962, this was replaced by a purpose-built College.7 Like the first Vaughan College, this became an important learning space, its human scale, specialist library and public spaces providing the ideal environment for mature learners’ journeys into degree-level education. Reflecting on Brown’s history of Vaughan College, Freeman remarked, ‘The college has always been more than a collection of courses, with the common room and associated social activities playing a vital role in creating the culture of the institution.’8 The College continued to fulfil its role of providing adult education to Leicester until 2013 when the University of Leicester shut the building, one year after it celebrated its 150th anniversary.9 The teaching of the remaining courses, all degree-level, was moved onto the main University campus. At the time of the closure, the then vice chancellor of the University made assurances about institutional commitment to supporting adult education, stating that the removal of a dedicated teaching space was intended to benefit learners and ‘an important element’ in the future of provision.10 Furthermore, to assuage public outcry, the existing Institute of Lifelong Learning was renamed the Vaughan Centre for Lifelong  Kelly, T. 1992. A History of Adult Education in Great Britain: From the Middle Ages to the Twentieth Century, 188. Liverpool: Liverpool University Press. 6  Ministry of Reconstruction, Adult Education Committee. 1919. Final Report: 169, 333 (a). 7  Brown, 81. 8  Freeman, M. 2014. Review: A Blessing to the Town: 150 Years of Vaughan College, Leicester. History of Education: Journal of the Education Society 43: 274. 9  University of Leicester: https://www2.le.ac.uk/news/blog/2012/june/vaughan-college-celebrates150-years-of-adult-education. Accessed 31 October 2018. 10  University of Leicester: https://www2.le.ac.uk/staff/announcements/microsites/relocation-of-vaughancollege-teaching/news-and-updates/vaughan-college-move-underlines-our-commitment-to-adult-learning. Accessed 31 October 2018. 5

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Learning.11 However, teaching on campus was only to last three years before the University launched a 90-day consultation on a proposal to disestablish the centre and stopped student recruitment.12 The threatened removal of VCLL’s departmental status and the dispersal of its staff signalled the end of dedicated adult education provision. The announcement immediately prompted a vigorous response bringing together current students, Vaughan alumni, current and former tutors, and supporters in the town and nationally. A campaign of protest was conducted through local media, public stalls and protests, petitions and coverage by local radio and regional television.13 Education bloggers, local politicians and trade unions lent support for what was considered to be ‘an invaluable resource for the whole of the city and beyond’.14 Campaigners showed that the Centre was in good shape15: its part-time enrolments had held up in contrast to the 55 per cent fall seen nationally since 2012, and in 2016, many of the programmes were recruiting at greater levels than the national average.16 In spite of this, and the strength of opposition, the leadership team of Leicester University and the University Council voted for ‘disestablishment’. This means that the department will close entirely in 2020 when the final cohorts of mature students complete their degrees. The Leicester University branch of the Universities and Colleges Union described the decision as ‘a short-sighted act of cultural and social vandalism’.17

 Burgess, R. 2013. Letter: College Coming into Heart of the University. Leicester Mercury, July 22.  University of Leicester Website: https://www2.le.ac.uk/staff/announcements/vaughan-centrefor-lifelong-learning-update. Accessed 21 November 2018. 13  See, for example, the summary on University of Leicester’s website: https://www2.le.ac.uk/institution/unions/ucu/news/round-up-of-opposition-to-the-proposed-closure-of-vaughan-centre. Accessed 31 October 2018. 14  Ashworth, Jon, MP for Leicester South, quoted in Dryden, F. 2016. 3000 Sign Petition to Try to Save Vaughan Centre. Leicester Mercury, August 29: 12. 15  Martin, D. 2016. Vaughan Centre Is Paying Its Way, So Why Close It? Leicester Mercury, August 12: 10. 16  Butcher, J. 2015. ‘Shoe-Horned and Side-Lined’? Challenges for part-time learners in the new HE landscape. HEA, 3. 17  Leicester UCU. 2016. Response to Council Decision to Shut Down Vaughan. https://www2. le.ac.uk/institution/unions/ucu/news/response-to-council-decision-to-shut-down-vaughan. Accessed 27 September 2018.

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Adult Education in a Hostile Environment The experience of Vaughan by September 2016 seemed to be a late and ‘particularly emotive case’ among the host of many UK university extramural or adult education departments which have been forced to close their doors in the last few decades.18 Increasingly hostile and contradictory funding developments and government policies have had a negative impact on such departments and their mature and part-time provision.19 The related cultural shift which had an impact on the type of provision offered, and the emphases apparent in the names assigned to it, can be traced back over decades: ‘as lifelong learning has taken hold in policy rhetoric, the democratic aspirations and social purpose of life-long education have been marginalised.’20 In the past decade, these problems have been compounded by the pressures associated with the fees regime and the impact of austerity and neoliberal approaches, including New Public Management.21 Adult education represents a context in which these pressures on the conditions of staff, the treatment of students and the civic vocation of universities have been disproportionately harmful and of long standing. Although the initial arguments used to justify the closure of VCLL were specifically economic—it was claimed that it received subsidy and ‘has been operating at a substantial deficit’—it swiftly became clear that this decision was essentially strategic and related to structural and cultural rather than local factors.22 The impact of these factors on university adult education, its students and staff and the civic mission of the university is outlined further.

 Ferret. 2017. Co-operation is the key to Leicester Vaughan re-launch. TES, November 3: 53.  Stanistreet, P. 2009. Mind the Funding Gap. Adults Learning, January 4. 20  The Editors. 2006. From the ‘Great Tradition’ to ‘Celebrity Big Brother’: Whatever Became of Adult Education? International Journal of Lifelong Education 24: 456. 21  Osborne, S. P., and K. McLaughlin. 2002. New Public Management in Context. In New Public Management: Trends and Perspectives, ed. K. McLaughlin, S. P. Osborne, and E. Ferlie, 7–14, 9–10. London: Routledge. 22  Dryden, F. 2016. 2000 Sign Petition to Save Learning Centre. Leicester Mercury, June 24: 6. 18 19

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Crisis in University Adult Education ‘Let the destruction of dedicated University Provision of Adult Education stop here’ was the plea of over 30 academics and experts who signed a letter to the Daily Telegraph in support of VCLL on 4 September 2016.23 This appeal was made in the context of a growing number of official reports raising concern about the state of adult education provision.24 The austerity following the financial crisis of 2008 in the UK has resulted in ‘[s]pending on apprenticeships and other work-based learning for adults [falling] since 2009–10 by about 44% in real terms’, a reduction predictably accompanied by a decline in adult learners.25 Structural shifts in funding with an emphasis on formal qualifications had already narrowed the scope of adult education provision in HE. The impact of this can be seen starkly in the fall in numbers of extramural departments. In 1980, there were 37 specialist departments in 47 universities; this had fallen to 20 by 2006, although there were now many more universities.26 This declining trend was used by Leicester University to normalise their proposed closure of VCLL as the Vice Chancellor, Paul Boyle, cited the closure of Sheffield, Cardiff and Hull’s lifelong learning departments to illustrate how Leicester University was merely following the trend.27 It should be noted that both Sheffield and Cardiff still have vigorous lifelong learning departments. Unsurprisingly, the decline in mature and part-time University students was accelerated by the 2012 rise in fees, contributing to a 55 per cent fall in part-time, sub-degree HE students since 2010.28 The  Open letter. 2016. Too Important to be Left to Chance. Daily Telegraph, September 4: 17.  For example, Barnes, S-A., D. Hughes, and K. Adriaanse. 2016. Adult Education: Too Important to be Left to Chance. Adult Learner Survey Research Report for the All Party Parliamentary Group for Adult Education (APPG)—Inquiry into Adult Education. 25  Belfield, C., C. Farquharson, and L. Sibieta. 2018. Annual Report on Education Spending in England Funded by the Nuffield Foundation. The Institute for Fiscal Studies, 47. Butcher, 3. 26  Jones, B., R. Mosely, and G. Thomas. 2010. Introduction. In University Continuing Education, 1981–2006: Twenty-Five Turbulent Years, ed. B. Jones, R. Mosely, and G. Thomas, 2. Leicester: NIACE. 27  Boyle, P. 2016. Letter to Vijay Singh Riyait, Abbey Ward Councillor. June 1. 28  Butcher, 10. 23 24

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g­ overnment’s withdrawal of the teaching grant from all but science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM) subjects, and ongoing reductions in financial support for adult education also played their part: Leicester’s VC blamed the ‘very real cuts by central Government to adult education’.29 Given that many mature ‘[s]tudents [are] faced with “Hobson’s choice”— it is either part-time or nothing’, many people are missing out on university-­level education: they miss their ‘second chance’.30 Ironically, Leicester University’s 2016/2017 Office for Fair Access  agreement acknowledged their support for VCLL-enabled access for those for whom this form of education ‘would otherwise not be possible’.31 The actions of Leicester University testify not only to financial pressures but to issues of a shifting culture. As one VCLL tutor wrote to the THE, ‘why is adult learning just not trendy enough for Paul Boyle, our new vice-chancellor?’32 Traditional adult education delivered by specialists on ‘dark evenings in unassuming classrooms’ is not glamorous, or amenable to massification or technological fixes.33 Part-time students are not seen to fit well within the university system: the marketised university works on a ‘one-size-fits-all basis’, while students lacking traditional qualifications are viewed as more labour-intensive.34 Fee and grant regime changes make it logical for University recruitment to focus on students paying full-time fees, spending lavishly on ‘in house’ university services. Part-time, mature students are neither cash-generating campus consumers nor a lucrative source of fee income.35 Moreover, the marketisation of universities emphasises highly paid university management teams and investment in capital projects, rather than support, research and teaching staff. In response to staff redundancies, for example, a 2018 University and College Union campaign at Leicester University had the tagline  Boyle. Letter to Councillor Riyait.  Butcher, 7; Ashworth, J., MP. 2017. Column: In the House. Sometimes, a Second Chance Is All We Need. Leicester Mercury, December 2: 24. 31  University of Leicester’s OFFA agreement 2016/2017: 7.14. 32  Bryant, E. 2016. Lifelong learning trumps trendy. Letter to THES, September 22. 33  Bryant. Letter to THES. 34  Butcher, 7. 35  Marsh, C. 2017. The Feeling of Engagement: Lifelong Learning About Religion in Part-Time, Secular Higher Education as a Private and Public Good. Widening Participation and Lifelong Learning 19 (1): 8–32, 27. 29 30

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‘Workers not Widgets, Brains before Buildings’.36 The fall in part-time students also reflects the fact that for many universities, investment in ‘widening participation’ required as a condition of their ability to charge higher fees is interpreted as relating specifically to the recruitment of full-­ time, school-leaving undergraduates.37 Leicester University’s justification of their closure of VCLL stressed that this did not impact on their duty of ‘widening participation’.38 The fate of VCLL can, therefore, be understood as the removal of provision considered insufficiently profitable within the managerial university.

Impact of Current Environment on Adult Students It is clear that, as Jones et al. noted in 2010, ‘the funding system and the overall culture of Higher Education have discriminated consistently against part-time learners’.39 Moreover, many ‘part-time’ degrees offered are unsuitable, reliant on elements of the mainstream programmes and so characterised by daytime teaching, a lack of pastoral support and random changes to timetables. This unpredictability makes it hard to negotiate the demands of either part-time work or childcare (which Butcher identifies as a responsibility shouldered by 38 per cent of adult learners).40 It is hard to argue with Jones’ statement that ‘HE is rapidly becoming the monopoly of the 18 year old’.41 Unsurprisingly, mature learners often feel ‘out of place’ in the campus environment suffering impostor syndrome.42 Their needs, practical, educational and emotional, are not well-supported within current university structures. Ironically, at the time of VCLL’s  LUCU. Facebook site. https://www.facebook.com/leicesterucu/. Accessed 6 November 2018. Anon. 2018. Building Tension. Private Eye, September 21: 38. 37  As reflected in this Gov.UK page: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/widening-participation-in-higher-education. Accessed 21 November 2018; See also Bill Jones cited in Wheeler, C. 2016. Anger as Adult Education Faces Sharp Decline. Sunday Express, July 31. 38  University of Leicester Council. Minutes of a meeting held on Friday 16 September 2016, 4 (16/ M72). 39  Jones et al., 3. 40  Butcher, 5. 41  Jones in Wheeler. Sunday Express, July 31. 42  Chapman, A. 2017. Using the Assessment Process to Overcome Impostor Syndrome in Mature Students. Journal of Further and Higher Education 41: 112–9. 36

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­ isestablishment, Leicester University’s full-time mature student dropout d rate was the third worst in the country at 24 per cent according to Higher Education Statistics Agency data.43

 orking Conditions for Staff in University Adult W Education Conditions for staff in university adult education departments, typified by those at VCLL, amplify the precarious conditions associated with neoliberal university management almost to the point of caricature. This is most apparent in the trend towards a two-tier system of employment and the marginalisation of academics.44 The Vaughan Centre had what were referred to as associate tutors on precarious casual contracts and contracted staff, the distinction always being made between the two groups so that so-called staff meetings never normally included associate staff. However, the difference between the Vaughan Centre and other academic departments was that it employed only a minimal number of academics, many on part-time contracts some as small as half a day a week. Thus, the majority of the teaching in 2016 was carried out by around 60 associate tutors.45 Many of these were responsible for writing and delivering their own courses as if they were full-time academics but on a fraction of their pay and with less infrastructural support. These tutors were employed as ‘temps’ by an external agency despite the fact that many had worked for Vaughan for over a decade or, in some cases, more than two decades and were therefore highly experienced adult educators as well as experts in their own disciplines. It is not surprising that an idea of a co-operative

 HESA. 2016. Table T3a—Non-continuation Following Year of Entry: UK Domiciled Full-Time First Degree Entrants 2013/14. https://www.hesa.ac.uk/data-and-analysis/performance-indicators/ releases/2014-15-non-continuation. Accessed 6 November 2018. 44  For a forcible characterisation of the latter as ‘proletarianisation of academic labour’, see Hall, R. 2018. On the Alienation of Academic Labour and the Possibilities for Mass Intellectuality. Triple C 16: 97. 45  There were 62 at the start of the ‘consultation’. With thanks to Paul Cutts and Clive Marsh for this information. 43

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future for the Centre which contracted all its academic workers within a democratic, flat pay structure came from an associate tutor.46

Consequences for the Civic University The ideal of a civic university expresses the intimate link between a university and its local community. By contrast, the neoliberal university, with its narrative of competition, seeks a global stage.47 VCLL was considered the antithesis of this global focus during the Save Vaughan Campaign: ‘centres like the Vaughan Centre are precious resources that have served their communities well for generations. They have a completely different ethos to universities.’48 Unlike Leicester University, VCLL was considered ‘part of the fabric of the city’.49 It was recognised as contributing to the public good as well as the individual: ‘It has given me and thousands of other people real opportunities to change their lives and in doing so the lives of their families and the communities in which we all live and work.’50 Having an impact on the community was direct as well as indirect as the counselling courses taught by Vaughan College have provided thousands of hours of free provision through student placements such that ‘places such as The Leicester Counselling Centre could certainly struggle to survive without students from Vaughan’.51 One of the most striking elements of the Save Vaughan Campaign was how little response the leadership of the University evinced to public outcry or even to high-profile local and political pressure. Seen in slow motion, the fate of Vaughan College had parallels to the fate suffered by many local Leicester firms which were bought out and then closed by multinationals who prioritised global strategy rather than local links and loyalties.  As this tutor is now employed by the university, we feel that it is best to preserve their anonymity here. 47  See Collini, S. 2012. What Are Universities For? Harmondsworth: Penguin. 48  GC in the ‘Save Vaughan’ petition. 2016. https://www.change.org/p/the-university-of-leicestersave-the-vaughan-centre-for-lifelong-learning. Accessed 10 October 2018. 49  Cllr Vijay Singh Riyait. 2016. Letter to the Leicester Mercury, June 11. 50  SK in ‘Save Vaughan’ petition. 51  GH in ‘Save Vaughan’ petition. 46

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 hoenix from the Ashes: Building Leicester P Vaughan College as a Co-operative The public claim on Vaughan College generated a strong belief among tutors that they had a responsibility to continue the provision for part-­ time mature students, the courses they ran and the collective college environment in which they were provided. Moreover, they were determined that their work mattered too much to become simply another doleful statistic. They plotted a different narrative, as Private Eye reported in September 2018, ‘Two years ago the university closed the much-loved Vaughan Centre for Lifelong Learning…[it] has now reopened as an independent college after a local campaign to save it.’52 Leicester Vaughan College is intentionally created to offer an ‘alternative, reproducible and sustainable model of Higher Education focused on the needs of students, staff and the wider community’.53 LVC offers mature students what Universities increasingly will not offer and whilst LVC is still very much a work in progress, it has ambitious plans and is thus simultaneously daunting and exciting. LVC offers a pioneering alternative to the current mainstream university sector through its democratic structures and through the co-operation of staff, students and community in the running of the College. Our ambition therefore is to ‘reclaim the university’ for those who are marginalised from the sector, in particular, part-time and mature students, and to offer them an active role in their learning experience.

Choosing to Be a Co-operative The idea of a co-operative to save the provision had been mooted in the early stages of the ‘consultation’ when the proposal was discussed only among the BA in Humanities and Arts tutors in relation to whether their course should try to secure a new home in another department or institution. For some, an independent institution was considered to be the best 52 53

 Anon. 2018. Building Tension. Private Eye, September 21: 38.  ‘Objects’.

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way to ensure the survival and quality of the degree; for others, it was perceived as a positive opportunity to return to core educational values and to escape the neoliberal imperatives of University management. The idea soon re-emerged following the decision to disestablish the Centre, and discussion with Joss Winn, Sarah Amsler and Mike Neary, of Lincoln’s Social Science Centre, made the co-operative seem a real possibility. Those who visited Lincoln were enthused, but the issue was then how to convince the VCLL  department that this was the best way forward. During autumn 2016, several potential homes for the various VCLL programmes were explored. The possibility of relocating to other academic departments was quickly eliminated as the courses and disciplines taught at VCLL did not map easily onto existing structures and no departments were keen to take on part-time evening provision. By November 2016, the options had narrowed to the following: removal to another local HE or Further Education (FE) institution; relocation to the City Council’s adult education college with potential validation by Leicester University; or the creation of an independent institution constituted as a co-operative. Each potential ‘home’ for the Centre’s programmes raised different objections which were related to concerns about job and financial security among staff, staff autonomy, and the issue of degree-awarding powers. The latter was the obvious drawback to the co-­operative proposal and to the scheme to be subsumed as part of the City Council’s Adult Education College. VCLL staff were concerned that removal to another HE or FE institution would result in the courses being dispersed so they were no longer a collective entity. As part of a collegial team who understood adult education as a specialist task, they were able to understand each other’s problems, often in the face of lack of understanding from other areas of the University. Consequently, working on the principle of ‘strength in unity’, the Counselling programme, which received other offers, preferred to remain within the department collective. At an open meeting involving both contracted staff and associate tutors, the co-operative proposal emerged as the most attractive route. It offered staff a way to continue to work together as adult educators (albeit in different disciplines), providing the opportunity to develop an institution which prioritised the needs of adult learners rather than ­side-­lining them. The decision solidified once other local HE institutions declined to take either the Centre or its courses

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and Leicester University refused to act as a validator for the courses to be delivered at the local adult education college.54 The co-operative offered autonomy to staff with the ability to be directly involved in the renaissance of an institution to which they were highly committed while the proposed flat pay structure offered equality and security. On 14 December, less than a fortnight after the open meeting, a group of current and former tutors and their supporters met formally. Their first action was to agree to pursue a co-­operative model for their autonomous institution, informally known as the Vaughan Phoenix.

What Form of Co-operative? Initially, it was assumed that the new Vaughan legal personality would be either a workers’ or a multi-stakeholders’ co-operative. The most significant advantage of the later was that its membership could extend to the wider community and that the varied public counselling bodies which depended on the many placement hours undertaken by Vaughan students could have a stake in the College. Advice from Ian Wilson at Co-operative and Social Enterprise Development Agency raised the possibility of a further form of co-operative: the CBS.  This model of co-­ operative has open membership, limited by subscription to the values of the society. Its community focus immediately appealed and it was adopted as the most suitable structure. This choice aligns with LVC’s aim to provide accessible teaching for ‘a broad range of students from diverse communities’.55 It offered a way to build on the collective strength evident in the Save Vaughan campaign, during which not only students and tutors co-operated together but also Vaughan alumni and members of the wider community: local, national and international. In addition, it seemed to fit Vaughan’s history: David Vaughan wanted his College to be for the whole town and the Save Vaughan Campaign demonstrated that people felt the College belonged to Leicester and not Leicester University.56  This was because with the removal of the Vaughan Centre courses outside the university those able to oversee validation of these specialist courses had also become external to the university. 55  ‘Objects’. 56  Atkins. Birth and Early Years, 46. 54

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What Sort of Educational Offer? Historically, Vaughan College had been a location for varied adult education. It offered unaccredited courses, validated sub-degree courses as well as offering degrees and MAs. By the time the Vaughan College building closed, VCLL was only able to offer programmes leading to degree-­level awards. As options for acquiring the ability to award degrees were explored by the Vaughan Phoenix team, irreconcilable differences emerged over the question of formal validation and the nature of the new institution’s educational offer. For some members of the Vaughan phoenix team, the new College was a chance to move beyond many restrictions and regulations which accompany recognised degree-awarding powers and become educators upholding academic standards without bureaucratic and financial constrictions. There are ventures around Britain which have managed to set up HE-level education projects or programmes of this more radical kind, such as Lincoln’s Social Science Centre, the Free University of Brighton and the Ragged University.57 For others in the team, continuing to be able to award recognised degrees was the central aim of the new College and one which would secure part-time and mature student access to the upper tier of educational provision in the locality. The Save Vaughan Campaign demonstrated how much this access to part-time degrees was valued by mature learners as comments on the petition testified: I am a mature student in my first year and without this other mature students will not be able to study and make these important life changes…. This degree has changed my life.58 I’m a first year student on a two year course and planned to follow on with another course after this to get my degree. Nowhere else offers this what will I do now! [sic] I work full time so part time is my only option.59  Neary, M., and J. Winn. 2017. The Social Science Centre, Lincoln: The Theory and Practice of a Radical Idea. Journal on Research Policy and Evaluation 1: 4. Also see Chap. 4 by Saunders in this volume. 58  MB in Save Vaughan Petition. 59  TM in Save Vaughan petition. 57

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The counselling programme composed the greater number of students within the Vaughan Centre, and degree-level courses are a professional requirement for them. While degree-level, non-accredited courses may have been more acceptable for some students on the arts and humanities programme, others were undertaking the degree so that they could pursue a teaching qualification or progress to other graduate professions. Offering non-accredited courses, even if at a higher level, was also considered to be stepping on the toes of potential allies, such as Leicester Adult Skills and Learning Service and the Workers’ Educational Association. Furthermore, if Vaughan did not offer accredited degrees, its students would not have access to government support. Without fee income, there could be no financial foundation and thus no sustainable source to establish equitable and sustainable conditions for staff. While other non-accredited HE courses operated with staff who had other sources of income, tutors in the Vaughan Centre were losing their jobs. They could not teach for free and wanted to escape from a system which assumed that much of the work they did would be (and was) done for free. In sum, setting up a co-operative HE institution which delivered degrees was felt by most of the Vaughan Phoenix team to be a radical and challenging objective which recognised the reality of both their own needs and those of their students.

Foundation Once these key issues had been resolved, Leicester Vaughan College Ltd. was registered with the Financial Conduct Authority in August 2017 as Community Benefit Society 7422, less than one year after the disestablishment of the Vaughan Centre. It was officially launched in October 2017 and now has over 100 members. Membership is based on ­agreement with the objects of the society, which are set out in the rules of the society, and there is an age limit of 16. LVC is run as a not-for-profit organisation and this ethos is reflected in the decision to have an asset lock; should LVC cease, any assets will be passed over to a similar organisation rather than being distributed back to the members or workers. The intention is to keep fees lower than those charged in the sector. This is important as high fee levels have been iden-

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tified as a significant barrier to student participation, especially for those on low incomes and mature students.60 However, as a start-up which aims to be financially sustainable rather than relying on philanthropy for its core costs, LVC needs to engage with the current realities of university funding in which student fees provide the main income. Fees will need to be set at a substantial, yet defensible, rate to generate sufficient income to cover the teaching costs with all staff employed on an equal pay rate. Any surplus could then be used for the benefit of local HE adult education, perhaps providing support for students with children, or bursaries for refugees who are ineligible for loans, or in other ways members felt to be appropriate. LVC currently has a programme of non-accredited courses designed to address the needs and the interests of a broad range of mature students. They are not intended to challenge existing providers but to give individuals a taste of degree-level study. The first course, a day workshop in ‘Secondary Trauma’, ran in January 2018; the first, long-format course, ‘Learning to Look at Art’, ran in the summer term of 2018. The second year of the non-accredited programme began in autumn 2018 offering courses in counselling, arts and humanities, astronomy and space science. While it has been a challenge to develop, market and administer a teaching programme whilst pursuing validation and institution building, offering these courses has been a positive choice. It allows LVC to find its place in the ecosystem of local adult education provision and to gain experience unshackled by the corporate rules and the restrictive processes of a large institution. The non-accredited programme makes LVC visible as an active institution, helping to build its profile and credibility. The delivery of accredited courses for mature and part-time students is the core ambition of LVC.  As Jon Ashworth, MP for Leicester South noted, securing this upper tier of educational provision is ‘essential to our community and will play an important role in transforming people’s lives’.61 However, obtaining Degree Awarding Powers is a substantial challenge for a fledgling college. The regulatory changes in spring 2018  Egglestone, Corin, Conor Stevens, Emily Jones, and Fiona Aldridge. 2018. Adult Participation in Learning Survey 2017, 50, 54. Department of Education. 61  Ashworth. Sometimes, a Second Chance Is All We Need, 24. 60

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with the establishment of Office for Students were intended to enable the rapid recruitment of new providers to the Higher Education market. However, these have also created a space for alternatives to neoliberal institutions.62 At present, the College is working towards being able to teach degree-level courses from autumn 2019 as part of a federation of HE co-operatives. It aims to start with Certificates in Counselling and with an interdisciplinary degree in art and humanities as these are courses for which there is a known local demand.

 he Co-operative Advantage: Democracy T and Participation The principle of democratic participation by all members is at the heart of LVC. Rather than its path being determined by the managerial class exalted in by the neoliberal University and their preference for buying-­in expertise and imposing top-down solutions, LVC’s focus and development are subject to co-operative, democratic control through an Annual General Meeting of members and the Board of Directors they elect. As a newlyfounded CBS, LVC is currently being managed by a co-opted Board of Directors which consists of the three founder members, ex-students, current and former tutors from the Vaughan Centre, representatives from Leicester City Council’s Adult Skills and Learning Service, adult education experts and those with experience working in business and with knowledge of co-operative HE. A subcommittee is in charge of the day-to-day running of the college and consists of board members and non-board members, including LVC tutors and former Vaughan College students. While the Board of Directors is tasked with many decisions for the College, certain key decisions will be put directly to members including potential partnerships with other academic institutions and significant decisions around programmes, fees, wages and the direction of the College. After the first Annual General Meeting early in 2019, the membership of the Board of Directors will be elected directly by the Society. However, while members may vote to change aspects of the operation and focus of the College, its  Swain, Harriet. 2017. Coming Soon, a University Where Students Could Set Their Own Tuition Fees. Guardian, September 12. 62

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essential nature and purpose is written into the society’s rules, to which those joining the society subscribe. This locating of authority in the underlying rules of the society and the democratic expression of a community of supporters and their representatives contrasts dramatically with current models of leadership in universities. Within the flat pay structure, any head of College will be a colleague fulfilling a specific role who will feel no temptation to ‘think themselves the equivalent of CEOs of large companies, deserving to be paid at “market value”’.63 Similarly, the direction and welfare of the college will not be at the mercy of ambitious individuals building their own managerial careers or trying to generate large financial surpluses to support vanity building projects and high salaries. Instead, within a democratic structure and a collegiate ethos, the experience and expertise of all staff members can be respected and welcomed to strengthen and enhance the College. LVC has the advantage over traditional institutions of starting out with brains rather than bricks and mortar; we are thus focused on the quality of teaching and student support. This sense of mutual endeavour makes the most of the College’s most valuable resource, its people, in contrast to neoliberal and marketised university management which typically buys in external expertise while marketing the expertise of its staff as a saleable commodity. The College will thrive on the contribution of talents not the accumulation of assets: the ethos will be community benefit, not institutional profit. This value accorded to each person and their contribution by the democratic ethos of co-operation offers the prospect of creating a better active learning environment for adult learners, getting away from apparent ­distinctions which can exist between younger students and academic staff in conventional university contexts. The dynamic of co-operation acknowledges the concept of legitimate self-interest and so values a context in which individuals and groups can openly acknowledge and express this. Rather than conflicts of interest being worked out through competition and the exercise of power within a hierarchical structure, there can be a transparent and communal search for resolution. Thus, at LVC both  Graphical Linear Algebra (blog). 2016. Leicester the Battle for Universities. September 17. Accessed 11 January 2019. 63

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staff and students participate in the running and development of the College at all levels and both groups have places on the management board. At present, three former VCLL students serve on the LVC Board of Directors, including a former Students’ Union mature student representative. A former student of VCLL runs our Open Research Forum, which aims to demystify research and is grounded in student-as-producer. The Forum is accessible for anyone with an interest in a democratic research space. LVC is not about bricks and mortar and it does not start with a dedicated building, but it aims to use its practices and culture to create a suitable learning environment for mature students. Its focus is on face-to-face teaching provided in supportive small groups, offering that human contact and personal support which many adult students value. Adult students know that their educational needs are central to the College’s provision and it is expected that this will build their confidence, averting feelings of isolation and disengagement.64 Moreover, in a co-operative structure, students are able to bring prior skills with them which are valuable in the running of the College. The College was not set up to teach co-operative pedagogy but its values and practices already form significant ingredients of adult teaching and learning. LVC will take this further so that Co-operation will be imbued within the College at all levels: not just in the classroom but up to, and including, institutional governance. The co-operative model offers a chance of creating a college which generates the experience of teachers, learners and local community working together to offer HE that is both inclusive and interactive.

Conclusion Although David Vaughan’s original College was not a formal product of the co-operative movement, from its inception it promoted an ethos which the social historian, Siobhan Begley, characterised as ‘fraternal co-­ operation’.65 The objects of LVC acknowledge the cultural connection 64 65

 Butcher, 33.  Begley, S. 2013. The Story of Leicester, 164. Stroud: The History Press.

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between the original foundation by emphasising an intention to ‘continue and expand the Vaughan tradition’.66 The account of the Phoenix in the Aberdeen Bestiary describes how it prepares for immolation by creating a protective casket for its ashes so that nothing important is lost in the cycle of destruction and rebirth.67 The regenerated Phoenix is both essentially and recognisably itself, but also a new creation, re-born and resurrected. This Phoenix emblem expresses the twofold nature of our hopes and aspirations for LVC: the preservation of something deeply good and valuable, and the opportunity for renewal and the emergence of a new form. LVC aims to secure a future for the specialist, accessible, part-time, face-to-face provision of Higher Education to adult learners in Leicester and its region on behalf of the community as a whole and the generation of students yet to come. In contrast to neoliberal university culture, with its distorted priorities and their vitiating impact on adult education provision, students and staff, LVC seeks to make this commitment manifest in a co-operative form whose democratic and not-for-­profit culture offers a pioneering alternative and hope for a ­sustainable future.

 ‘Objects’.  University of Aberdeen, MS 24 (Bestiary, England, c.1200), fol. 56 recto. https://www.abdn. ac.uk/bestiary/ms24/f56r. Accessed 11 January 2019. 66 67

8 The Co-operative Intellect: Journeys in Radical Human Ecology Luke Devlin, Svenja Meyerricks, and Anne Winther

Our contribution to this volume is a sharing of our experience of co-­ operative education in action: specifically, our involvement in Scotland’s Centre for Human Ecology.1 We explore the history of the Centre’s role in Scottish education, seen through our perspective as current directors of the Centre. Critically, we propose the rise of the ‘co-operative intellect’, which we suggest has emerged at the confluence of three main currents: the generalist tradition of the democratic intellect; the Scottish school of human ecology, embedded in soil, soul and society; and the  Henceforth ‘the Centre’: we avoid our conventional use of ‘CHE’ to avoid confusion with ‘Co-operative Higher Education’ in other chapters. 1

L. Devlin (*) Centre for Human Ecology, Pearce Institute, Glasgow, UK Intercultural Research Centre, Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, UK e-mail: [email protected] S. Meyerricks • A. Winther Centre for Human Ecology, Pearce Institute, Glasgow, UK e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s) 2019 M. Noble, C. Ross (eds.), Reclaiming the University for the Public Good, Palgrave Critical University Studies, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-21625-2_8

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‘co-operative turn’ we now emphasize during the Centre’s transition to an education co-operative, which we define as education for, with and as co-operation. We acknowledge our account of the Centre’s history as being necessarily partial and incomplete: many voices could be heard, and fuller accounts of aspects of the Centre’s development have been given elsewhere, as we will indicate. In particular, women leaders of the Centre such as Vérène Nicolas, who made skills for collaboration a central component of the MSc when she facilitated the core modules during the University of Strathclyde years, often contributed to the holding of the space and day-to-day running of the courses but feature less prominently in publications. We are conscious of this omission and see this rendition as part of a conversation rather than a definitive text listing all important individuals and their contributions. Nor do we seek a revisionist tidying-up of the Centre’s complex, conflicted and messy evolution, much of which predates our involvement. Our intention here is simply to move the story forward: to share our vision of how co-operative education can support radical human ecology to flourish anew, while honouring and stewarding the legacy we inherit, and suggesting possible routes forward as we help navigate the Centre into the next phase in its near-50-year-old story. By putting deep collaborative structures at the heart of the Centre’s governance model, we envisage that in present and future endeavours, diverse and plural voices will feature more prominently in its outputs. This chapter presents in itself a piece of collaboration, and a step on this path.

The Centre for Human Ecology: A Brief History In this section, we begin by offering a short history of the various iterations of Centre for Human Ecology (CHE) and conclude with a brief overview of distinctive elements of pedagogy in the Scottish Higher Education system. The Centre was founded at the University of Edinburgh in 1972, originally as the School of the Man-Made Future (a name which foreshadows the current understanding that we now live in the Anthropocene—a geological age in which human activity is the dominant influence on ecological and ­climate

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systems). The leading founder, Conrad Hal Waddington, was a geneticist and systems theorist who took a broad, interdisciplinary and holistic approach to the study of human ecology to foster an understanding of the complex, interconnected ecological and political crises facing society. In his posthumously published Tools for Thought: How to Understand and Apply the Latest Scientific Techniques of Problem Solving,2 Waddington examined the structures and processes of complex systems, and how an understanding of them allows one to challenge what he called COWDUNG: the conventional wisdom of the dominant group. This jibe set the blueprint for the Centre’s ethos of critical campaigning scholarship, with an emphasis on proposing alternatives to materialist paradigms, which promote ecologically devastating capitalist economies. The Centre emerged during the flowering of ecological awareness that coincided with the publication, also in 1972, of the Club of Rome’s Limits to Growth,3 which identified the risks of exceeding planetary carrying capacity through unrestricted economic growth, consumption and population. Waddington was a founding member of the Club of Rome and was involved in commissioning the report. Limits to Growth laid the foundation for the subsequent discourse around sustainable development and was brought to global prominence by the Brundtland Commission in 1987.4 Following Waddington’s death in 1975, director Ulrich Loening and colleagues continued the work of the Centre, establishing the first MSc in Human Ecology in the UK. In the 1990s, Alastair McIntosh arrived as Teaching Director and introduced a distinctive element of transdisciplinary5 pedagogy. McIntosh’s impact, especially with regard to the Celtic bardic techniques and Quaker influences he brought to the Centre, is captured well here:  Waddington, C. H. 1977. Tools for Thought: How to Understand and Apply the Latest Scientific Techniques of Problem Solving. Basic Books: New York. 3  Meadows, D. H., D. L. Meadows, J. Randers, and W. W. Behrens III. 1972. The Limits to Growth, 15–30. New York: Universe Books. 4  World Commission on Environment and Development. 1987. Our Common Future. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 5  We make a distinction between transdisciplinary and interdisciplinary. We hope this distinction is clear to the reader in this chapter. See also Nicolescu, B. The Transdisciplinary Evolution of Learning. Centre International de Recherches et d’Etudes Transdisciplinaires. 2

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The personal, political and, above all, the psychospiritual implications of this holistic approach shifted increasingly from theory into practice with controversial consequences…. The Teaching Director played a leading role… in high-profile campaigns… [which] increased tensions both within the [Centre] and between the latter and its host institution. McIntosh employed Celtic shamanic and bardic techniques in empowerment of his Quaker commitment…. The Centre drew upon Scottish and Celtic spiritual traditions… [and had]… a teaching programme that incorporated aspects of deep ecology and eco-feminism.6

The Centre’s presence within the University of Edinburgh could be seen as something of a pocket of resistance against wider trends in Higher Education towards marketization, managerialism and the synchronization of educational outcomes with the needs of political, military and corporate elites. These developments, as we will explore below, stood in opposition to firmly rooted prior pedagogical traditions in Scottish Higher Education (see the description of the democratic intellect, later in this chapter), which the Centre consciously tried to exemplify. In 1996, the Centre was closed by the University of Edinburgh, due to the radicalism of its agenda, in particular, McIntosh’s work on land reform and critique of science policy, which sought to accord academia with the needs of government and industry. This emphasis was not warmly embraced even by all within the Centre itself. However, an international campaign against the Centre’s closure, with letters of objection signed by most of the leading voices in ecology and sustainability of the era, reflects how well regarded the Centre’s work was during this period. McIntosh has given a fuller treatment of this affair.7 George Monbiot summarized the precarity of this period thus:

 Roberts, R. 2005. Centre for Human Ecology (Edinburgh, Scotland). In The Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature, ed. B. R. Taylor and J. Kaplan, 285–85, 284. Bristol: Thoemmes Continuum. 7  McIntosh, A. 2001. Soil and Soul: People Versus Corporate Power. London: Aurum Press Limited; McIntosh, A. 2012a. The Challenge of Radical Human Ecology to the Academy. In Radical Human Ecology: Intercultural and Indigenous Approaches, ed. L. Williams, R. Roberts, and A. McIntosh, 31–56. Farnham: Ashgate. 6

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The Centre for Human Ecology is now a desperately-underfunded, independent organization, whose members rely on social security, donations, and voluntary work from concerned scientists around the world. They have done the right thing, and it hurts. I am afraid that this is the sort of choice with which many scientists who are prepared to shoulder their responsibilities might have to face. You will not get big money to answer big questions. The big money is reserved for the small questions.8

The University of Edinburgh’s court cited a failure to create a viable future framework as the reason for their decision to close the Centre. A group of staff members, fellows and former students incorporated the Centre as a limited company and registered charity in 1997. The newly independent Centre continued its activities with a series of public lectures and short-term research and educational projects, which have continued to the present. In 1999, the Centre became an accredited institution of the Open University and resumed delivery of the MSc; however, in 2005, the partnership with the Open University ended and the Centre joined the Department of Geography and Sociology at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow. The final cohort entered the MSc programme in 2008, when departmental restructuring and differing academic priorities meant the partnership with Strathclyde ended. This time it was not only human ecology that got this treatment but also our departmental colleagues in sociology, geography and community education. The reason given publicly was the Principal’s aspiration to rebrand Strathclyde as ‘MIT on the Clyde’ by prioritizing science, technology, engineering and maths subjects without critical perspectives. This led to welcome support from colleagues such as Noam Chomsky at the real MIT, who described the decision as ‘very odd’.9 Additional explanation by the new Dean of Humanities and Social Sciences that the department’s scholarship was ‘too critical’ and not ‘mainstream’ enough were countered by Professor David Miller, who remarked that ‘what is the point of an “uncritical sociology” that is unable to conduct rigorous empirical research without fear  Monbiot, George. 1997. Science with Scruples. https://www.monbiot.com/1997/01/01/sciencewith-scruples/. Accessed 30 October 2018. 9  Denholm, A. 2011. Chomsky Jibe Over ‘MIT on Clyde’ Is Welcomed. The Herald, June 4. 8

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or favour and to publish the results? This is—in my view—the only way that human knowledge can progress’.10 A thread common to all incarnations of the Centre is a rootedness in the place, culture and distinct educational tradition of Scotland. Following the Act of Union in 1707, Scotland retained its independent religious, legal and educational institutions and systems. Historically, Scottish Higher Education was based on different pedagogical foundations to south of the border. A generalist approach grounded on creating well-­ rounded citizens, based on Roman and Continental philosophy, contrasted with the English Higher Education tradition of early specialization within one academic discipline, based on Greek philosophy.11 Davie describes the three nineteenth-century official commissions, which investigated the Scottish universities. [The]… dichotomy between a social elite of classical scholars [of Oxford and Cambridge] and a barely educated populace was, Davie argued, utterly alien to the intellectual democracy of Protestant Scotland, where the elite was cultural, not social—a matter of trained minds rather than of privileged status—and the mass of society, even where impoverished and materially powerless, still was expected to engage with the great questions debated each week from the pulpit.12

The Scottish generalist tradition is evident within the school system and Higher Education and has re-emerged within primary and secondary education with the advent of Curriculum for Excellence (CfE). The pedagogy is experiential and topic based, with the aim of creating ‘successful learners, confident individuals, responsible citizens and effective contributors’.13 However, there are difficulties integrating CfE with the single  Haywood, M. 2011. Sociology at Strathclyde Under the Axe Due to ‘Critical’ Stance. http:// myshelehaywood.com/sociology-at-strathclyde-under-the-axe-due-to-critical-stance/. Accessed 5 November 2018. 11  Davie, G. 1961. The Democratic Intellect: Scotland and Her Universities in the Nineteenth Century. 2nd ed. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. 12  Paterson, L. 2015a. George Davie and the Democratic Intellect. In Scottish Philosophy in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, ed. G. Graham, 28. Oxford Scholarship Online, https://doi. org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199560684.003.0010. Accessed 4 March 2019. 13  Education Scotland. What Is Curriculum for Excellence? https://education.gov.scot/scottisheducation-system/policy-for-scottish-education/policy-drivers/cfe-(building-from-the-statement10

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disciplinary demands of the secondary school curriculum and creating a lifelong experiential learning process (thus creating capable and critical citizens).14 Within Higher Education, generally speaking, an undergraduate degree at the four ‘ancient’ Scottish universities of Edinburgh, Glasgow, Dundee and St Andrews takes four years to complete, one year longer than the English undergraduate degree. Within the first two years, students pick three subjects, and only specialize in the last two years of study. English and Scottish Higher Education systems have been further diverging since devolution in 1999: while English policy is based on differentiation and competition, Scottish policy has favoured integration and more egalitarianism, and rejected top-up fees.15 Scotland’s politics and culture are also different from south of the border. McIntosh claims that in Scotland, ‘we stand with a culture that is still capable of handling metaphysics in popular discourse’ and geopoetics (the concern ‘with a relationship to the earth and with the opening of a world’), which contribute to discourses in both land reform and human ecology.16 Scotland remains the most unequal country in terms of land ownership in Europe, with only 969 people owning 60% of the land (i.e. 83.1 per cent of the total rural land).17 There has been a raft of Scottish land reform ­legislation, but as yet has led to little fundamental change in the distribution of power.18 appendix-incl-btc1-5)/What%20is%20Curriculum%20for%20Excellence? Accessed 13 January 2019. 14  Priestley, M. 2018. In Britain’s Battle Over School Curriculum, Celtic Nations Have Got It Right. The Conversation, University of Stirling. https://theconversation.com/in-britains-battleover-school-curriculum-celtic-nations-have-got-it-right-90277. Accessed 2 January 2019; and Priestley, M., and W. Humes. 2010. The Development of Scotland’s Curriculum for Excellence: Amnesia and Déjà Vu. Oxford Review of Education 36: 345–61. 15  Keating, M. 2005. Higher Education in Scotland and England After Devolution. Regional & Federal Studies 15 (4): 423–35. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/13597560500230524 16  McIntosh, 2012a (n7), 34; White, K. 2004. Geopoetics: Place, Culture, World, 243. Glasgow: Alba Editions; McIntosh, A. 2017. Some Contributions of Geopoetics to Modern Scottish Land Consciousness. Expressing the Earth Conference. Scottish Centre for Geopoetics and the University of the Highlands and Islands, Isle of Seil, June 23. http://www.geopoetics.org.uk/some-contributions-of-geopoeticsto-modern-scottish-land-consciousness-alastair-mcintosh/. Accessed 1 November 2018. 17  Wightman, A. 2011. The Poor Had No Lawyers: Who Owns Scotland (And How They Got It). Edinburgh: Birlinn. 18  Scottish Parliament. 2003. Land Reform (Scotland) Act 2003 asp2. Edinburgh: HM Stationery Office; and Scottish Parliament. 2015. Community Empowerment (Scotland) Act 2015 asp6. Edinburgh: HM Stationery Office.

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Unsurprisingly, land reform has been central to the practice of many at the Centre.19 The nineteenth-century clearances, the more recent twentieth-­century cultural ‘ethnocide’ of the Gaelic language (and also Doric and Scots) and the persistent legacy of this dispossession are missed out of most English curricula, even though it is now widely recognized that the decline of the natural environment and of cultural and linguistic diversity are intertwined.20 Although the Centre had the natural world as its focus when it was founded, we attempt with our re-emergence to deepen connections between ecocidal and social crises in our community and in Scotland. As stated in the introduction, since 2010, the Centre has made a home in Govan, an area in the southwest of Glasgow acutely affected by post-­industrial decline that has left visible scars: the old Graving Docks, a symbol of the area’s shipbuilding past, that were closed in 1988 lie abandoned as an unofficial monument to Govan’s industrial past and culture of marine heritage craft. Govan Cross has lost much of its historical hustle and bustle, which has given way to pawn shops and charity shops, dominated by the Jobcentre. Govan is now one of the most deprived areas in Europe with an average male life expectancy of under 67  years.21 A cluster of the Centre’s fellows, directors and former students either work or make their home there—as one of them puts it, is it that the blossoms must once again be sought not in safety, close to the trunk, but blowing in the storm out on that limb? It is too early to say.  McIntosh, 2001 (n7); Roberts, 2005 (n6); and McIntosh, 2012a (n7).  MacKenzie, A. 1946. The History of the Highland Clearances. 2nd ed. Glasgow: Maclaren; and Smout, T. C., and S. Wood. 1991. Scottish Voices 1745–1960. London: Fontana Press; MacInnes, 2006 (MacInnes, J. 2006. Duthchas Nan Gaidheal. Selected Essays of John Macinnes, ed. M. Newton. Edinburgh: Birlinn), cited in MacKinnon, I. 2012. Education for Life: Human Ecology Pedagogy as a Bridge to Indigenous Knowing. In Radical Human Ecology: Intercultural and Indigenous Approaches, ed. L. Williams, R. Roberts, and A. McIntosh, 139–60. Farnham: Ashgate; Riddoch, L. 2014. Blossom: What Scotland Needs to Flourish. Edinburgh: Luath Press Ltd.; UNESCO. 2017. Biodiversity and Linguistic Diversity. Available at http://www.unesco.org/new/en/culture/themes/ endangered-languages/biodiversity-and-linguistic-diversity/. Accessed 3 November 2018. 21  Glasgow Centre for Population Health. 2012. Greater Govan. https://www.understandingglasgow.com/profiles/neighbourhood_profiles/2_south_sector/34_greater_govan. Accessed 3 November 2018. 19 20

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What has happened is that the Board has chosen to relocate the library and our hand-made table  – the symbolic hearth and heart of the CHE  – to Govan.22

The Centre’s library is located in the Pearce Institute, a historical community building built in 1905 and gifted to the people of Govan. The Centre’s library window overlooks reminders of post-industrialism (River Clyde) and Scotland’s spiritual past (Govan Old Church, an ancient pilgrimage site and one of Scotland’s holiest places).23 The community and the local history of this place inform our re-emergence as a co-operative: ‘deepening our sense of seeking to be “communities of practice” that can cultivate such long wave skills as eldership and mentoring. These look like being increasingly necessary if we are to hold fast to working for a transformed world and yet neither sell out nor burn out in the face of multiple discouragements’.24

 he Scottish School of Human Ecology T in Practice Within radical human ecology of the Scottish School as practised at the Centre, the form has been as important as the content of education, with the aim to nurture community-mindedness in teachers and learners alike.25 In the course of its successive incarnations, the Centre has been fostering what we identify as a ‘co-operative intellect’ (Fig. 8.1):  McIntosh, 2012a (n7), 39.  Mayhew Smith, N. 2011. Britain’s Holiest Places. Bristol: Lifestyle Press; and McIntosh, A. 2012b. The ‘Sacredness’ of Natural Sites and Their Recovery: Iona, Harris and Govan in Scotland. In The Diversity of Sacred Lands in Europe: Proceedings of the Third Workshop of the Delos Initiative – Inari/ Aanaar 2010, ed. J.-M. Mallarach, T. Papayannis, and R. Väisänen, 231–43. Gland, Switzerland: IUCN and Vantaa, Finland: Metsähallitus Natural Heritage Services. 24  McIntosh, A. 2012c. Teaching Radical Ecology in the Academy. In Radical Human Ecology: Intercultural and Indigenous Approaches, ed. L. Williams, R. Roberts, and A. McIntosh, 235–57, 252. Farnham: Ashgate. 25  Loening, U. 2012. The Attitude of Human Ecology. In Radical Human Ecology: Intercultural and Indigenous Approaches, ed. L. Williams, R. Roberts, and A. McIntosh, 15–30. Farnham: Ashgate; McIntosh, 2012a (n7); McIntosh, 2012c (n24). 22 23

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Fig. 8.1  The co-operative intellect (After: Geddes in Davie 1961 (n11); Newman 1907 (n41); McIntosh 2008 (n39); Read 2015 (n26); and Barnett 2018 (n37))

that is, the skills for collaboration critical to building community for life-­sustaining cultures and resilience in social and ecological systems. The emergence of a co-operative intellect presents an alternative to the technocratic hyper-specialization intellect emphasized by societies whose aim is to develop exploitable skills for neoliberalism and economic growth.26 In the following three sections, we describe the head, heart and hand triad in relation to the Centre’s approach for, as and with co-operation.

Head: Education for Co-operation Human ecology has been described as subversive and political thinking that needs to be applied to how, where and whether humans live on Earth—an attitude vital to stimulate imaginative solutions to fit human  Read. 2015. The Politics of Transindividuality. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill.

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activities into nature’s patterns.27 The experiential and interdisciplinary nature of the subject began with the storytellers within traditional cultures, before developing comprehensive approaches to human–­ environment interactions.28 During the past three decades, the description and practice of human ecology has been multi-faceted, reflecting the diversity in views and voices. There has been an ongoing tension between positivist (physical realities of environmental destruction and ecological limits) and metaphysical (liberation theology, geopoetics, indigenous land rights and cultural ethnocide) approaches.29 The idea of the co-operative intellect builds on the idea of the democratic intellect of the Scottish tradition and co-operative pedagogy. The democratic intellect as defined by Elliot in 1932: it is a heritage wherein discipline is rigidly and ruthlessly enforced, but where criticism and attack are unflinching, continuous, and salt with a bitter and jealous humour. It is a heritage wherein intellect, speech and, above all, argument are the passports to the highest eminence in the land.30

In the democratic intellect, philosophy is the basis for dialogue, abstract reasoning is favoured over knowledge acquisition and a holistic interdisciplinary perspective is sought. This approach is especially ­relevant to co-operative education, because, as already mentioned, the purpose of the tradition is to foster critical debates, developing collective wisdom rather than social status, and engage everyone, the whole of society, regardless of circumstance.31

 Loening, 2012 (n25).  Borden, R. J., and R. Carson. 2012. Foreword. In Radical Human Ecology, ed. L. Williams, R. Roberts, and A. McIntosh, xv–vi, xv. Farnham, Ashgate. 29  Roberts, 2005 (n6); McIntosh, 2012a (n7); MacKinnon, I. 2012. Education for Life: Human Ecology Pedagogy as a Bridge to Indigenous Knowing. In Radical Human Ecology: Intercultural and Indigenous Approaches, ed. L. Williams, R. Roberts, and A. McIntosh, 139–60. Farnham: Ashgate. 30  Elliot, 1932, 64, cited in Paterson, L. 2015b. Democracy or Intellect? The Scottish Educational Dilemma of the Twentieth Century. In The Edinburgh History of Education in Scotland, ed. R. Anderson, M. Freeman, and L. Paterson, 226–45, 226. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. 31  Paterson, 2015a (n12); and Paterson, 2015b (n30). 27 28

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Similarly, the co-operative movement in the early twentieth century ‘was alive with intellectual vigour and it reached out through a variety of educational channels to a large cross section of the British public’.32 Although this pedagogy is not directly replicable today, the twenty-first-­ century pedagogy still needs to recreate this vigour and inclusiveness. To achieve these aspirations, MacPherson highlights the importance of holistic and interdisciplinary pedagogy and reflective analysis of the successes of the past for informing the practices of today.33 The idea of the co-operative intellect is also rooted in the ontology and epistemology of the work of Patrick Geddes, who was instrumental in developing the Scottish Generalist Tradition and took a philosophical approach to science teaching.34 He identified the tripartite of ‘head’ (cognitive, reason, logic); ‘heart’ (feelings, intuitions, empathy, compassion); and ‘hand’ (activism), and coined the phrase ‘act local, think global’.35 The tripartite, head, heart and hand, underpins the philosophy of the Centre for Human Ecology and was at the core of the curriculum of the Human Ecology MSc course, which, beyond reading lists and essays, included first-person inquiries, group dynamic processes, field trips, immersive experiences in ecopsychology and creative assignments. With a focus on creating a self-reflective community of learners and rounded, compassionate individuals, the Centre breaks away from neoliberal ‘banking’ models of education.36 At the Centre, we have used these transdisciplinary lenses, our ecological values (which form our very ethos) and our history to inform our new co-operative pedagogy as to (1) how we educate for enacting social and environmental justice and (2) how we educate from a whole-world perspective and for the well-being of the whole world.37 Recognizing that  MacPherson, I. 2007. One Path to Co-operative Studies: A Selection of Papers and Presentations, 374. Victoria, Canada: British Columbia Institute for Co-operative Studies. 33  Ibid. 34  Davie, 1961 (n11). 35  Cited in McIntosh, 2012a (n7), 34, 38. 36  Freire, P. 2000. Pedagogy of the Oppressed. New York: Continuum; Neary, M., G. Saunders, A. Hagyard, and D. Derricott. 2014. Student as Producer: Research-Engaged Teaching, an Institutional Strategy. The Higher Education Academy. 37  Barnett, R. 2018. The Ecological University: A Feasible Utopia. London: Routledge. 32

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co-operation is central to this pedagogy, we integrate the Centre’s pedagogy within its new organizational structure that has evolved concurrently, as the co-operative intellect (Fig. 8.1). The co-operative intellect, then, can be understood as an enactment, fulfilment and recapitulation of many ideas, converging in a new approach with its own distinctive character: from the Scottish generalist tradition and the democratic intellect to ecological and co-operative principles.38 The co-operative intellect may create a ‘cycle of belonging’ which ties community and nature to place through grounding, identity, values and responsibility.39 However, the co-operative intellect is not necessarily tied up with place, as it can be found in communities of interests or communities of practice as in a group of people learning together. We note that the tripartite of the co-operative intellect also aligns with Theory U’s ‘open mind, open heart and open will’.40 The final purpose of co-­operative education, then, is the completion of the human person: the integral development of an individual’s capability and flourishing in their community.41 We unpack this in the following sections when discussing the heart and hand elements of the co-operative intellect.

Heart: Education as Co-operation Our consideration of the co-operative intellect now moves to heart— education for co-operation: the enactment and embodiment of co-­ operative values as practised by the Centre’s pedagogical approach. As we have seen, the Centre’s distinctive approach emerged from a synthesis between the ecological and biological systems thinking of the early founders, and the ‘transformative turn’ introduced by McIntosh and others, which integrated spiritual activism and an advocacy of indigenous  Ibid.; and MacPherson, 2007 (n32).  McIntosh, A. 2008. Rekindling Community: Connecting People, Environment and Spirituality, Schumacher Briefing No. 15, Green Books. 40  Scharmer, C. O. 2009. Theory U: Leading from the Future as It Emerges. Oakland, CA: BerrettKoehler; and see Winther et al. in this book. 41  Newman, J.-H. 1907. The Idea of a University. London: Longmans. http://www.newmanreader. org/works/idea/. Accessed 5 November 2018. 38 39

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e­ pistemologies and participatory inquiry.42 This resulted in the development of a distinctive approach to pedagogy as the development of learning community: one in which learners simultaneously grow in wisdom and useful knowledge, and live out that learning in becoming, in a paraphrase of Iain Crichton Smith, ‘real people in real places’.43 In this section, we explore ways in which this type of pedagogy can contribute to the emergent co-­operative intellect, and the ongoing formation of individuals within the co-operative movement and beyond. We draw on McIntosh’s account of his tenure as teaching director, along with our own experiences and observations as both students and, subsequently, directors of the Centre.44 For our current purposes, we here divide the Centre’s history into three phases: Phase I, the initial era at the University of Edinburgh (1972–1996); Phase II, the externally accredited era with the Open University and the University of Strathclyde (2000–2011); and Phase III (2011–present), the current independent era of the co-operative intellect. McIntosh’s treatment of phases I and II, which is freely available on his website, is the strongest overview of the Centre’s transformative approach to teaching human ecology and we recommend it for those interested in further exploring what we briefly lay out there.45 Broadly speaking, the pedagogy is one that nurtures and supports students in the learning process of discovering the essence of what it can mean to be fully human.46 MSc students started with a co-learning process of building community through sharing meals around the Centre’s symbolic heart and hearth— our large table, hand-built by students under the direction of the late land-reform activist Tom Forsyth. This table, on which we wrote this chapter, is encoded with symbolism which helps tell the story of the Centre. The main construction is in elm, one of the main indigenous Scottish trees. One leg is Sitka spruce from Tom’s croft, symbolizing the place of the outsider in the community, because Sitka is an ‘invasive’ or  McIntosh, A., and M. Carmichael. 2015. Spiritual Activism: Leadership as Service. Totnes: Green Books. 43  Crichton Smith, I. 1986. Towards the Human. Loanhead, Midlothian: Macdonald Publishers. 44  McIntosh, 2012c (n24). 45  Ibid. 46  Crichton Smith, 1986 (n43); McIntosh, 2012a (n7). 42

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alien species. The central inlaid logo of the Centre is in bog oak from near Faslane nuclear base and would probably carbon date at about 5000 years. This represents an ancient connection with Celtic understandings of oak as the tree that bears the golden bough of mistletoe, the ‘lightning tree’, a symbol of strength and perseverance. It was also the tree from whose acorns scholar’s ink was made. Assembled around this table, each cohort of students would commence a learning journey, beginning with an introductory week getting to know each other and demarcating the expectations and boundaries of the group process. This was followed by the teaching in earnest: two semesters of core and elective modules that investigated human ecology from transdisciplinary directions, including a firm quantitative understanding in the PRED (population, resources, environment and development) approach to the field. Alongside this essential grounding in the materialist paradigm, students explored the qualitative knowledge domains: the philosophical and psychospiritual aspects of the human condition. Undergirding all this was a conscious holding of process: interpersonal and group dynamics, peer-to-peer support, encountering different methodologies, and mutual aid. This was furthered in a residential field trip or study tour to a community of place, where human ecology can be explored in microcosm. To complete the MSc, students had to undertake a Master’s thesis on a topic of their choice, although it was also possible to do the modules without thesis as continuing adult education. As former students, we can attest to the power of this way of teaching and learning. The combination of quantitative, qualitative and process-­ based learning (which, not coincidentally, maps well to our head, heart and hand rubric) led to a way of being in the world, and gave us a set of tools for thought which equipped us well for going forth again into the world with renewed agency: The vigour of this epistemological depth charge is all the greater when dropped from out of a socially stratified world stuck within its own like-­ minded bubbles. Some students will not previously have had meaningful contexts from which to explore the bubble of their upbringing and alternate takes on reality.47 47

 McIntosh, 2012c (n24), 235–36.

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Since the cessation of teaching in 2011, the Centre has been holding workshops or ‘roundtables’. For smaller workshops, these are also physically held around the Centre’s table, to recreate the co-operative atmosphere and learning environment of the MSc programme. In 2017, a larger project, Unbrexable: connections and caring in European Scotland, was conceived as an empathetic response to the unfolding uncertainty post the June 2016 Brexit referendum. Its focus on the ‘heart’ meant that its aim was for co-operation. It brought together people from continental Europe, who were experiencing a multitude of emotions relating to the precarity and uncertainty of their ongoing residency and employment in Britain and gave them an opportunity to share their feelings. We identified common values, heard disappointing stories from witnesses of the unfolding xenophobia in British immigration policies and shared our anxieties. We recognized our impotency and inability to move to action (the ‘hand’), but we succeeded in making connections and supporting each other.48

Hand: Education with Co-operation A crucial part of the Centre’s re-emergence as an independent education institution has been to nurture roots in community, which has been the engaged or ‘hand’ aspect of the Centre’s educational activity. Communities of interest and communities of place are two different types of descriptive communities49 or ‘cycles of belonging’50 the Centre aims to grow and nurture. The community of interest comprises visiting scholars and ­practitioners in human ecology and related fields. The community of place is made up by the people of Greater Govan, where the Centre has been running education events since 2011, developing and offering  Centre for Human Ecology. 2018. We are Unbrexable! Report of the ‘Unbrexable – Connections & Caring in European Scotland’ Conference, 2 September 2017, Pearce Institute, Glasgow. Centre for Human Ecology. 49  Banks, S., 2003. The Concept of ‘Community Practice’. In Managing Community Practice: Principles, Policies, and Programmes, ed. S. Banks, H. Butcher, P. Henderson, and J. Robertson. Bristol, UK: Policy Press. 50  McIntosh, 2008 (n39). 48

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t­ ransformative, convivial and popular education in partnership with visiting educators and with local organizations. This has resulted in a lively network of ‘regulars’ who attend these events, publicized on social media and on our network email list, which constitute an informal learning community. In the next section, we outline the Govan Folk University (GFU) that demonstrates the Centre’s commitment to our local community. We then discuss the Centre’s modus operandi of inviting scholars and practitioners of a high calibre to the area. These two aspects of the Centre’s way of working exemplify collaboration within the local community and with a community of interest, respectively.

Govan Folk University The Centre has been part of the emergence of the GFU, a partnership of educational, arts, religious, community and social enterprise organizations which began in 2011. The make-up of GFU changed over the years as it was essentially a loose network with a shared idea, rather than a constituted umbrella organization. The shared aim was to recognize and strengthen Govan as a place of learning, with an aspiration to …reclaim the meaning of education in ways that deepen the many forms that it can take in the community. This includes honouring our cultural values and sharing skills that are born of experience and rooted in a sense of people, place and purpose—to serve all that gives life in Govan and the wider community.51

The premises of GFU were informed by ideas around ‘unschooling’ as developed by Ivan Illich, built on the premise that ‘most learning happens casually, and even most intentional learning is not the result of programmed instruction’.52 The focus of GFU was to broaden the conception of education to encompass a variety of forms of community and co-­ operative learning beyond events normally classified as education, also  Govan Folk University. http://govanfolkuniversity.org/index.php/about/. Accessed 26 February 2019. 52  Illich, I. 1970. Deschooling Society, 12. New York: Boyars. 51

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including informal learning in everyday encounters, films, roundtable discussions, arts and crafts. Inspiration for this was derived from the Scandinavian folkehøgskole (folk school) concept of experiential learning within the context of community. The Centre’s contribution to GFU primarily consists of educational events that are often horizontal and participatory in style. For example, the Centre’s Roundtables are seminar-style events at which guests present on a topic related to human ecology, followed by a discussion between all participants. The Roundtables take place in the Centre’s library, around the table described earlier. Only around 12 people fit comfortably around the table, which was thought to be the maximum number of people for having a meaningful conversation. Roundtables were conceptualized as opening up a space for in-depth sharing, rather than merely ‘discussing’ a seminar topic. Roundtables can be stand-alone or part of a series that was conceived to contribute to current affairs. For example, in 2014, a series included conversations around: cultural renewal towards community health and resilience; a theology of climate change; and relationships with the land and ownership. All of these fed into broader conversations had in Scotland ahead of the independence referendum. The Centre and GFU are deeply involved in a range of other initiatives. ‘Govan Together’ was a Scottish government–funded partnership project between five community organizations who were involved in GFU in 2012. The project delivered community conversations and shared meals in the Pearce Institute as a central community hub, attended by a cross-section of Govanites. These events combined education and conviviality with addressing domestic food insecurity, increased by Westminster welfare reform and austerity and conversations about local priorities and how to collectively address them, thereby bringing Govanites together in the process to shape the future of their community—reflecting the values that ‘nothing about us without us is for us’. The community meals have since changed location several times, but after the funded project was concluded, the meals have been held by a succession of volunteers and funded organizations up to this day, in 2018. Since the kind of work undertaken by community organizations differs significantly from an academic environment, the Centre’s co-­operative style in Govan was evident in the openness towards an expanded array of

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education methods, which included the arts. For example, GFU’s ‘Puppets in Partnership’ festival in 2013, of which the late local Church of Scotland minister for Govan, Moyna McGlynn was a passionate leader, hosted a varied programme for children and adults in different community venues across Govan, including internationally acclaimed puppet theatre performances in the historical Govan Old church and plays in local schools performed by pupils. Building on the long heritage of puppetry as a means to address and comment on political and cultural issues, many of Puppets in Partnership shows addressed environmental or social topics (e.g. ‘The Man Who Planted Trees’). Using a medium such as puppetry meant that the GFU network was reaching out to a wider cross-section of the community than it otherwise would have done. In 2018, the partnership project ‘Weans, Work & Wisdom’ between CHE and two other community organizations, Galgael and Plantation Productions, built on previous community consultations to take forward four theme strands of community development in the Greater Govan area, using action research methods: local power and grassroots democracy, community media, co-operative childcare and community-based education. CHE developed the latter theme strand and with it plans to further GFU with the ultimate aim to establish Govan as a place of learning, marking and weaving together initiatives and places where informal and formal learning of practical and theoretical skills take place.

Education Through Collaboration To deliver a diverse range of educational events, the Centre frequently collaborates with visiting scholars and practitioners such as academics, authors, journalists, artists and others. Contributors are generally well regarded in their field, and their work relates to human ecology, is transdisciplinary and combines theory and practice. Popular events in recent years have included, for example, evening or day-time seminars with leading thinkers George Monbiot, Charles Eisenstein, Jay Griffiths, Lesley Riddoch, Tim Ingold, Michael Albert, Sara Kindon and David Abram. Contributors have stated that they value the community platform in GFU venues such as the Pearce Institute or the Galgael Trust

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which attracts different and more diverse audiences than, for example, academic venues. Speakers often will not ask for a fee, accepting donations or expenses only. Feedback from participants suggests that participants in the Centre’s events came from Glasgow and the surrounding area and either had a particular interest in the field, were familiar with the presenter’s work or were regular event attendees. Radical human ecology traces roots of belonging to place while remaining inclusive towards the roots and cultures of migrants.53 The Centre therefore advocates a culture of hospitality and solidarity with migrants in  local communities, for example, in the aforementioned conference ‘Unbrexable’. In events hosted by the Centre, roots of belonging are explored in a Scottish context and elsewhere, by hosting visiting indigenous community leaders to share their approaches around inclusive self-­ determination. For example, in spring 2018, the Centre collaborated with LifeMosaic, an organization that works with indigenous communities on self-determination. LifeMosaic had invited Colombian Misak leaders Jeremias Tunubalá Ullune and Liliana Pechene Muelas to work with communities in Scotland—primarily rural communities who have achieved (or are in the process of achieving) land reform to collectively own their land on the Isles of Eigg, Mull and Skye. The Centre and Life Mosaic co-hosted a residential training for community activists from all over Scotland on the Isle of Bute, where Jeremias and Liliana shared their Plan de Vida (Life Plan) approach for community self-determination in a three-day-long residential workshop. Workshop participants worked on a variety of issues such as co-operative housing, community charters and anti-fracking activism or nature connection with children. The residential took the group on a learning journey which focused primarily on a step-by-step approach to developing a life plan by accessing and building on collective memories in a community context. The Centre subsidized the residential to enable community activists on a low income to participate, and Luke and Svenja delivered a workshop on place and place-­ making grounded in the place within which we found ourselves (Bute) and relating to the different backgrounds of the participants of the residential.  McIntosh, 2012a (n7); and McIntosh, 2012b (n23).

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The Centre’s modus operandi has been to invite and collaborate with scholars and practitioners, who exemplify a radical human ecological and co-operative attitude. These collaborations have become an important aspect of how the Centre operates in a community context, as it builds on the Centre’s history and reputation to bring important discourses to, and share valuable practices in, the local community. This approach has made important and impactful work available to a wider audience by removing potential barriers for attendance through a strict pay-what-you-can approach and by choosing community locations that are easily accessible to people from a variety of backgrounds and create a convivial atmosphere for public discussions. Additionally, these talks are filmed and uploaded to our website and shared via social media and email for those who cannot be there in person. Feedback given by contributors and participants suggests that this strategy is successful.

Proposals for the Future In the Centre’s education for, with and as co-operation, a richness of methods and material from the Strathclyde and Edinburgh years can be drawn from to inform the tripartite of head, heart and hand aspects of an emerging co-operative intellect. The reflective and creative aspects of a human ecology curriculum also reflect that times have changed: the big socioeconomic and ecological challenges are well known and no longer seriously questioned within the scientific (and wider) community, as was the case during the early years of the Centre. Instead, the big questions are how we can address these issues in ways that include profound personal, collective and cultural shifts. During Phase III to date, the emphasis on integrating the tripartite remained the same, but the emphasis was shifted towards a community context in which the ‘hand’ aspect was prioritized. The aim of the Centre to co-create a learning network across Govan was exemplified through the GFU process. However, what the Centre has been lacking during this phase is a strong continuity in its community of learners. During Phase II of delivering the MSc in Human Ecology, the Centre had moved towards emphasizing a community of learners as an integral part of the

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educational process.54 Residential trainings create a temporary community of learners, but there needs to be more of a robust community of teachers, researchers, students and administrators with the resources to sustain the labour and investment required for our ambitious aspirations. As this is an important aspect of co-operative education, we (the authors) hope that, by formally transitioning to a co-operative and running accredited and longer courses, a strong community of learners will emerge, and that the Centre will intensify our partnership work with local community organizations and strengthen the community of place. Building enthusiasm and interest in the co-operative model, clearly communicating and promoting it, and engaging people with it are essential priorities (Fig. 8.2). The Centre has adopted a co-operative governance structure. At the same time, the Centre has become a founding member of the Co-operative University and is a part of the Working Group, which is transitioning to the Interim Academic Board, whose pedagogy is described elsewhere in this book. The co-operative intellect, defined here, highlights the affinity between the Scottish tradition of human ecology and co-operative values (and co-operative Higher Education aspirations) of colleagues outside Scotland. As well as running popular modules such as ecopsychology, sustainable food systems and action research, we hope to deliver courses in transformational leadership, personal development, community development, sustainable food systems, degrowth and well-being economics. We are open to proposals by members for course offerings, consultancy, research projects or other activity that they may want to offer via an education co-operative. We see a role for the Centre in building narratives for inclusive community building and a new economic paradigm, working with local groups in Glasgow and further afield in Scotland, the UK and globally to counteract damaging effects of dominant neoliberal ideology, and provide theoretical and practical support for viable alternative systems, including co-operation. We recognize that for students and learners to be co-producers of knowledge and learning, the Centre needs to facilitate the (inter)personal development of students—building curiosity (head),  McIntosh, 2012c (n24).

54

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Fig. 8.2  Building capacity for co-operative education: Collectively taking the first steps of transition February 2019

compassion (heart), courage (hand) and co-operation (community). We see the transdisciplinary implementation of the co-operative intellect as part of building the capacity for individual and societal transformation. As the Centre for Human Ecology works towards its 50th anniversary in 2022, it has renewed clarity of purpose, energy and intention to contribute to the co-operative education advanced in this volume. Drawing on the taproot of our pedagogical traditions and values, the Centre now opens its doors to potential learners, teachers and members. We have demonstrated the resilience, capability and commitment required to have weathered various storms within managerialist neoliberal Higher Education: together with our co-operative education colleagues, we aim to co-create the kind of wisdom-culture necessary to ensure a life-­ giving future.

9 The Co-operative as Site of Pedagogy: The Example of Edinburgh Student Housing Co-operative Pablo Perez Ruiz and Mike Shaw

Critical university studies in the UK have a tendency to focus on marketization, the constraints and distortions of the Teaching and Research Excellence Frameworks (REF and TEF) and issues to do with precarity, debt, working conditions, new managerialism and governance.1 Yet for An earlier version of part of this chapter appeared as a blog entry. Credit is also given to Dr. Teresa Macias for her help drafting the chapter.  It is tempting to suggest, particularly for the most scholarly works, that a critique focusing on characteristics of New Public Management (NPM) and managerialism maps on to existing critiques. On NPM, see discussion in the first chapter of this volume. As examples of this focus, see: Watts, R. 2017. Public Universities, Managerialism and the Value of Higher Education. Cham: Palgrave; Smyth, J. 2017. The Toxic University: Zombie Leadership, Academic Rock Stars and Neoliberal Ideology. Cham: Palgrave; Thomas, R. 2018. Questioning the Assessment of Research Impact: Ilusions, Myths and Marginal Sectors. Cham: Palgrave; Gupta, S., J. Habjan, H. Tutek, eds. 2016. Academic Labour, Unemployment and Global Higher Education Neoliberal Policies of Funding and Management; On debt and student finance, McGettigan, A. 2013. The Great University Gamble: Money, Markets and the Future of Higher Education. London: Pluto Books. It is to be hoped that students will feature more prominently; in any case, student voices have been much less prominent in this field than they ought to be. As examples of mass-market titles, see Collini, S. 2017. Speaking of Universities. London: Verso; Murphy, S. 2017. Zombie University. London: Repeater. 1

P. Perez Ruiz (*) • M. Shaw Students for Co-operation, Edinburgh, Scotland © The Author(s) 2019 M. Noble, C. Ross (eds.), Reclaiming the University for the Public Good, Palgrave Critical University Studies, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-21625-2_9

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many university students, it is an increasing inability to meet their cost of living through student loan finance that has become the dominant narrative. A recent survey of over 3000 students found that 38 per cent of respondents had been unable to eat healthy and nutritious food because of a lack of money or other resources, and a quarter said they had been hungry but did not eat for similar reasons.2 In the same report, 43 per cent of respondents had turned off their heating despite being cold due to anxieties about energy costs.3 The cost of library fines, transport, launderettes and general campus commitments is increasing year on year, proving a burden for many students.4 For those students forced to work in low-paid, casual jobs, or who come from severely disadvantaged backgrounds, the barriers and structural inequalities are well known.5 However, the imbalance in the university ecosystem caused by neoliberalism is felt particularly acutely within student housing. Whereas universities once offered accommodation in halls of residence at affordable prices, privatization means that it is becoming unusual to find university accommodation at anything less than market rates.6 Lured by the lucrative returns of high-density housing, private provision has filled the gap and charges high prices accordingly. For students living in purpose-built student accommodation, or halls of residence, rents have risen on average by 5 per cent per year for the past decade. In the private rented sector, rents have increased on average around 1.5 per cent year on year.7 Although the cost of rent fluctuates wildly across the UK, the UK national average for students is £130.59 per week with the average

 NUS. 2018. Class Dismissed: Getting in and Getting on in Further and Higher Education, 45. London: NUS Poverty Commission. 3  Ibid. 4  Trednence Research UK. 2018. Living and Lifestyle: The Student Perspective: Research Commissioned and Led by the Students’ Union Research Group, 3. Unknown: Trendence Research UK. 5  See Raffo, C., et al. 2014. Adult and Tertiary Education and Poverty—A Review. Joseph Rowntree Foundation; and NUS. 2018. Class Dismissed: Getting in and Getting on in Further and Higher Education, 42. London: NUS Poverty Commission. 6  NUS. 2018. Class Dismissed: Getting in and Getting on in Further and Higher Education, 42, 45. London: NUS Poverty Commission. See https://www.nusconnect.org.uk/resources/ class-dismissed-getting-in-and-getting-on-in-further-and-higher-education 7  Ibid., 42. 2

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­ aintenance loan payment coming in at just £138.85 per week.8 What is m more, 44 per cent of students struggle to keep up with the rent, 45 per cent say the cost of accommodation impacts their mental health and 31 per cent find their studies are affected too.9 This is little short of a crisis, given overworked students studying and working full-time, or with substantial caring responsibilities.10 One possible solution to this student housing crisis (and for the housing crisis more widely) is the co-operative model, or student housing co-­ operatives (SHCs). The discussion in this volume on Co-operative Higher Education (CHE) has been framed in terms of alternatives to the higher education institution and its practice yet co-operative student housing is part of that alternative. SHCs not only constitute a valuable element of a broader CHE ecosystem which offers a reproducible, sustainable, alternative model, but it also complements CHE by providing education for students. The education students acquire in being part of a co-operative equips them with the skills they need to participate fully in the management and design of their own education in a co-operative university, but also with the broader skills for citizenship and work in the post-­ capitalist economy. This chapter tells the story of one co-operative, the Edinburgh Student Housing Co-op (ESHC), through the narratives of founder members. ESHC is a success, the rent is currently £320 per calendar month, some way below commercial rents in the centre of the city, and there is a long waiting list for membership. However, the chapter describes not only the journey of the co-operative as it was conceptualized, established and organized, but also how the co-operative in itself functions as a site of pedagogy. Thus, through the story of the lived experiences of the authors, we are able to follow both the setting up of the co-operative and its

 See https://www.savethestudent.org/accommodation/national-student-accommodation-survey2018.html 9   Butler, J. 2018. National Student Accommodation Survey 2018—Results, https://www. savethestudent.org/accommodation/national-student-accommodation-survey-2018.html 10  https://www.theguardian.com/education/2015/jan/15/students-demand-end-to-rents-thatswallow-up-95-of-their-loans 8

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­ edagogic meaning as a space of learning.11 In this sense, the chapter p describes both the advantage of living in a student housing co-operative and the rich and authentic learning that takes place by being an active and engaged member. Despite a long and successful history across North America and in parts of Europe, co-operative student housing has never developed any sort of critical mass in the UK.12 Non-student housing co-operatives do have a traceable history. The first housing co-operatives started in Germany in the 1890s and in the UK, in 1901, with the Ealing Tenants Co-partnership, an early experiment in ethical investment. Brentham Garden Suburb in Ealing followed in 1904, pre-dating the Garden City and tenant co-partnership movements such as in Hampstead, Welwyn and Letchworth.13 In Brentham: For a minimum shareholding of £50, payable in instalments, the Ealing society provided housing in the same pattern book terraces as private landlords. Similar to current co-operatives, tenants were joint owners so that they would have pride in ownership and an incentive to keep their home in good order as their efforts were directly linked to the rent levels and the dividend they received on their shares.14

The most successful co-operatives address a clear social need and these, constructed for workers, were no exception. Other co-operatives have also prospered, for example, in 1927, the East River Housing Co-op in New York was set up by the Garment Workers’ Union to house its sweated worker members. Following Rochdale principles of one person one vote, the co-operative currently has 4500 apartments in 12 buildings.15 North  See Middleton, A. 2018. Reimagining Spaces for Learning in Higher Education. London: Palgrave Macmillan; MacPherson, I. 2003. Encouraging Associative Intelligence, Co-operative Learning and Responsible Citizenship in the 21st Century. Manchester: Co-op College Working Paper 1; and MacPherson, I. 2011. Community, Individuality and Co-operation: The Centrality of Values. In The Hidden Alternative, Co-operative Values, Past, Present and Future, ed. Webster, A., et al. Manchester: MUP. 12  http://www.learningcentre.coop/resource/student-housing-co-ops-north-america 13  Birchall, J. 1995. Co-partnership and the Garden City Movement. Planning Perspectives 10 (4): 329. 14  Birchall, ibid., 17. 15  http://coopvillage.coop/eastRiver/ 11

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American Students of Cooperation is also strongly focused on student housing co-operatives.16 A small number of housing co-operatives for students and young people were started in the UK in the 1970s and the UK National Union of Students, which has a long-term commitment to co-operatives, experimented unsuccessfully with student housing initiatives more recently.17 However, in the last decade, student and worker co-operatives, supported by the organization Students for Co-operation and others, have been increasingly active as part of a broad, grass-roots campaign for affordable housing and stronger tenants’ rights.18 Current legal and financial structures are inhospitable for co-operatives in the UK, whilst most members of the public do not really know what a co-operative is. However, SHCs in Birmingham, Edinburgh and Sheffield have now been successfully established and others will follow shortly.19 To further explore ‘growing’ the co-operative student housing model, Students for Co-operation commissioned a report which assessed the key problems facing the creation of new SHCs including limited access to finance; co-operative knowledge and business deficit of new co-operators, and high turnover of membership with the associated problems of continuity.20 The resulting report which consulted with existing student co-operatives, prospective co-­ operative groups, housing co-operative support organizations and potential lending institutions proposed the creation of a new body—Student Co-operative Homes (SCH)—a secondary co-operative consisting of SHCs. SCH has pledged to increase the national capacity of SHCs from 150 to 10,000 beds within the next five years.21  See https://www.nasco.coop/  Urbed. 2004. A Co-operative Future for Student Housing. Manchester: Urbed. See http://urbed. coop/projects/cooperative-future-student-housing 18  Students for Co-operation is a national body created to help develop and support student cooperatives across the UK. It was founded in 2013. See https://www.students.coop/about-us/ 19  The first was in Birmingham in 2014 and see http://www.students.coop/our-network/birmingham-student-housing-co-operative/; http://sshc.sheffield.coop 20  Acorn. 2016. Feasibility Study for a National Body of Student Housing Co-ops, see http://www. acorncoopsupport.org.uk/Feasibility_Study_for_a_National_Body_of_Student_Housing_ Co-ops.pdf 21  This national body will also access finance to purchase property freeholds, have equity from existing co-operatives and support from experienced co-operators sitting on its board of directors. It will support a generation of student co-operators by providing a long-lasting infrastructure for students 16 17

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As students and founders, we had various levels of interest in, and commitment to, the co-operative model through politics, ideas, values and membership of Students for Co-operation. Co-operatives are not charities; they are about self-help—empowering people to take control over their lives, communities and the economy. To that end, they must be democratically organized and led by their members.22 All tenants of housing co-operative are members and therefore should be thoroughly invested in its success. It quickly became clear, however, that securing sufficient financial investment for housing co-operative—an untested venture—would be challenging. The Rector of the University of Edinburgh had committed to making student accommodation a priority for his term in office so together we developed a strategy. The initial stage was simple. We had to demonstrate demand to prove our co-operative model and proposal was viable. To do this, we ran an all-student referendum at the University of Edinburgh, mandating the students’ union, EUSA, to work with the City Council and interested students to establish a student-owned housing co-operative project. We spoke to thousands of our peers throughout the campaign.23 In response, hundreds of students described how they had struggled to pay rent and how they or their friends had been exploited by Edinburgh’s property market. At the same time, there was significant support for the idea of a housing co-operative. The consensus was clear: the world of student housing was about to be turned upside down in Edinburgh at least and the experiment could begin. Over 92 per cent of respondents voted in favour of the proposal. We began a series of meetings with experienced organizers within the co-operative movement24 and with the City Council’s Housing Leader who instructed his team to hunt through council portfolios for potential properties. This stage was a long, drawn-out process as sometimes involved in social change and community projects. See https://www.uk.coop/students/ about-student-co-op-homes 22  https://www.students.coop/resources/what-is-a-co-op/ 23  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zGESEKr2U4g 24  Interco-operation and start-up support was vital to the ESHC support was from the Co-operative Enterprise Hub, Co-operative Business Consultants, Radical Roots, the Phone Co-op, Co-operative Education Trust Scotland and Birmingham Co-operative.

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­ romising leads failed to materialize, properties were few and far between p and finance was non-existent. Eventually Edinburgh’s largest housing association, Castle Rock Edinvar (CRE), approached the City Council regarding a property they owned. The Council encouraged CRE to consider us as a serious contender for taking on the property as a co-operative. Wright’s Houses contain 24 flats, a total of 106 bedrooms, split across two buildings with the Golf Tavern sandwiched in the middle. The buildings were constructed by CRE in 1994 and leased to Napier University for 20 years. With the lease coming to an end, Napier had decided to move to new halls leaving CRE with a couple of soon-to-be-empty buildings that they needed to fill. CRE instantly bought into the idea and used their staff’s expertise and experience to advise us. From our first meeting with CRE, it was clear to us that the project was financially viable if we could lease the building from them at a market rate, whilst leaving the option to buy open in future years once we had financially proven ourselves as a viable project to potential investors. Not only were we able to convince CRE to have confidence in us, we were also able to negotiate the lease to be paid retrospectively at the end of each quarter. This simple agreement allowed us to collect the first few months’ rent before paying the first lease payment, massively decreasing the amount of start-up capital we needed in these crucial early days. Cash-flow was managed carefully. Our standard terms for costs such as legal fees, insurance, building surveyors and stamp duty were issued as 30- or 60-day invoices—thereby postponing payment until the co-­ operative had begun collecting the first rents. To become a member of the co-operative, members had to purchase a £100 withdrawable share, but no deposit was required. This collectively raised a crucial £10,000 to cover costs in our first month. Scotmid Co-operative also gave us a £2000 grant towards communal renovations, and we took out a £15,000 loan from Co-operative and Community Finance to cover initial cash-flow. Napier University was obliged by their lease to return the building in the same condition it had been in originally, requiring them, for example, to strip the carpets and repaint the walls. A deal was struck and we agreed that Napier could save on the cost of tidying up the building and in

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exchange, leave us all the furniture, fixtures and fittings—saving us a significant amount of start-up capital. Early in the process we attempted to draw up a comprehensive list of tasks and actions that we would need to achieve in order to start and then grow the process. This proved to be a useful exercise for breaking the project down into manageable areas to include everything from incorporation of the co-op, to contracts for fire extinguishers and alarm systems; to considering different democratic structures for managing the co-­ operative. In addition to practical and financial labour, a key concern was to work out how to manage the tasks fairly and co-operatively. It was in learning how to work through these challenges collectively that a huge amount of value lay. It was through our participation in these areas that a set of skills and experiences were developed and a site of pedagogy created. There were many challenges. For example, the administrative and project management functions represented a considerable burden, given that this was the work of volunteers who were also studying or engaged in waged work. Our greatest concern, however, was ensuring not only that the requisite number of co-tenants applied but also that they were the right applicants. We needed to attract and accept members who would actually put in the work to make the co-operative function and flourish. Alongside a whole swathe of benefits, being a member of a housing co-­ operative carries a fair degree of responsibility for the success of the project. Thankfully, we had done sufficient market research and there were plenty of people committed to making the project a success. Being the most affordable student housing provider in the city certainly helped. For comparison, Napier University was charging over £100 more per month than the co-operative. We received close to 200 applications for 104 bedrooms and the diversity and quality of applications was impressive. Then came the difficult task of selection. The applications were anonymized and judged entirely on their 200-word answers to two simple questions: Why do you want to live in the co-operative? What skills, experience or ideas would you like to bring to the co-operative? The first meeting in the Golf Tavern with our newly accepted members was an exciting experience. Co-operatives are first and foremost about people. Suddenly we were part of a community in formation, sharing ideas, stories and

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e­ nthusiasm. Together we were ready to begin turning numerous sterile flats into our one massive home. The ESHC has a horizontal structure, run democratically and directly by its tenants/members. At the time of writing, tasks are distributed among four different working groups: Participation: This working group is self-reflective and addresses the democratic structures of the co-operative to help make getting involved and having members’ voices heard more effective; Procedures: All things legal and financial are taken care of by this working group; from leases to bills, and budgets to assets; Places: Deals with the maintenance of the two buildings and 106 bedrooms; People: Deals with all things social and community orientated. From outreach to parties, and event planning to documenting members’ lives. Working groups convene in the broader General Meeting, which takes place fortnightly and in which major decisions are taken following consensus decision-making. Consensus decision-making is a creative and dynamic way of reaching agreement between all members of a group. Instead of simply voting for an item and having the majority of the group getting their way, a group using consensus is committed to finding solutions that everyone actively supports, or to which they consent. Working groups are open to all members, and there are additionally several subgroups and task forces which deal with particular issues, such as pest control or the basement renovation.25 Each working group holds a weekly meeting, providing a space for developing a wide range of skills from maintenance to finance. Turnover at student co-operatives is usually high due to the transient population so institutional memory, continuity and efficient record keeping is crucial for the survival of the co-operative. In 2017, the Participation Working Group put forward the Work Sharing Plan. This Plan is a way of making sure all the work in the co-operative  We currently have two unused car parks in our basements. The plan is to turn these into communal space and venues for events. By doing a lot of the construction work ourselves, we can keep costs down and invest in higher-quality materials. It is also a great opportunity to train our members in all sorts of useful DIY skills. 25

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gets done and that everyone contributes in an equal way. The system assigns roles to individual members and supports them in carrying out their assigned role. So what has been the experience of those living in our housing co-­ operative?26 When referring to their experiences of ESHC, interviewees did not simply cite affordability and better housing conditions as the only or even chief benefits of living in a co-operative, though both of these advantages were highlighted. Interviewees also spoke compellingly of their experiences as active rather than passive students and the ongoing processes of teaching and learning they have undergone about ‘other ways of living’. For instance, they juxtapose experiences of mastering practical skills such as maintenance and budgeting with acquiring the skills and capabilities to participate in ‘by-consensus’ and egalitarian decision-­ making processes that require ‘taking the point of view of other people’ and being able to ‘take initiative without taking control’ of the living processes of the co-operative. The need to construct ‘egalitarian’ living environments with ‘like-minded’ people that become ‘neighbours’ of a kind that are different to those found in the private housing market is emphasized as of great importance to interviewees. There is also a strong desire and commitment to construct mutually caring relationships with others, and this is contrasted in the interviews to individualistic conceptions of the neoliberal subject. Thus, those interviewed suggest that a great value of the co-operative is its potential to constitute a transformative and mutual teaching/learning space which enables mutual identity building.27 This understanding of the co-operative as a space of teaching/learning is based on a conception of education that conceives of teaching/learning as mutually sustaining cognitive activities that draw upon Paulo Freire’s conception of popular education.28 As Freire proposes, education does take place not just in conventional classrooms but also in quotidian, routine and dialogical relationships between subjects in which roles of teacher  See the video Democratic Housing in Edinburgh. 2014. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= Xsbih_3Rrdo 27  Brown, W. 2009. Edgework: Critical Essays on Knowledge and Politics. New Jersey: Princeton University Press. 28  Freire, P. 2000. Pedagogy of the Oppressed. New York: Continuum. 26

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and student become diffused and, at times, fused together. Furthermore, education is not just the transferring of information from someone who has knowledge to someone who does not. Rather, education requires ‘acts of cognition’ that are fundamentally collaborative and in which teachers and students engage in constant dialogue in ways that transcend and in many ways unsettle normative differentiations of teacher and student. As is noted elsewhere the co-operative theorist MacPherson would call this relationship association which is a ‘special kind of knowing that emerges when people work together effectively,…[making] collective behaviour more economically rewarding, socially beneficial and personally satisfying’.29 The teaching and learning experience becomes as important in popular education as the cognizable object. In fact, Freire stresses that the cognizable object, such as language, numbers or, in the case of the ESHC, finances or maintenance, is not the end result of education but rather the intermediator of dialogical, horizontal and democratic relationships between teacher and student. This evidences the importance that Freirian education places on education as ongoing and continuous processes of relationship building. To be clear, popular education favours a ‘problem-­ posing’ pedagogical method in which teachers and students collaborate and engage in constant dialogue and reflection about the world.30 Popular education, therefore, is founded on similar values to co-operatives because it is predicated on the notion that knowledge is collectively owned and shared, and not the sole property of the teacher as the only ‘true knower’. Being teaching/learning collaborative and dialogical processes also means that the roles of teacher and student can become indistinguishable because the ‘teacher is no longer merely the-one-who-teaches but one who is himself taught in dialogue with students, who in turn while being taught also teach’.31

 MacPherson, I. 2002. Encouraging Associative Intelligence, Co-operative Learning and Responsible Citizenship in the 21st Century. Manchester: Co-operative College Working papers. 30  Freire presents the problem-posing method as an alternative to traditional ‘banking education’ in which teachers transfer information that students must memorize and repeat, and to the Socratic method based on the constant posing of questions and interrogation of students by the teacher. 31  Freire, 2000, 67. 29

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When speaking of their experience in the ESHC, participants continuously refer to the collaborative, egalitarian and communitarian character of co-operative living as significant learning experiences and challenges that give character to their life in the co-operative. Processes of negotiating and manoeuvring diverse points of view, behaviours and lifestyles while remaining committed to co-operative life are presented as integral learning processes of co-operative living. This learning experience is not defined as a conventional process of knowledge transfer. Rather, teaching and learning take place in relational and mutually sustaining processes in which teaching and learning roles become undifferentiated. While formal initiatives such as orientation sessions and general meetings constitute organized forms of knowledge transfer in which the co-operative attempts to ‘teach’ its members how to live co-operatively, as interview participants suggest, learning how to live in a community most commonly takes place in their daily relationships with other members and in informal processes such as meal sharing, cleaning, painting, decorating and other tasks. Another condition of popular education is an understanding of education as a deeply political and socially situated activity. As Freire suggests, popular education seeks to create spaces for teachers and learners to reflect and become politically conscious about the social world and social reality. Popular education, in fact, denies conceptions of the subject and of learning as ‘abstract, isolated, independent and unattached to the world’.32 In the interviews with ESHC members, we observed how the conceptualization of co-operative living is always contrasted with the precarity and oppression of neoliberal and capitalist regimes. Members consistently refer to co-operative life as an alternative to oppressive and unjust conditions of the market, systems of profit and private enterprises. As one participant says, ‘we [in ESHC] are operating in a system that is more ethical and we are providing more affordable housing than those unscrupulous landlords’, with another saying, ‘the way to work around capitalism as we know is by creating businesses than co-operate’ rather than compete. Evident in these statements is not only a profound awareness of the importance of the housing co-operative, but also of its possibility to transgress and transcend capitalist and neoliberal  Freire, 2000, 62.

32

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relations. Furthermore, by defining their experiences of living in the co-­ operative as an act of resistance against capitalist and neoliberal domination, members are engaging in the kinds of acts of ‘epistemic disobedience’ that, as Walter Mignolo argues, are fundamental to process of (un)learning.33 These processes of (un)learning, as authors such as Giroux and Prádanos propose, are integral conditions of any process of resistance against the neoliberal emphasis on ‘commercialization, privatization and deregulation’.34 Finally, popular education emphasizes the role that teaching/learning plays in the very transformation of the learning subject. In fact, Freire argues that a fundamental condition of popular education is its consideration of the subject as unfinished and in-process of becoming.35 In the case of ESHC members, their experiences of living in the co-operative suggest ongoing interrelated and mutually sustaining processes of subjectification taking place in the teaching/learning experience of living in ESHC. For instance, interviewees speak of constantly negotiating their own subjectivity in contrast to normative discourses of neoliberal individuality. As Wendy Brown argues, the ideal neoliberal subject is one that understands him/herself as ‘rational, calculating creatures whose moral autonomy is measured by their capacity for “self-care”’.36 Nevertheless, the interviews with ESHC members suggest that something other than, but not completely disassociated from, the reaffirmation of the neoliberal subject is taking place in the teaching/learning processes and their related processes of subjectification at play in the life of the co-operative. Participants explain their decision to move to the co-­ operative using discourses of affordability, alternative home ownership and ethical profitability suggesting an intentionality to move out of capitalist conceptions of the housing market in order to search for ‘housing without exploitation’, and homes without landlords. In discussing their motivations, co-operators also referenced the deleterious effects and  Mignolo, W. D. 2009. Epistemic Disobedience, Independent Thought and Decolonial Freedom. Theory, Culture & Society 26: 159–81. 34  Giroux, H. 2002. Neoliberalism, Corporate Culture, and the Promise of Higher Education: The University as a Democratic Public Sphere. Harvard Educational Review 72: 425–64. 35  Freire, 2000, 65. 36  Brown, 2009, 40. 33

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­ recarity associated with trying to secure student housing in the private p sector, the negative impact of gentrification, the resulting displacement of vulnerable people, the emphasis on profit and the often exploitative practices of private landlords and letting agencies. Participants seem to also construct and, in time, learn alternative subjectivity discourses articulated, for instance, through notions of co-operation, consensus decision-­ making, and practices of participation that while respecting the individual also seek the common good. Together with these discourses, we witness how participants intentionally move away from self-serving discourses of profitability and towards ideas of collaboration, communal living, mutual caring, and alternative property ownership. As one participant says, ‘the flats always co-operate with materials, equipment and even utensils that we all share’, suggesting that individualistic property ownership loses importance when attempting to build a community of ‘mutual caring and support’ with ‘like-­ minded people’ who share ‘common political aspirations’. Nevertheless, the individual does not disappear in attempts to build community. For instance, interviewees speak of life in the co-operative as a constant process of negotiating collective values and individual interests. As one participant commented, living in the co-operative is like living in a family of ‘active, welcoming, warm and loving’ people in which you can be alone ‘when you want to’ but you are never lonely or isolated. In this environment, as another participant indicated, they negotiate and balance the need for ‘time to yourself ’ with the need of ‘getting involved’ with the conviction that ‘people [are] looking out for you’. Constant negotiations between collectivity and individuality getting involved and carving space for oneself are very much an active learning process. As another participant commented, ‘I am learning so many things because by having to run everything, you learn so much and this is very good. We are no longer passive students; we are active students.’ This ongoing process of teaching/learning reflects not only how the co-operative constitutes a radical educational space but also how that space is one in which subjects constantly negotiate their own sense of self in relation to both the collectivity of the co-operative and the normative conceptions of market, risk, calculability and self-serving individuality professed by neoliberalism.

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The construction of a new social imaginary is one of the most critical effects of the learning and its related subjectification processes taking place in the co-operative. This imaginary does not only unsettle the idea of an immobile and essential neoliberal individual, but most importantly opens up possibilities for ESHC members to imagine a different world. This pushes back against fatalistic acceptance of capitalism and the ‘slow cancellation of our future’.37 As one of the interviewees argues, we are socialized to believe that without capitalism, ‘there would be chaos, violence and disorder, and humanity would descend into anarchy. But [the co-operative] is not a chaotic mess, it is a self-managing space….[It provides] opportunities for liberating and creative work that brings the best out of people…showing that we can do so much better and that we deserve better’ than living within the constraints of capitalism and the current power system. Housing is a crucial part of students’ livelihoods, and both universities and private landlords/companies are currently making exorbitant profits with it. Student housing co-operatives are an essential part of a co-­ operative university ecosystem not just because they cover the material needs of students in a fair and co-operative fashion but also because they act as radical pedagogical spaces, places of teaching/learning that are fundamental for the constitution of a political subject. This subject lives by values that not only correspond to those identified by the International Co-operative Alliance, but that also contrast and, in many ways, resist neoliberal and capitalist conceptions of the individual and education. A co-operative university would not merely entail a different way of managing a university but would require the development of a co-operative pedagogy, of which student housing co-operatives should play a central role. If we move away from notions of classroom education and its conceptions of teacher–student relationships and into other spaces in which subjects may pick up, learn and ‘internalize’ alternative conceptions of being and good living, we may gain a different understanding of e­ ducation and how student housing co-operatives can play a crucial role in the cooperative university ecosystem.  Quoted in Fisher, M. 2014. The Slow Cancellation of the Future. In Ghosts of My Life: Writings on Depression, Hauntology and Lost Futures, 6–8. Alresford: Zero Books; Fisher, M. 2009. Capitalist Realism: Is There No Alternative? Ropley: Zero Books. 37

10 Co-operative Research and Research Co-operatives Thomas Swann

Higher Education, Research and Co-operation In discussions of co-operative Higher Education, a focus on teaching is often more prevalent than a focus on research. While Higher Education teaching has seen attention in relation to co-operative aspirations in terms of both how it is conducted and how it is institutionalized, for research, only the former of these has been explored in any detail.1 There are several strands of thought on how academic research can be conducted in co-operative ways, often centred around bringing non-­ academics into processes of research (design and practice) as participants, rather than as subjects to be studied, and in relation to discussions of the  See Joss Winn’s bibliography for a comprehensive overview of the literature: https://josswinn. org/2013/11/21/co-operative-universities-a-bibliography/. Accessed 6 March 2019. The discussion below highlights some of the contributions to research methodology discussions that have drawn on participatory, collaborative and co-operative principles. These primarily cover, however, the practice of such research rather than its institutionalization. 1

T. Swann (*) Loughborough University, Loughborough, UK © The Author(s) 2019 M. Noble, C. Ross (eds.), Reclaiming the University for the Public Good, Palgrave Critical University Studies, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-21625-2_10

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student as (co-)producer of knowledge. These attempts at aligning research with certain values, such as those that have defined the co-­ operative movement (e.g. democracy, equality, equity and solidarity), are important because just like in co-operative approaches to teaching, research can be a site in which we strive to transform the social relations we live in. Research is fundamental not only in its own right but also as a foundation for effective teaching, something as true of co-operative Higher Education as in mainstream contexts. How would a co-operative structure support research? And how in a Higher Education landscape of increasing precarity would a co-operative structure provide employment and financial security not only for teachers but also for researchers? This chapter addresses these and the overarching question of how co-operative principles, like those highlighted above, can inspire research—both its practice and its institutionalization—as much as it has inspired teaching. Before attempting to answer these questions, however, a more fundamental one might be, why do we need to take research practice out of mainstream, neoliberal Higher Education? While there might be good reason to someone wanting to do research in more co-operative ways within the mainstream, one of which I will discuss further in more detail, this does not necessarily entail that this must be done outside of mainstream (i.e. non-co-operative) institutions. Notwithstanding moves to marginalize and ultimately eradicate certain disciplines from universities, most notably humanities subjects like philosophy and history, there is still an element of freedom to what we academics working in mainstream Higher Education are permitted to study.2 For some subjects that depend on corporate funding, such as many science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM) fields, researchers may be told directly what to research and how, with funding linked to specific projects with desired outputs. In other areas, however, the performance management academics are increasingly subject to come down to the quantity and ranking of publications, not principally on the content or orientation of those publications. It could be argued then that if one wants to do research in a more  Cruickshank, J. 2016. Putting Business at the Heart of Higher Education: On Neoliberal Interventionism and Audit Culture in UK Universities. Open Library of Humanities 2 (1): e3, 1–33. https://doi.org/10.16995/olh.77 2

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co-operative way, then one should just get on and do it. As long as it leads to publication in the right journals, no one will care about whether it is co-operative or not, whether it aims to contribute to social change or not.3 This may well be true, but at least in the UK, how academic performance is managed and whether people are hired or their employment is continued depends as much on securing funding grants for research as it does on publications. Funders like the UK research councils may well struggle to grasp the value of co-operative research practices (even within supposedly ‘transformative’ agendas) while fixed outputs are privileged in research assessment. Academics seeking to work in this way—whether they are teaching as well as researching or predominantly focused on research—will find it difficult to win funding and so secure their employment. They may be forced to abandon research oriented towards co-­ operation and social change in pursuit of secure employment. And this does not even begin to cover the low success rates for research-funding bids. Alongside this is the related problem of academics being denied research time in workload models unless they can buy themselves out of teaching with research funding. Doing research properly is often difficult even with such buy-outs, but without them, it may be impossible for many academics.4 Options for being ‘research active’, and doing research in ways that reflect the values of co-operation (values such as democracy, equality, equity and solidarity), are therefore increasingly few, with teaching-only contracts increasingly being used to steer research activity in certain directions that institutions deem as having more chance of success in research assessment processes like the Research Excellence Framework.5  Mark Fisher makes a similar argument around content being unimportant as long as the package sells (Fisher, M. 2009. Capitalist Realism. Is There No Alternative? London: Zero Books). Here, the content of research may well be unimportant to managers as long as it can be evidence of high research standing. 4  Universities and Colleges Union. 2016. UCU Workload Survey 2016. https://www.ucu.org.uk/ media/8196/Executive-summary%2D%2D-Workload-is-an-education-issue-UCU-workloadsurvey-report-2016/pdf/ucu_workloadsurvey_summary_jun16.pdf. Accessed 18 September 2018. 5  For instance, in preparation for the Research Excellence Framework exercise in 2021, universities have been accused of moving staff onto teaching-only contracts when their research does not meet 3

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What I want to suggest here is that a co-operative model of support for research may be a potential solution to these problems. Just as co-­operative approaches have inspired models for teaching and for its institutionalization in universities and colleges, so too can they inspire the practice and institutionalization of research. A research co-operative could provide the formal structure that in one way or another allows its members to do research that might otherwise be impossible or difficult in mainstream Higher Education. In fields where little more than time is needed for research (e.g. philosophy), a co-operative model could offer ways to make that time available where it is denied in universities as they are today. In fields where financial and other resources are required on top of time, a research co-operative may present one way of allowing people to secure that funding and those resources, something I return to as a central function of a research co-operative. Even in resource- and capital-intensive fields such as many STEM subjects, we can start to think about how a research co-operative could facilitate the kind of access that is currently only available to Higher Education and related institutions that meet UK Research and Innovation requirements. I begin in this chapter by considering what co-operative values might mean for research practice, focusing on co-production as one way of framing research that is transformative and empowering for all participants. This first part discusses what research inspired by co-operative values might look like. After highlighting several examples that in different ways help shed light on how a research co-operative might operate, I briefly discuss the idea of the platform co-operative as something that may be relevant to discussions of a research co-operative. This second part focuses on what the co-operative institutionalization and support of research might look like. Finally, I suggest some of the steps forward for those who want to make a research co-operative a reality, before closing with a discussion of a possible hybrid model for how a research co-­ operative might, in the short term at least, have a relationship with mainstream Higher Education. Throughout this chapter, I will take for granted institutional expectations. See, for example, Morrish, L. 2019. REF2021: Adding Insult to Injury? https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/impactofsocialsciences/2019/02/06/ref2021-adding-insult-to-injury/. Accessed 5 March 2019.

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the assumption that co-operative Higher Education and co-operativism in general are good things that we should support and aim to extend. It is anticipated that readers of this book will be sympathetic to co-­operation, in general, and co-operative Higher Education, in particular.

Co-operative and Transformative Research Just as co-operative principles can influence and inspire the way we teach in Higher Education, so too can they play a role in how we conduct research. When thinking about how to do research in ways that are in tune with principles of co-operation, we need to ask questions about the kinds of topics we choose to research, the methods we adopt, how we approach research subjects and participants and how we want the results of our research to be used. There are a range of perspectives on research that can help us answer these questions. One that is particularly useful in thinking about co-operative research is the idea of co-production.6 Co-production in research is well on the way to becoming established in social sciences and humanities and is used in a number of ways to describe a set of often quite dissimilar research agendas and projects. There are, however, certain core themes of co-produced research that are indicative of how research can be done in co-operative and transformative ways. Co-production of knowledge refers to practices whereby academics and non-academics collaborate on research and where the process of conducting research is as beneficial to the non-academic participants as the outcomes, that is, the means as well as the ends are valued. As Bell and Pahl outline, co-production covers research that ‘does not access a pre-­ existing reality but is active in the creation of reality’; ‘tease(s) out forms of knowledge extant within communities that are often overlooked or undervalued by more traditional forms of academic research, including embodied, emotional and tacit ways of knowing and representing the  Facer, K., and B. Enright. 2016. Creating Living Knowledge: The Connected Communities Programme, Community–University Partnerships and the Participatory Turn in the Production of Knowledge. University of Bristol/AHRC Connected Communities Programme. https://researchinformation.bristol.ac.uk/files/75082783/FINAL_FINAL_CC_Creating_Living_Knowledge_ Report.pdf. Accessed 17 September 2018. 6

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world’; is ‘produced and privileged by marginalised and oppressed subject positions’; and, in relation to social change, ‘produce(s) knowledge of value for existing social struggles, in which academic co-producers themselves are embedded’.7 The concerns that have motivated co-production have emerged through a range of research agendas and methodologies, such as Participatory Action Research, radical pedagogy and black, feminist and indigenous critiques of the kinds of approaches to knowledge production that dominate natural and social sciences.8 Rather than see those who take part in research projects as subjects to be studied or as sources of data to be collected and analysed, co-production sees participants as co-­ researchers, actively shaping both the research questions any project aims to answer, the methods used in acquiring those answers and the outcomes and their usefulness in non-academic terms. Crucially, both the outcomes—avoiding purely academic reports, articles, chapters and books and instead focusing on what is concretely and practically useful to participants—and the methods—which in themselves help, for example, build confidence, develop knowledge and transfer skills—aim at being transformative in that they help create social change for the people involved. While some branches of co-produced research focus on areas like community health and poverty reduction through the International Monetary Fund and World Bank, more radical agendas situate co-­ production in discourses around challenging patriarchal, colonial and capitalist knowledge and agency.9 These more radical strands of co-­ production take a liberatory and emancipatory stance when it comes to

 Bell, D. M., and K. Pahl. 2018. Co-production: Towards a Utopian Approach. International Journal of Social Research Methodology 21 (1): 106. 8  Hall, B. L. 1992. From Margins to Center? The Development and Purpose of Participatory Research. The American Sociologist 23 (4): 15–28. 9  Hinchliffe, S., M. A. Jackson, K. Wyatt, A. E. Barlow, M. Barreto, L. Clare, M. H. Depledge, R. Durie, L. E. Fleming, N. Groom, K. Morrissey, L. Salisbury, and F. Thomas. 2018. Healthy Publics: Enabling Cultures and Environments for Health. Palgrave Communications 4 (57): 1–10; Kamruzzaman, P. 2009. Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers and the Rhetoric of Participation. Development in Practice 19 (1): 61–71. 7

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social change and are often linked to political movements such as post-­ colonialism, feminism, anarchism and autonomist Marxism.10 As co-production is practised as a transformative research agenda or methodology, it will always be subject to tensions between these more radical leanings and attempts at bringing parts of it in line with more mainstream political dynamics.11 In relation to co-operativism, however, co-production can be seen as offering a possible approach to research that embodies the core co-operative values. Co-production enshrines the principles of self-help and self-responsibility by engaging communities directly in the process of linking knowledge production to social change. Academic experts do not study situations and present solutions from the ivory tower, even if there was still such a thing; they instead facilitate participants co-researching and developing solutions themselves, seeing self-education as a crucial component of social change. Democracy is central to how co-production processes are determined and undertaken, with participants playing key roles in discussions about what is co-­ researched and how, and having a final say on whether a project goes ahead. As well as research built around the idea of co-production, however, there are of course other forms of research that are transformative and that contribute to bringing about social change.12 In humanities, for example, research might be a solitary activity that, for the most part, involves the researcher working alone. In STEM subjects, research may be conducted by individuals or in groups, but it will not always be appropriate to centre the research around methods of co-production. In these  Coleman, L., R. Durie, N. Eisenstadt, R. Firth, B. Franks, S. Gradin, U. Gordon, K. Milburn, A. Prichard, C. Rossdale, and T. Swann. In Preparation. Reassessing Co-Production: Towards Emergence, Horizontality and Transformation. 11  Ibid.; Bell, D. M., and K. Pahl. 2018. Co-production: Towards a Utopian Approach. International Journal of Social Research Methodology 21 (1): 105–17; Enright, B., K. Facer, and W. Larner. 2016. Reframing Co-production: Gender, Relational Academic Labour and the University. In Emotional States. Sites and Spaces of Affective Governance, ed. E. Jupp, J. Pykett, and F. M. Smith, 37–52. London: Routledge; Eisenstadt, N., and J. McClellan. In Preparation. Foregrounding Co-production; Eisenstadt, N. 2014. We Just Provide the Tools – From Engagement to Co-production in Community Mapping. Paper Presented at Mapping Culture Communities, Sites and Stories, Centro de Estudos Sociais (CES), University of Coimbra, May 28–Jul 30; Know Your Bristol. 2015. A Participatory Heritage Mapping Toolkit for Researchers and Communities. https://knowyourbristol.org/resources/. Accessed 16 August 2018. 12  Hall, 1992. 10

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cases though, research can still be transformative and have an impact on positive social change. While much of the direct research activity in these and other fields may not always be suited to an overall methodology of co-production, that does not rule out their embodying co-operative values in their wider academic milieus, in how collaboration is negotiated when it is appropriate and in how their research priorities and outcomes involve and are directed towards non-academic communities, for example, in the practice of making philosophical enquiry a more participatory activity.13

 ransformative Research in Mainstream Higher T Education If research that chimes with the principles of co-operative Higher Education, such as democracy, equality, equity and solidarity, is something we think valuable and worth pursuing, insofar as it contributes to transformative social change, what is it in mainstream, neoliberal Higher Education that is holding this kind of research back? Of course, there are several examples of projects adopting co-production (see Bell and Pahl for a recent overview and critical discussion), but this does not mean that there are not tensions in universities that mitigate against it and put in place barriers that often prevent researchers from doing co-production.14 As well as some of the problems identified above around research activity and time in general being reduced or excluded entirely in workload and performance management, there are also factors that impact specifically on the potential for co-operative research in mainstream institutions, such as the following: university ethics boards showing some level of conservatism in terms of research design; problems around remuneration for participation in co-produced research and ownership of outputs; and funders not recognizing that the activity of co-produced research can be  Gordon, U. 2007. Practising Anarchist Theory: Towards a Participatory Political Philosophy. In Constituent Imagination: Militant Investigations/Collective Theorization, ed. E. Biddle, S. Shukaitis, and D. Graeber, 276–87. Oakland and Edinburgh: AK Press. 14  Bell, D. M., and K. Pahl. 2018. Co-production: Towards a Utopian Approach. International Journal of Social Research Methodology 21 (1): 105–17. 13

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directly transformative and instead only acknowledging research with impact that utilizes the results, abstracting them from any site of co-­ production and applying them elsewhere. The structure of most Higher Education research funding demands that projects be determined largely in advance, with detailed research designs approved by ethics committees long before participants can be practically brought on-board and properly remunerated for the time they spend on a project (if this is ever a possibility at all). This creates a tension that might pull co-operative, transformative research away from activities that are genuinely democratic and emerging from engagements with non-academic communities. This is not to say that genuinely democratic engagement does not happen, but that when it does happen, it does so in spite of these tensions. In many cases, academics will instead be going to communities with something like a pre-designed project and will attempt to garner support and participation. Similarly, in any situation where research is inspired by co-operative values, the academics will likely have more power than other participants and, depending on how remuneration is able to be negotiated, more support for their active role (they may be employed to do this research while others will have to find time on top of other commitments). Whether intentional or not, this disparity undermines how equal, or not, different partners can be in any project. More problematic, however, is the institutional power of the universities themselves in the research practice, and academics as well as other participants will be constrained and pressured by funding, ethics and reporting frameworks dictated by university managers. Research can easily become far less horizontal than the co-operative ideal would suggest, with universities as institutions at the top of the hierarchy determining the scope others have for autonomy. Finally, research that is supported by mainstream funding and Higher Education structures will often be pulled towards reinforcing and reproducing existing power relations rather than challenging them and trying to create alternatives.15 Like any established institution with some kind of power in society, universities have an interest in maintaining certain status quos and are intrinsically connected to

15

 Eisenstadt and McClellan, In Preparation; Eisenstadt, 2014.

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neoliberal process of value.16 As such they will act both ideologically and functionally as barriers to research that is genuinely transformative. In contrast to this, it might be possible to explore the idea of a research co-operative, imagined as a separate institution from mainstream Higher Education that facilitates transformative research inspired by co-­operative values as one way of navigating these tensions. In the following sections, I will look in more detail at how such a research co-operative might work, starting with some examples of initiatives that perform similar roles to a research co-operative. None of these examples fulfil all or even most of the criteria of a research co-operative (i.e. an institution run as a co-­ operative that supports co-operative forms of research) but they do suggest different ways in which the infrastructure of co-operative, transformative research can be conducted. Furthermore, while only one of these examples is formally linked to academic research, together they show how research, research-related activities and projects aimed at social change can be funded in different ways.

Experiment A crowd-funding platform for scientific research, Experiment launched in 2012 (then under the name Microryza) (experiment.com). It operates as a standard crowd-funding site, with researchers providing public pitches for their projects and members of the public invited to donate towards them. At the time of writing, the site boasted almost 800 successfully funded projects with over 40,000 individual backers. Projects generally request around $5000 in funding with some asking for under $1000 and others as much as $16,000. Experiment is aimed at pilot studies and small research projects and allows for non-academics (what they call independent scientists) to submit proposals as well as corporate researchers and those working for non-profits. The site promises research funding without overheads but does charge an 8% fee of the total raised on successfully funded projects.  Hall, R. 2018. The Alienated Academic. The Struggle for Autonomy Inside the University. London: Palgrave. 16

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Byline and Contributoria Experiment is one of the few successful platforms focusing on academic research funding. More common, although still limited in number, are sites aimed at supporting investigative journalism, which although ­different to academic research still involves individuals and groups being supported in researching specific topics. Byline is a platform that allows members of the public to support the work of specific journalists or to donate towards journalists completing certain stories (byline.com). Contributoria, which operated in 2014 and 2015, worked along similar lines but asked members of the public to ‘vote’ for proposals for investigative stories (contributoria.com). Non-paying members could allocate a certain number of votes per month to stories they wanted to see funded, with paying members having a higher number of votes.

The Ferret Sticking with the realm of investigative journalism, The Ferret is a platform that was started in 2007  in Scotland as a fact-checking service, examining claims made by politicians, public figures and organizations (theferret.scot). Like Byline and Contributoria, The Ferret aims to put subscribers and readers at the centre of decisions about reporting, but importantly it is also run as a co-operative with subscriber-members and journalists sitting on a board that makes decisions about the organization collectively. Therefore, rather than having commissioning decided based on public popularity, here a board representing members judges whether to award funds to proposed projects. The Ferret is also committed to supporting diversity and has a fund available to facilitate contributions from ‘Black, non-white and people of colour, as well as those from under-­ represented groups’. It also provides journalism training for these and other groups.

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Edge Fund Edge Fund is arguably the most radical of the examples discussed here, stating as part of their vision that ‘we need to understand the systems and structures that give people the power to abuse others and the planet and then remove them and replace them with an alternative that is equitable, sustainable and just’ (edgefund.org.uk). Through a focus on projects that make change happen, along the lines of a prefigurative politics, Edge Fund aims to finance social change initiatives and between 2012 and 2017 supported more than 170 groups, providing over £300,000  in funding. Applications for financial support are assessed by the collective of members and community and advisory groups. Edge Fund also involves the groups applying for funding in deciding ultimately how the total pot of available funds are distributed between them, practising a form of participatory budgeting. Recent rounds of grants have supported organizations working with LGBTIQA and women asylum seekers, non-­ hierarchical social spaces, rent campaigning, disabled people’s rights, anti-cuts activism and access to free healthcare among others. Edge Fund’s funding model is based on individual and organizational donations and they ‘will not take money from any groups or individuals if that means going against [their] aims and values’. What these examples show, and there are no doubt many more out there, is that there are already platforms and organizations that are experimenting, successfully in some cases, with different ways of distributing funding to research and activities that are in many ways similar to research or that, like the model of co-operative research discussed above, aim at facilitating social change. Decisions about whether to fund a particular project are based often on the kinds of principles that we might want to consider for research that fits within the scope of co-operative Higher Education. Crucially, several of these examples also suggest how such decisions can be done in ways that tends towards a democracy that is lacking in current distributions of research funding.

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What is a Platform Co-operative? One recent development in the co-operative movement that might be particularly applicable in the case of a research co-operative is that of platform co-operatives. Platform co-operatives are an attempt to take advantage of the availability of digital technology to allow for a decentralized form of co-operative where service users have quick and direct access to service providers. Platform co-operatives are counterposed to the idea of ‘platform capitalism’.17 This refers to the business models of firms like Uber, where the firm acts as a platform that keeps both users and service providers at arm’s length, merely facilitating transactions for nominally independent workers. For platform capitalism, all the risk and precarity lies with the worker. So how might platform co-operativism differ? Platform co-operatives make the same use of digital networking technologies, such as smartphone apps, as capitalist platforms, but one crucial difference is that the platform is owned and controlled by the people doing the work, the users or a combination of both. Rather than relying on precarious labour to provide a service or product, platform co-­ operatives aim to ensure a greater degree of job and income security. This might mean developing the platforms themselves in collaboration with trade unions so that the working and payment conditions facilitated by the platform meet with definitions of ‘decent work’.18 For platform co-­ operatives, the corporation extracting profit from the transaction is taken out of the equation and more of what users pay can be distributed directly to the employees. This model has been put in practice across the world in areas that are normally subject to the precarious work of the gig economy. Stocksy, for example, is a platform co-operative providing stock photography and cinematography (stocksy.com). Owned by the artists themselves, Stocksy returns 50–75% of the fees paid for image or video use directly to the artists. Co-operative members, recruited through open calls for contributors, are able to control the co-operative through a range of democratic processes. Green Taxi Cooperative, a platform co-operative  Srnicek, N. 2017. Platform Capitalism. London: Polity.   International Labour Organization. n.d. Decent Work. https://www.ilo.org/global/topics/ decent-work/lang%2D%2Den/index.htm. Accessed 26 September 2018. 17 18

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based in Denver, Colorado, was formed to offer drivers an alternative to Uber-type platforms and was supported logistically in its set-up by the Communication Workers of America trade union (greentaxico-op.com). Elsewhere, platform co-operatives specializing in food delivery have also been established, challenging the dominance of Deliveroo and, as with other examples, aiming to give workers more control over their work and a better standard of living.19 The examples discussed in the previous sections (Experiment, Byline, Contributoria, The Ferret and Edge Fund), while not platform co-­ operatives, do share the common feature of all being primarily online platforms. If these examples highlighted some of the ways a research co-­operative might operate with regard to funding, then perhaps the platform co-operative model is worth considering with regard to employment security and long-term sustainability rather than projectbased support. It should be noted, however, that authors such as Nick Srnicek have critiqued the idea of platform co-operatives as a challenge to the dominance of platform capitalism, arguing that ‘all the traditional problems of coops (e.g. the necessity of self-exploitation under capitalist social relations) are made even worse by the monopolistic nature of platforms, the dominance of network effects, and the vast resources behind these companies’.20 Instead, Srnicek proposes public platforms that involve ‘investing the state’s vast resources into the technology necessary to support these platforms and offering them as public utilities’.21 Perhaps a research co-operative affiliated to a state-backed co-operative university could make such a platform workable as a site for co-operative, transformative research.

 Scholz, T. 2015. Platform Cooperativism. Challenging the Corporate Sharing Economy. New York: Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung. 20  Srnicek, N. 2017. Platform Capitalism, 68. London: Polity. 21  Ibid. 19

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Framework and Requirements With these practical examples and a broad overview of the idea of platform co-operatives considered, I now want to turn to what a research co-operative could look like. As well as concrete proposals for making co-operative research possible, there are more general elements of a research co-operative framework that are important in challenging the problems identified in mainstream Higher Education research process and practice discussed earlier. From the start, any research should be co-­ produced and emerge from engagements between researchers and community participants, whether in the actual practice of research or in the broader milieu of design and outputs. The application process for any research funding or for ethics approval, therefore, needs to be flexible and accessible enough that at little or no personal cost participants can collaborate from the outset. Perhaps formal applications could be limited to what can realistically be written in one day, or even one afternoon, with potential financial and practical support available to those applying. Bureaucratic mechanisms should be minimized and platforms used for applications should be as user-friendly as possible. If decisions about funding and any necessary reporting were managed collectively and democratically, by the participants in the research as much as by research cooperative members, then the institutional power of funding bodies and universities could be challenged and those doing the research would have the fullest control possible over how they do it. With a research co-­ operative funding and supporting radically transformative research, the conservatism of institutional funders could also be overcome and the kind of change the research was aiming at bringing about would be up to the participants and the larger collective of co-operative members. Fundamentally, a research co-operative would need to be able to support research that was transformative on its own terms and as much as possible under its own conditions. Practically, that might mean finding ways to remunerate participants fairly or address the question of how long a project should be funded for (is the one-to-three-year norm for most research projects really long enough to bring about transformations, even ones of limited scope?). In any case, how a research co-operative function should

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be thought through in terms of how it enables and encourages research that is transformative and that reflects the values of co-operativism. In the long term, we need to have in mind what is referred to in tech-­ development as a ‘minimum viable product’: what minimum, necessary and sufficient features would a research co-operative need to have in place to properly support transformative and co-operative research? Primarily, like any co-operative, it would need to provide its members with a decent standard of living while allowing them to carry out their work in appropriate ways. This could operate through people being employed by the co-operative on a permanent basis, working on a project basis funded by the co-operative or, like the platform co-operatives challenging Uber and the like, having members work as freelancers but receiving work through the co-operative, perhaps with income security for periods of unemployment and sickness as well as paid holiday leave. Income to support this could be generated by providing services such as consulting and conducting research for other organizations, or through taking an overhead on external funding co-operative members have successfully applied for. This latter option would of course depend on the co-operative having the kind of accreditation necessary for applying for funding from the mainstream funding bodies, allowing members of the co-operative to use their membership as a credential when applying for funding (in the same ways staff at universities can apply for research funding). While a research co-operative might at a certain level of development be eligible for recognition as an independent research organization and so be able to apply for UK research council funding,22 affiliation with a co-operative university as a registered Higher Education institution might be more feasible in the short-to-medium term. Funding sources outside of research councils, such as charities, learned societies, business and civil society, may also provide more accessible streams of revenue to make a research co-operative viable. But looking beyond applications for UK research council-type funding, there is a potential network of thirdsector organizations and charities as well as private-­sector organizations  UK Research and Innovation. 2016. Eligibility for Research Council Funding. https://www. ukri.org/files/legacy/documents/updated-eligibility-criteria-nov-16-pdf. Accessed 17 September 2018. 22

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that could, on the one hand, be interested in paying co-operative members for research services and, on the other, be potential targets for funding applications for independent research. Within the co-­ operative Higher Education movement, a research co-operative could also provide research and related services to co-operative universities, such as ethics approval, conducted in ways more in keeping with co-­operative values. Working towards that long-term position, in the short-to-medium term, there are still functions a research co-operative could perform that would practically support transformative, co-operative research. Thinking in terms of this more immediate perspective, a research co-operative could support members’ research activities, be they academics currently employed by universities or other institutions or independent researchers, through, for example, helping one another write grant proposals, facilitating access to academic journals, providing guidance in terms of an accepted standard for ethics or even making small grants available for low-cost research projects or for seed-corn-type funding to help get projects off the ground that might seek more substantial funding elsewhere. Drawing on members’ expertise and experience, a research co-operative could in relatively early stages create training courses on co-production and similar research methodologies that would give members the tools to develop their own research practice. Again, these could be open to academics and independent researchers but also to potential participants in planned co-produced research projects. Financing for such initiatives could come from membership fees on a sliding scale so as to allow for cheaper access for those on low incomes and/or in precarious employment. Many of us in academia already pay membership fees to professional associations, so in its first years, a research co-operative could raise funds in the same way.

Conclusion For those interested in exploring the potential of something like a research co-operative, a decision needs to be made about the nature of engagement with mainstream Higher Education. Broadly speaking, there are

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four options. First, we can take heart in the recent grassroots, rank and file resurgence in trade unionism in Higher Education, whether in University and College Union in the UK or in member-led unions of precarious academics in the US and elsewhere. We can see that there might be some hope in reforming and even revolutionizing Higher Education and decide to stay there, for all its current ills, and fight for something better. Second, we can jump ship, so to speak, and abandon mainstream Higher Education entirely, focusing our energy on reinforcing and expanding co-operative Higher Education and creating a new space for transformative research in it. The third option open to us is to combine these first two approaches. Realistically, any steps in the short-­ to-­mid-term future will require a hybrid strategy, engaging with and ­trying to improve mainstream Higher Education research while trying at the same time to build autonomous, democratically run alternatives. On the one hand, for all the reasons discussed in the previous section, any access to even semi-reliable income and research funding in the years to come will depend on inhabiting where possible existing Higher Education institutions. On the other, one of the best ways of creating change is to actively make it happen, and this can have an impact on existing institutions if certain co-operative practices in academic research are adopted in any future transformation in Higher Education. A hybrid model would allow co-operative members, where possible, to draw on resources from the universities where they have some level of employment or other affiliation. A fourth approach, which runs along similar lines to the hybrid model, is to link a research co-operative directly to the establishment of a co-­ operative university. Such an affiliation might be the best option available to a research co-operative in so far as it provides the escape from neoliberal Higher Education while at the same time linking the alternative to an institutional framework that would potentially allow for access to funding and provide a constellation of functions within which a research co-­ operative can find a role. As well as potentially having access to research council funding through a co-operative university, a research co-­operative, being plugged into the broader co-operative movement, could also act as a guarantor of good practice in co-operative, transformative research. Through providing services to the co-operative movement and potentially

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to the private and third sectors, the income gained through this kind of approach might also allow a research co-operative to offer small grants to members not directly employed by a co-operative university to provide independent and precariously employed academics the resources they need to get a project off the ground. Membership of the co-operative might also assist independent academics and those working in Higher Education in finding additional paid opportunities such as consulting and conducting research projects for other co-operatives, the private sector and governmental and non-government organizations. Furthermore, as members we might be able to support one another by facilitating friendly peer-review of application drafts, sharing successful applications, enabling collaborations and helping with access to research participants. Thinking longer-term, a research co-operative affiliated to a co-operative university might be able to provide members with a regular salary, both through allowing members to apply for funding through the co-­ operative—depending on what accreditation was available—and taking a small cut of any funding or income members make through work received as a result of being a member. A research co-operative affiliated to a public co-operative university in this way could be an important step forward because it potentially combines the best elements of co-operative models of working and developments in the technology that would support platform co-operativism while keeping alive the ideal of publicly funded Higher Education. A (to some degree) state-backed co-operative university might mitigate some of the pitfalls faced by co-operatives and move towards a public platform of the type suggested by Srnicek. An approach that takes research and potentially Higher Education as a whole entirely out of the public sector runs a risk of letting the state off the hook and allowing the burden of funding Higher Education to fall elsewhere, that is, on the academic teachers and researchers and students themselves. While the problems of neoliberal Higher Education are well documented in this volume and elsewhere, does this really mean that the public model of Higher Education should be abandoned in its entirety? Is there not perhaps an alternative that draws on the benefits of co-operativism while securing people’s livelihoods and the service education provides to individuals and communities in a public model of funding and regulation? If this is pos-

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sible, and quality education in line with co-operative values is achievable within a renewed spirit of public education, then is it not possible too that academic research, conducted similarly in line with the values of the co-operative movement, can find a place within this framework? However we try to answer these questions, it is clear that something needs to change if genuinely transformative research is to thrive and play a role in social change. A research co-operative—co-operative both in terms of its approach to conducting research and in the employment relations of its members—may form a part of how we respond to these and other challenges.

11 Massive Open Online Course u.lab: Creating Transformational Learning in Scotland Anne Winther, Valerie Jackman, and Keira Oliver

The course was different from any other. It was where I would learn about myself in ways I never thought were important. u.explore student, 2018

Higher Education (HE) in the twenty-first century will have to build capacity to address the anthropogenic crises of our time, which are manifested in gross inequality, human suffering and environmental

NB: The contents of this chapter represent the authors’ views alone and not that of the Scottish Government

A. Winther (*) Centre for Human Ecology, Pearce Institute, Glasgow, UK e-mail: [email protected] V. Jackman College Development Network, Stirling, UK K. Oliver Scottish Government in Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s) 2019 M. Noble, C. Ross (eds.), Reclaiming the University for the Public Good, Palgrave Critical University Studies, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-21625-2_11

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destruction.1 Yet instead of ranking universities on their ability to tackle these crises, in England, as in so many other countries, the emphasis appears to be in ranking universities by graduate pay.2 Top graduates continue to seek coveted highly paid jobs at financial institutions and FTSE 100 companies, which is dominated by businesses that contribute directly or indirectly to global inequality and planetary destruction.3 Relatively few newly qualified graduates work directly on addressing the crises of our time, which leads us to ask why education does not do more to encourage young people to challenge systems and institutions to adopt different (intrinsic) values and act accordingly?4 This year is the 50th anniversary of Paulo Freire’s book Pedagogy of the Oppressed.5 We feel that Freire would criticize the UK’s education system by asking why it does not pursue justice (both social and environmental); foster peace and love for humanity and our planet; and embrace and nurture the questioning of our society, the one in which we live, that causes such destruction. These ideas are not new. The co-operative movement has identified the need for co-operative education to counteract the extrinsic and material value base of capitalism from the nineteenth cen Gadotti, M. 2004. Education for Sustainable Development: What We Need to Learn to Save the Planet? Instituto Paolo Freire; For example, see also: Stern, N. 2007. The Economics of Climate Change: The Stern Review. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; Jackson, T. 2009. Prosperity Without Growth: Economics for a Finite Planet. London: Earthscan; Urry, J. 2010. Sociology Facing Climate Change. Sociological Research Online 15: 3. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5153/sro.2190; Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. 2014. Climate Change 2014: Synthesis Report. Contribution of Working Groups I, II and III to the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, ed. Core Writing Team, R. K. Pachauri, and L. A. Meyer. Geneva: IPCC; WWF. 2016. Living Planet Report 2016. Gland, Switzerland: WWF International; Scottish Government. 2018. Poverty & Income Inequality in Scotland: 2014–17; World Health Organization (WHO). 2018. Suicide: Key Facts. WHO online: http://www.who.int/news-room/ fact-sheets/detail/suicide. Accessed 25 September 2018. 2  Britton, J. 2017. The Degrees That Make You Rich…and the Ones That Don’t. BBC online: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-41693230. Accessed 15 September 2018; and Richardson, H. 2018. Degree Courses to be Rated Gold, Silver and Bronze. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-43346678. Accessed 22 September 2018. 3  When analysed by sector, approximately one-third of the value of the FTSE 100 is made up of tobacco, oil, mining, defence and chemical industries (data from https://shareprices.com/sector). 4  Cook, D. 2013. Realising the Co-operative University: A Consultancy Report for The Co-operative College; and Crompton, T., et al. 2014. No Cause Is an Island: How People Are Influenced by Values Regardless of the Cause. The Common Course Foundation. Online. 5  Freire, P. 2000. Pedagogy of the Oppressed. New York: Continuum. 1

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tury onwards.6 Holloway sees education for fostering social wealth as a means of counteracting neoliberalism, and in 1934, Benjamin argued that changing an individual from a passive student or spectator to someone who has agency was essential for ‘progressive social revolution’.7 It is clear to us that, if we are to address the crises facing humanity, we cannot continue with the same ‘teaching, research, and application’ basis for HE.8 As Scharmer has said, twenty-first-century universities ‘will be based on the unity of research, teaching and civilizational renewal’ (italic for emphasis, not in original text). Civilizational renewal is not an individual endeavour; it is situated within the social field. Renewing civilization necessitates a new and radical pedagogy for education which is bound in the social fields of co-operation and builds on what we have in common.9 One experiment of education for civilizational renewal is the Massive Open Online Course (MOOC), developed by Otto Scharmer and others at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and the Presencing Institute (PI), also in Massachusetts and founded by Scharmer in 2006, called MITx u.lab: transforming business, society and self.10 This chapter begins by describing the theoretical basis of u.lab, Theory U, and then goes on to describe the US-based u.lab course, which has become one of the biggest educational experiments of the decade; 75,000 people from 183 countries enrolled in 2015 alone.11 We review u.lab as an example of the following: a course trying to create civilizational

 Woodin, T. 2011. Co-operative Education in Britain During the Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries: Context, Identity and Learning. In The Hidden Alternative, Co-operative Values, Past, Present and Future, ed. A. Webster, et al., 78–95. Manchester: MUP. 7  Holloway, J. 2010. Crack Capitalism. London: Pluto Press; for a description of Benjamin’s paper, see Neary, M., G. Saunders, A. Hagyard, and D. Derricott 2014. Student as Producer: ResearchEngaged Teaching, an Institutional Strategy. The Higher Education Academy. Also, Benjamin, W. 1970. Author as Producer. New Left Review 1 (62). http://goo.gl/0npxcq 8  Scharmer, O. 2018a. Education Is the Kindling of a Flame: How to Reinvent the 21st-Century University. Huffington Post. Online. 9  Gadotti, 2004 (n1). 10  Found on the Presencing Institute website: https://www.presencing.org 11  Yukelson A., J. Arts, K. Bird, and O. Scharmer. 2016. edX Home Page: MITx: 15.671.1x u.lab: Leading From the Emerging Future. https://courses.edx.org/courses/course-v1:MITx+15.671.1x+ 3T2016/38aa2c110ece40248f278ec76784a17c/. Accessed 24 October 2018. 6

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renewal; Benjamin’s (1934) agency for ‘progressive social revolution’;12 and co-operation in education. Our evidence for understanding both embodied characteristics and overall impact is drawn from how the learning from u.lab has been enacted in a Scottish context. Our example, ‘u. explore, a PDA in personal development’,13 is an educational prototype for developing self-esteem, tackling mental health issues and renewing passion and curiosity of young people. We argue that this course is an example of co-operative education as u.explore was co-produced14 with students at Edinburgh College in the first six months of 2018. Although Theory U is not a theory of, and u.lab is not a course explicitly for, co-­ operative education, we discuss Theory U and u.lab here as they are pedagogically and intellectually distinctive with both courses challenging our approach to HE. We illustrate how Theory U and u.lab can make a pedagogic contribution to co-operative Higher Education (CHE).

Introduction to Theory U, u.lab and the MOOC The course u.lab ‘teaches’15 people about Theory U (a transformational leadership metatheory). Theory U was developed from a long process of research, dialogue, reflection and application by Peter Senge, Otto Scharmer, Joe Jaworski and others at the MIT Sloan School of Management.16 Wanting to share Theory U, Scharmer and others at MIT and PI developed the u.lab MOOC,17 which is now available free online as an annual course offering starting each September.  Neary et al., 2014 (n7).  First taught at Edinburgh College 2018. Personal Development Award in u.explore. http://www. edinburghcollege.ac.uk/courses/Enterprise-and-Commerce/Personal%20Development%20 Award%20in%20U%20Explore/TH1UEXPE18. Accessed 18 September 2018. 14  Neary et al., 2014 (n7). 15  The authors use this word advisedly as u.lab does not conform to any traditional form of ‘teaching’ in Western cultures. 16  Senge, P. M., C. O. Scharmer, J. Jaworski, and B.-S. Flowers. 2005. Presence: Exploring Profound Change in People, Organizations and Society. London: Nicholas Brealy; and Jaworski J. 2011. Synchronicity: The Inner Path of Leadership. 2nd ed. Oakland, CA: Berrett-Koehler. 17  Presencing Institute. 2018. u.lab 1x: Leading from the Emerging Future. https://www.presencing. org/#/programs/course/landing-page/ulab_1x/at_a_glance. Accessed 22 October 2018. 12 13

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The Theory: Theory U Theory U18 is the methodology, mechanism, metatheory and framework, which ties together multiple different change, design and systems theories. Theory U describes a process of change for the individual, community, organization or society and offers levels of engagement that can extend over a lifetime. The learning is continuous, but it is possible to take value from Theory U without years of study. Theory U is an adaptive process and a journey with no end (which mirrors Neary et al.’s never finished project of ‘Student as Producer’) because it is experienced on many different levels, starting with self-development, leading to the capacity to act and then to engagement in further iterations of the ‘u-­process’ (Fig. 11.1).19 Theory U is also concerned with the development of the self within the social field, which in Theory U’s first inception was within management organizations.20 This placing of ‘self ’ within the social field can make Theory U a theory of both transformational and co-operative leaderships.21 Theory U is rooted in human ecology, systems thinking, David Kolb’s experiential learning theory,22 social justice and deep ecology, and has a strong values base, focusing on giving and love for humanity and the planet.23 Across radical and profound philosophical thought, there is a synchronicity in identifying the importance of listening, reflecting and acting with the head, heart and hand (the Scottish generalist tradition;24  Scharmer, C. O. 2009. Theory U: Leading from the Future as It Emerges. Oakland, CA: Berrett-Koehler. 19  Neary et al., 2014 (n7). 20  Scharmer, 2009 (n18). 21  Cook, 2013 (n4). 22  Pór, G., H. Bradbury, and B. Uldall. 2017. Future Organizing: Connecting Self and Systems Transformation. In Cooking with Action Research: Stories and Resources for Self and Community Transformation, ed. H. Bradbury, et al. Portland, Oregon: Hilary Bradbury Associates. 23  Scharmer, 2009 (n18); and Senge et al., 2005 (n16). 24  Devlin et al., in this book; McIntosh, A. 2012a. The Challenge of Radical Human Ecology to the Academy. In Radical Human Ecology: Intercultural and Indigenous Approaches, ed. L. Williams, R.  Roberts, and A. McIntosh, 31–56. Farnham: Ashgate; and McIntosh, A. 2012b. Teaching Radical Ecology in the Academy. In Radical Human Ecology: Intercultural and Indigenous Approaches, ed. L. Williams, R. Roberts, and A. McIntosh, 235–57. Farnham: Ashgate. 18

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Fig. 11.1  Scharmer’s u-process as experienced in Scotland (drawn by Linda Hunter and adapted from a drawing by Kelvy Bird. Published online http://www. ottoscharmer.com/sites/default/files/Scharmer_ETU_Fig 04_ThreeMovements_Web. jpg created under the Creative Commons Licence, https://creativecommons.org/ licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/ and in Scharmer, O. 2018. Theory U: Core principles and applications. Oakland, CA: Berrett-Koehler)

ecological literacy;25 and transformational learning for sustainability26). In this way, it develops transformational leadership capacity, which is grounded in ethical and moral values and critical thinking. Central to  Orr, D. 1992. Ecological Literacy: Education for a Postmodern World. Albany, NY: State University of New York. 26  Singleton, J. 2015. Head, Heart and Hands Model for Transformative Learning: Place as Context for Changing Sustainability Values. Journal of Sustainability Education, March 16. http://www. susted.com/wordpress/content/head-heart-and-hands-model-for-transformative-learning-placeas-context-for-changing-sustainability-values_2015_03/. Accessed 1 March 2019. 25

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u.lab is the ‘u-process’ which provides a framework for learning and doing and upon which the course is based. Figure 11.1 shows a simplified version of the chronological stages of the u-process. The practice of Theory U means engaging with others and the self, learning to listen and act in new ways. Although the 500-page Theory U text-book27 is comprehensive, it is not possible to understand and practice Theory U by just reading the book. The practical nature of Theory U requires experiential, co-operative and collaborative learning.

Learning About Theory U: The Practice u.lab28 is the online course which provides the tools, practice and networking opportunities for experiential learning and which opens the door (providing the ‘know-how’29) to practice Theory U.30 The course is situated within the transformational learning field and connects ‘internal, intrapersonal transformation to external, social and systemic change’.31 Although developed by management gurus at MIT/PI, the course in Scotland appears to be less used by business people and more by activists, change-makers, facilitators, coaches, organizational designers, public sector senior staff and social entrepreneurs.32 The u.lab MOOC is not the only option for learning about Theory U. Self-directed learning is possible using the textbooks and materials on the PI website; there are the PI’s five-day ‘Foundation Programme’ (held a few times a year at different geographic locations worldwide); and courses focusing on specific tools, (e.g. Social Presencing Theatre, SPT), concerns (ethical finance and Transforming Capitalism Lab) and hub hosting (u.lab Scotland’s international ‘Hub Host Programme’).33  Scharmer, 2009 (n18).  Presencing Institute, 2018 (n17). 29  Scharmer, 2018a (n8). 30  Scharmer, O. 2018b. Theory U: Core Principles and Applications. Oakland, CA: Berrett-Koehler. 31  Pomeroy, E., and K. Oliver. 2018. Pushing the Boundaries of Self-Directed Learning: Research Findings from a Study of u.lab Participants in Scotland. International Journal of Lifelong Education: 2. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/02601370.2018.1550447 32  Winther, A., and K. Oliver. 2018. u.lab Scotland—Sharing Our Story II. Unpublished manuscript. 33  https://www.presencing.org; https://www.presencing.org/#/programs/marketplace/category/ social_presencing_theater; https://www.edx.org/course/just-money-banking-if-society-mattered27 28

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The u.lab MOOC has run five times in the last four years and is now an annual course run by Otto Scharmer, Adam Yukelson, Kelvy Bird and others through the PI’s website and MIT’s edX platform.34 Funding for the free u.lab course comes from an array of sources as it was set up as a collaborative endeavour with MIT and the PI; one source of income is an optional charge for certification on completion. For the u.lab MOOC and associated programmes, preparing for and then acting on the learning is growing into a yearly cycle. In Scotland, since 2015, over 1500 people have taken part.35 u.lab is atypical of MOOC courses, in that it is not a ‘one-way download’ of knowledge (‘banking’ education36). Learning is done offline or online in groups where technology is used to connect participants across the world and participants are invited to join both hubs and coaching circles.37 Hubs are communities of participants that tend to form around special interest groups or geographic locality (e.g. Edinburgh College, West of Scotland and Portobello hubs). They act as a support network for people participating in the course and tend to meet weekly or fortnightly to run through course learning, experiment with the tools and form coaching circles. Coaching circles can have up to six members, be set in a physical location (e.g. as part of a hub, or in an organization), or can be virtual. The PI facilitates the formation of online coaching circles, by linking people with others who have similar availability. Coaching circles are primarily for engaging with a core u.lab tool, case clinics. Some participants in Scotland have maintained their coaching circles for many years and attribute significant parts of their learning to participating in a coaching circle and/or hub. Often, in coaching circles, the connections are deep and the learning both profound and transformational.38 mitx-11-405x-1; https://www.presencing.org/#/transforming-capitalism-lab; https://ulabscot. com/tag/hub-host-programme/ 34  https://www.presencing.org and https://www.edx.org/ 35  Winther and Oliver, 2018 (n32). 36  Paolo Freire wrote 50 years ago Pedagogy of the Oppressed, where he criticized the ‘banking’ form of education—in other words rote learning and listening by downloading (n5). 37  https://www.presencing.org 38  Oliver, K., and K. Deacon. 2017. u.lab Scotland: Sharing Our Story 2015–2016. u.lab Scotland.; Pomeroy and Oliver, 2018 (n31); and Winther and Oliver, 2018 (n32).

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Fig. 11.2  The world’s first u.lab Hub Host Programme, Edinburgh, June 2017

Hubs in Scotland are supported by the u.lab Scotland network. This self-organizing network has co-created and offered an internationally recognized three-day residential ‘Hub Host Programme’ (Fig. 11.2) over the last two years, nurturing each time 50 hub host volunteers: from Scotland (Scottish participants had government-subsidized places) and overseas. Approximately 100 self-organizing hubs have formed across Scotland with each hub having at least one volunteer host or co-hosting team. People have taken part from national and local governments, the National Health Service, non-profits, charities, social enterprises and businesses. The hubs and coaching circles contain many of the features of co-­ operative education.39 For example: many become a continual learning journey for participants; they are self-organizing networks where the participants direct their own learning; volunteers have invested further in their learning by participating in the Hub Host Programme created and designed by u.lab alumni; the student brings context and develops the content of the learning in hubs; the learning happens collectively; and finally, the outcomes of the learning are realized in social contexts through the co-creation of prototypes. 39

 Co-operative University Working Group, unpublished papers; and Neary et al., 2014 (n7).

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 .lab Scotland and How u.lab Is Educating u for Civilizational Renewal Following the independence referendum in 2014, there was an ongoing discourse across the country around ‘what kind of society do we want to be?’ Members of the Scottish government sensed that there was an energy and appetite for change-makers across Scotland to come together to enact societal change. The Scottish government decided to support u.lab because it provided an approach to enable individuals and groups to engage the collective imagination and find co-operative transformational and innovative solutions to address the ‘great divides’ (social and ecological crises).40 It has funded the Hub Host Programme for Scottish participants, created the u.lab Scotland course webpages, funded research and supported the ‘holding team’. This financial and organizational support has not been directional, but has nurtured what would otherwise have been a fragile endeavour. In 2015, a group of Scottish alumni came together with the common intention of supporting and growing u.lab participation and Theory U practice. The group, the ‘holding team’ (Fig. 11.3; and includes the authors) have been holding the space for a ‘u. lab Scotland’ network over the past three years. Over the past two years, u.lab Scotland and the Scottish government have commissioned impact research.41 This has involved interviewing u.lab participants in Scotland to understand the impact participating in the course has had on them. Participants in the 2016 and 2017 u.lab 1.0x courses were found to have experienced significant and sometimes profound personal change. So, it has taken me into places I didn’t think I would go. I was purely thinking of this as just a methodology to understand the world better but actually it’s a methodology to feel the world in a different way. Chloe42

 Scharmer, O., and K. Kaufer. 2013. Leading from the Emerging Future: From Ego-System to Eco-System Economies. 41  Oliver and Deacon, 2017 (n38); Winther and Oliver, 2018 (n32). 42  Name changed for anonymity; from Winther and Oliver, 2018 (n32). 40

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Fig. 11.3  In-person u.lab Scotland holding team at Edinburgh College, May 2017

Another said: In any health programme we’ve always done the same thing the same way and expected a different result. What u.lab did for me, it gave me opportunities to have a different result rather than the same old, same old—and it did that through the tools it taught you in terms of the things like the empathy walk and shadowing and having a prototype. That’s what it did for me. It just gave me a different way to look at things. Erin43

Many of the 2017 participants either had done u.lab 1.0x multiple times or had participated in other PI or Hub Host programmes. Their narratives reveal how the learning has deepened; many participants have

43

 Ibid.

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integrated Theory U into their work or organization and others are using the skills and practice to invoke transformational change: I suppose if I was to summarise it I would just say that I’m more present and focusing on the right things; that I’m taking the time to be more reflective; I’m testing my approaches to things; I’m taking risks about doing things differently and I’m making sure that I’m taking people on the journey with me. In fact, more importantly we’re developing that journey together. Caitlin44

Both research studies suggest that participants understand and change themselves first to connect with what work they are called to do and understand more deeply what is required of them, including the internal barriers that may be stopping them from acting.45 They also interact more authentically and purposefully with others, seeing different perspectives and the value of moving from a mental model of ‘me’ to ‘we’ when it comes to seeking understanding and solutions, work with others more intentionally, creating supportive infrastructures to secure more coherent and inclusive change, and change systems through putting deeply explored and co-created ideas into iterative action, for example, Valerie’s prototype. Eva Pomeroy’s more detailed analysis of the 2016 study suggests that when participants start u.lab, they have a degree of ‘readiness’, in that they are motivated for self-discovery and transformational learning.46 All three of the authors have participated in u.lab multiple times and have attended Theory U or u.lab residential courses with two of us having hosted the Hub Host Programme. We see ourselves as examples of change-makers, u.lab practitioners and co-operative learners. In the next section, we describe how Valerie has used her u.lab learning to develop an educational prototype.

 Ibid.  Oliver and Deacon, 2017 (n38); Winther and Oliver, 2018 (n32). 46  Pomeroy and Oliver 2018, 11 (n31). 44 45

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 he Prototype: Exploring Personal Potential T and Creating Fulfilment Having worked in education for almost two decades, Valerie observed an increase in the number of students who lacked a real sense of self and purpose in what they were doing. Through her participation in u.lab, engagement with Theory U and reading Burnett and Evans,47 Valerie had an idea for a course that could help address this issue. With backing from Edinburgh College, Valerie developed a course called ‘u.explore; a PDA in Personal Development’. The first part of the course supports the students in getting to know and understand themselves better; the second helps them to explore the things they are genuinely interested in so that they can embark on a future that is truly meaningful and purposeful for them. The course is advertised through Edinburgh College’s usual promotion (via schools, social media, website). The first cohort in 2018 was quite diverse: ranging in age from 16 to 25; a mix of school leavers and individuals who had been in work; a 60/40 split female/male and with a number of different ethnic backgrounds. In order for the students to gain a recognized qualification and be eligible for government-funded places (the College course uses a fee system but the majority of students are eligible for free government-funded places or bursaries), Valerie mapped the course to a PDA at level 6 with the Scottish Qualification Authority.48 The PDA comprises four units: Self Awareness, Self and Work, Self and Community and Practical Abilities. Initially, Valerie saw the mapping process as a ‘hoop to jump through’ in order to achieve the qualification but in fact the process proved to be invaluable because it helped structure the programme. Given the students were the subject, it was important that they felt ownership of the programme so they played a significant role in co-­ creating the content. Taking each unit, in turn, Valerie worked with the students to explore topics that needed to be covered and together; the  Burnett, B., and D. Evans. 2016. Designing Your Life: Build the Perfect Career, Step by Step. London: Penguin, https://designingyour.life; and n17, n11, n18, n33, n40. 48  PDA is Personal Development Award, a Scottish Qualification Authority award (https://www. sqa.org.uk/sqa/57040.html) 47

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group identified a number of themes to form the content of the course (see Fig. 11.4). The students were then asked to rate their knowledge and experience for each theme using the following guide: beginner, improver or competent. Where students rated themselves as competent, they were paired up with a beginner and they took on a coaching role with the less experienced student. Not only did this acknowledge the experience of each participant, it also helped them develop skills including questioning, listening and coaching that were relevant to the units they were completing. The facilitation of the course involved several different approaches (Fig. 11.4). On themes where participants had no understanding, Valerie delivered workshops and provided directed learning. Students were also encouraged to find and develop appropriate resources to support the learning themes. The group planned and attended a learning day at Jupiter Artland where they were introduced to outdoor art and 3D modelling and encouraged to reflect on and share their learning. Visiting facilitators ran workshops on stress management techniques, building e-portfolio and using a website tool to help define who they are, and a role they want to pursue in the future. Although u.explore is based on Theory U, the ‘u-process’ (Fig. 11.1)49 was not followed in chronological order. Instead aspects of the ‘u-process’ were practised when relevant. Initially, students were encouraged to explore their own thoughts, feelings, knowledge and skills using reflective journaling. They were then encouraged to seek the views of others and, from this, identify the areas they wished to develop. In one workshop, a student was struggling to describe something in words so Valerie suggested the idea of expressing it without words, through the use of SPT (u.lab embodiment tool and technique)50 to unpick and articulate what was indescribable with language. The spontaneous use of SPT made it relevant to the students and relevant to the context. Empathy walks, where pairs walked together and shared thoughts, knowledge and experiences, were embedded in the programme as were sensing journeys.51 However, rather than being rigidly scheduled, these were used when the  See also n17, n18 and n30.  Social Presencing Theatre, https://www.presencing.org/aboutus/spt. See also n33. 51  u.lab tools, see n17 and n33. 49 50

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Fig. 11.4  ‘Personal development award, u.explore’ course outline (adapted from Scharmer et al.’s u.lab, https://presencing.org, Burnett and Evans, https://designingyour.life and the SQA PDA award, https://www.sqa.org.uk/sqa/57040.html)

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group needed time and space to process what was going on for them. Initially, the group was offered questions to consider in their reflective journaling, but as the group matured, they identified for themselves what they deemed to be the most relevant questions. What surprised the students was their involvement in the co-­ production of the course. They had to self-assess their existing knowledge and then identify and prioritize what they wanted to explore and learn. This was done co-operatively working in groups or in pairs. They were encouraged to find resources and source material that would help them and others learn what they needed to learn. When input was required from Valerie, she would define the requirements and then create a safe space for the students to explore potential content. Students had the freedom to find their way into subjects that sparked their curiosity and collectively supported this endeavour. None of the participants discussed mental health concerns when they were interviewed for the course. However, once trusting relationships had developed, some of the participants opened up about the issues they were experiencing. Valerie used different tools to explore these issues collectively. One such tool was ‘Emotional Stars’, a series of cards that help explore the subject of emotional intelligence. Using a pack of cards, each with an emotion written on it, Valerie asked participants to pick a card and then share their understanding of the emotion, what impact it had on them and what impact it might have on others. On reflection, Valerie believes that such activities could have been superficial had she not been involved as a co-producing participant. At times, the ‘level playing field’ made Valerie feel vulnerable; however, she recognized, that is, just how students can feel, especially when the traditional power of the tutor is evident. Operating from a place where the tutor and the participants share and learn together was a new experience for all involved. The learning journey and critical evaluation of the course can be evidenced by Valerie’s reflective journal. In the journal, Valerie voices her initial excitement, but also her fear of failure. She reflects on the usefulness of the different activities to wander into territories that can be uncomfortable or difficult to explore. For Valerie, engaging in the programme in a truly co-operative way moved her from a place of relative

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comfort to one where she felt challenged, stretched, vulnerable and at times uncertain that she was ‘doing the right thing’. But it also moved her to a place where she felt equal, excited, supported and trusted by the other participants. What started out as a diverse group of students who did not have much to say to each other and generally appeared to have little in common, ended up being a group of people who genuinely cared for one another. One student commented that he had ‘never experienced such a nurturing environment’. He said that for the first time in his life, rather than dread the thought of a Monday morning, he really looked forward to them because of the course. As relationships grew, so did the self-confidence of the participants. Recognizing personal strengths made it easier to identify areas where learning or development would be beneficial. In the course feedback, one student said, ‘I felt I belonged and the course made me aware of the things I needed to work on in my life’. Another said, ‘The course taught me to speak out, it made me feel less alone knowing there are other people in a similar situation to me not knowing what to do with their future’. A third participant said, ‘I’ve become a much more independent person and also have a much greater faith in my own abilities’. The course ran for ten hours per week over six months and, although Valerie has left Edinburgh College, the College is planning to repeat the course in 2019. There is potential to deliver this programme to a range of participants including school, college, university, people returning to work and young people who have overcome serious illness. In future, she would like to see the course enhanced by signposting to additional support or resources as required. Valerie is passionate that this course is accessible to and delivers for all young people who need it and is seeking to deliver the course in collaboration with co-operative education institutes.

Insights for radical and co-operative pedagogy MOOCs can provide exploratory methods of offering educational opportunities. Statistics show that people drop out quickly but often

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continue the course in their own time.52 The Scottish research and our own experiences point to the success of u.lab being not course completion, but rather the impact it has on individuals and the projects with which they engage. Although the impact for almost all individuals interviewed in this research was profound, we recognize that the interviewees represent only a small sample of those registered and we would welcome analysis of a broader range of u.lab participants. Given the level of impact articulated by those who were interviewed and the extent of engagement with u.lab worldwide, there are many lessons that might be useful for future CHE projects. u.lab and u.explore are unique experiments, but were not designed as CHE courses (the subject of this book). Nor can u.lab be said to be co-­ operative education as the course content, design and methodology are held by a core team.53 However, engagement with the course can be highly tailored by the individual.54 Also, co-operative learning happens within u.lab, especially within hubs and coaching circles; and alumni, either individually or collaboratively, have re-used u.lab material for further education in both u.lab, and other contexts, for example, hubs, the Hub Host Programme and u.explore. Also, u.lab and u.explore have features in common with co-operative education pedagogy and values, for example: the course material is freely available and accessible; the learning continues beyond the course duration and can become a lifelong project; u.lab challenges people to engage critically with the world around them, but with a lens of empathy and compassion, and then act with agency to invigorate social renewal. u.explore is more like an experiment in co-operative education than u.lab because of the role of the student in designing the u.explore course and assessment methods. u.explore was a first for Edinburgh College in that the heart of the pedagogy was ‘the teacher learns and the learners teach’. u.explore could be said to be an

 Onah, D. F. O., J. Sinclair, and R. Boyatt. 2014. Dropout Rates of Massive Open Online Courses: Behavioural Patterns. Conference: In Proceedings of the 6th International Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies (EDULEARN14), Barcelona, Spain. The authors do not have the statistics on course completion for u.lab. 53  Neary et al., 2014 (n7). 54  Pomeroy and Oliver, 2018 (n31). 52

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example of the radical pedagogy of ‘student as producer’ and it resists the concept of the student as consumer.55 A potential limitation with both u.lab and u.explore is accessibility. The language and culture together with learner ‘readiness’ (see below)56 have the potential to make the course exclusive, limiting the accessibility of transformational learning. Based on our own experiences and participant feedback, some u.lab participants have found the intellectual language and intensity of learning at the start off-putting, but this has been partly addressed by PI 2018 course refinements and Scharmer’s new publication.57 To overcome language and cultural barriers, some alumni have taken to ‘smuggling’ Theory U into learning contexts, especially in certain community and organizational contexts such as the Scottish NHS.58 Similarly, Valerie has attempted this ‘smuggling’ with u.explore, engaging students in a u-process without explicitly explaining Theory U. u.lab appears to be most relevant to participants who have a degree of learner ‘readiness’, meaning that participants are likely to have an underlying motivation to participate and a willingness to learn.59 The challenge is to take Theory U to those who do not perceive the need for it, but who could learn and benefit from it. A deeper understanding of its usefulness and limitations in innovative contexts could help this. As an innovation, u.explore is still nascent and needs funding to enhance it and extend it to a wider audience. A challenge for both courses is how to create ­opportunities and make the learning accessible for those who have not yet discovered their agency but who would likely benefit from the experience of such learning.60 At the start of u.explore, students had to gain confidence and build their capabilities before they could take on more of a directional role in their learning, which meant that involvement of the students in design Neary et al., 2014 (n7); Boden, R., and D. Epstein. 2006. Managing the Research Imagination: Globalization and Research in Higher Education. Globalization, Societies and Education 4 (2): 223–36. 56  Pomeroy and Oliver, 2018 (n31). 57  Oliver and Deacon, 2017 (n38); Winther and Oliver, 2018 (n32); Scharmer, 2018b (n30). 58  Winther and Oliver, 2018 (n32). 59  Pomeroy and Oliver, 2018, 11 (n31). 60  Benjamin, 1934, Neary et al., 2014 (n7). 55

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ing and assessing increased with time. Evolutionary change in the power relationships between students and lecturers is not unusual.61 Schiller et al. question the degree of student ‘under-preparedness’ in their cohort of students and whether hesitancy at the start was the unnecessarily formal approach of the lecturer.62 On the other hand, u.lab alumni voiced their need to develop themselves (both cognitively and emotionally) before they felt they could take action in the social field.63 Student ‘under-­ preparedness’ for co-operation is something that has been voiced as a concern at Co-operative University Working Group meetings64; we acknowledge that the notion of ‘under-preparedness’ needs further scrutiny, given its aspects likely relate to power, personal capacities and experience, language, culture and pedagogy. Making students active in designing their own lives65 is a contributor to developing well-being and this in itself has been shown to increase academic performance.66 Well-being is important, given suicide is the second leading cause of death among 15–29-year-olds globally.67 The experience of students indicates u.explore’s potential for providing a way of enhancing well-being and helping students to pursue a path that aligns with their motivations and capabilities.68 This indicates that the course should be more widely available and promoted to encourage students to engage with this type of learning. We started this chapter by challenging the purpose of education and identifying the need for education to change: where education for education’s sake is no longer enough. The u.lab course has societal renewal at its heart and is one of the few change leadership approaches that the  For example, Schiller, U., P. Jaffray, T. Ridley, and C. Du Plessis. 2018. Facilitating a Participatory Action Learning Action Research Process in a Higher Educational Context. Action Research. https:// doi.org/10.1177/1476750318776715 62  Ibid. 63  Oliver and Deacon, 2017 (n38); Winther and Oliver, 2018 (n32). 64  Pers. obs. and Co-operative University Working Group 2018, unpublished proceedings. 65  Burnett, B., and D. Evans. 2016. Designing Your Life: Build the Perfect Career, Step by Step. London: Penguin. See also https://designingyour.life 66  Adler, A. 2016. Teaching Well-Being Increases Academic Performance: Evidence From Bhutan, Mexico, and Peru. Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations. 1572. University of Pennsylvania. 67  WHO, 2018 (n1). 68  An example illustrating this is the quote at the start of this chapter. 61

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authors know of in the mainstream that does this. The experiments in this chapter describe how education has the potential to build self-esteem, confidence, self-love and self-respect; change students’ views to be more compassionate to the whole Earth and create agency to help participants become active in designing their own lives and the social world (creating a progressive society).69 ‘Knowing how’ to do this is fundamental in these challenging, uncertain and precarious times for humanity and the planet.70 The lessons from these experiments lead us to conclude that we need to nurture transformational forms of learning within CHE approaches so as to develop passion, curiosity, caring, initiative, criticality, agency and ‘know-how’ in our young and older people.

 Barnett, R. 2018. The Ecological University: A Feasible Utopia. London: Routledge; Benjamin, 1934 (n7); Burnett and Evans, 2016 (n65). 70  Scharmer, 2018a (n8). 69

12 Collaging with Co-operators: An Arts-­ Based Inquiry into Member Perceptions of Co-operative Higher Education Hannah Bland

Introduction The emancipatory tradition in education, and its commitment to collective knowledge production, is said to be threatened by decades of neoliberal policy that has positioned students as consumers and Higher Education (HE) as a business.1 This chapter explores a radically different response to this context—the formation of autonomous HE co-ops. Qualitative fieldwork across three sites seeks to understand the lived meaning of co-operative HE, and the implications for democratic education as a networked movement of grassroots practice. As an intervention that develops or alters one’s abilities, values and understandings of the world, education, and the way it produces and shapes the social world, is of profound interest to academics, activists and  See Giroux, H. 2014. Neoliberalism’s War on Higher Education. Chicago: Haymarket Books; Maisuria, A., and M. Cole. 2017. The Neoliberalization of Higher Education in England: An Alternative Is Possible. Policy Futures in Education 15: 602–19. 1

H. Bland (*) Independent, Fordingbridge, UK © The Author(s) 2019 M. Noble, C. Ross (eds.), Reclaiming the University for the Public Good, Palgrave Critical University Studies, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-21625-2_12

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politicians alike.2 Yet, differing ideas of progress have meant the role of education in society has never been clear cut. Rooted in an understanding of power as maintained through internalised ideals that position certain values, behaviours and characteristics as norms, the emancipatory tradition in education seeks to cultivate a critical consciousness through which individuals recognise themselves as agents of social production.3 With a critique that authoritative education domesticates a population into accepting existing context as truth, critical pedagogies promote democratic participatory processes and problem-posing stimuli whereby individuals question assumptions and generate a critical and collective consciousness that mobilises active citizenship.4 While the critical tradition is long standing in the theory and practice of adult education, many have argued that the meaning of post-­ compulsory education has “steered right” in the face of a neoliberal capitalist culture.5 As an ideology for the social world that mirrors free-market capitalism, neoliberalism promotes ideals of self-responsibility, assumptions of equal opportunity and a depiction of progress as an individualist pursuit of competitive personal advancement. The meaning, practice and institutions of post-compulsory education have come to be defined through a neoliberal agenda that both impedes efforts to practise emancipatory pedagogies and actively reproduces the structures and inequalities of the existing social world.6 With unemployment posed as a failure  See Brookfield, S. D., and J. D. Holst. 2010. Radicalizing Learning: Adult Education for a Just World. San Francisco: John Wiley & Sons; Giroux, H. 2014. Neoliberalism’s War on Higher Education. Chicago: Haymarket Books; Stanley, W. B. 1992. Curriculum for Utopia: Social Reconstructionism and Critical Pedagogy the Postmodern Era. New York: State University of New York Press. 3  See Freire, P. 1970. Pedagogy of the Oppressed. New York: Seabury. 4  See Darder, A., M. Barltodano, and R. D. Torres. The Critical Pedagogy Reader. London: RoutledgeFalmer; Freire, P. 1970. Pedagogy of the Oppressed. New York: Seabury. 5  See Brookfield, S. D., and J. D. Holst. 2010. Radicalizing Learning: Adult Education for a Just World. San Francisco: John Wiley & Sons. 6  See Amsler, S., and C. Canaan. 2008. Whither Critical Education in the Neoliberal University? Two Practitioners’ Reflections on Constraints and Possibilities. Enhancing Learning in the Social Sciences 2: 1–31; Canaan, J. 2010. Analysing a “Neoliberal Moment” in English Higher Education Today. Learning and Teaching 3 (2): 55–72; Harney, S., and F. Moten. 2004. The University and the Undercommons: Seven Theses. Social Text 22: 101–15; Read, J. 2009. University Experience: Neoliberalism Against the Commons. In Toward a Global Autonomous University, ed. The Edu2

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to compete, individuals in a neoliberal context are expected to manage risk through perpetual education and self-development.7 In this context the common good discourse is trumped by that which proposes education’s power as a personal asset. As an asset, knowledge can be objectified as private property and the process of its production thereby determined by a consumer relation and concerns of value-for-money and customer satisfaction.8 The democratising visions of dialogical and reflective inquiry into an unknown are thus impeded by the concerns over personal risk-­ management experienced by both students (facing debt and uncertain futures) and educators (facing institutional performativity measures and employment precarity).9

 o How are Educators and Students S Responding? As part of a global movement emerging in response to the notion of education’s commodification, towns and cities across the UK are seeing the formation of experimental projects in co-operative post-compulsory learning. In the wake of a change in policy that facilitates alternative proFactory Collective, 151–3. New York: Automedia; Cote, M., R. Day, and G. de Peuter. 2007. Utopian Pedagogy: Creating Radical Alternatives in the Neoliberal Age. The Review of Education, Pedagogy, and Cultural Studies 29: 317–6; The Edu-Factory Collective. 2009. Towards a Global Autonomous University. New York: Autonomedia; Hall, M. 2017. Against Academic Labour and the Dehumanization of Educational Possibility. In Negotiating Neoliberalism: Developing Alternative Educational Visions, ed. T. Rudd and I. Goodson, 27–40. Rotterdam: Sense Publishers; Williams, J. 2009. The Pedagogy of Debt. In Toward a Global Autonomous University, ed. The Edu-Factory Collective, 89–96. New York: Automedia. 7  See Bauman, Z. 2013. Learning to Walk on Quicksand: Lifelong Learning and Liquid Life. In Learning with Adults: A Reader, ed. P. Mayo, 9–18. Rotterdam: Sense Publishers. 8  See Maisuria, A., and M. Cole. 2017. The Neoliberalization of Higher Education in England: An Alternative Is Possible. Policy Futures in Education 15: 602–19. 9  See Amsler, S., and C. Canaan. 2008. Whither Critical Education in the Neoliberal University? Two Practitioners’ Reflections on Constraints and Possibilities. Enhancing Learning in the Social Sciences 2: 1–31; Canaan, J. 2010. Analysing a “Neoliberal Moment” in English Higher Education Today. Learning and Teaching 3 (2): 55–72; Harney, S., and F. Moten. 2004. The University and the Undercommons: Seven Theses. Social Text 22: 101–15; Read, J. 2009. University Experience: Neoliberalism Against the Commons. In Toward a Global Autonomous University, ed. The EduFactory Collective, 151–53. New York: Automedia.

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viders to gain degree-awarding powers, a number of these locally ­constituted initiatives are now seeking federation as an accredited cooperative university. Yet, with little research as to the meaning of these co-ops to members directly involved, discussions about a collective vision are limited. As a reconfiguration of labour relations that is premised on democracy, self-help and member control, the co-operative form has been considered hopeful as an alternative that avoids the conditions and relations of the neoliberal institution. However, despite the member-control and collective responsibility that the co-operative form is formally premised upon, many co-operatives see differences in levels of participation, senses of ownership and lived meanings within their memberships, and struggle to realise genuine democratic member-control. This chapter discusses findings from the qualitative research undertaken whilst visiting three pre-eminent England-based co-ops: Lincoln Social Science Centre, Leicester Vaughan College and Free University Brighton. Findings are drawn from collaging workshops in which participating members explored and expressed their subjective understanding of their co-op’s meaning, including its nature, purpose, place and aspiration. Discussing both patterns and inconsistencies across cases, the research addresses a common vision for co-operative HE. Reading commonality in seeming incompatibility, the chapter generates conversation as to how we might understand, speak of, and federate the highly heterogeneous phenomenon of co-operative HE.

Research Overview In order to understand the phenomenon of co-operative HE, the central question that guided this research is: What do three co-operative HE initiatives mean to those directly involved in them? The phenomenon of HE co-ops is complicated by varying understandings of Higher Education. Much of what is often included in visions of HE does not fit its traditional ideals of research-based teaching and learning, but rather includes varied practices of post-compulsory education.

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Additionally, co-operatives take variant legal forms and structures according to their localised visions. With the emergence of new co-operativism (less formalised voluntary-based collectives), what might be considered a co-op is no longer limited to those legally registered with national apex bodies or meeting the agreed set of values and principles forwarded by the International Co-operative Alliance. As such co-operative HE is a phenomenon of significant variability as is the case with the three case studies.

The Three Cases 1. Emerging in response to the trebling of tuition fees and cuts to funding for the arts and humanities in 2010, Free University Brighton (FUB) is the oldest of the three cases in this study. FUB is an informally constituted initiative which utilises free venues across Brighton and Hove, a small city in South East England. Managed solely by volunteers, FUB uses an online calendar, forum and “wishlist” to co-­ ordinate the sharing of knowledge and skills for anyone seeking to learn or teach. There are no qualification requirements (for teacher or student members) at any FUB activity and the activities range significantly in level, subject, form and course length. There are currently two undergraduate-level degree programmes, validated by external academics, and taught by volunteers with experience teaching in universities. 2. Lincoln Social Science Centre (LSSC), as discussed in Chap. 5 of this volume, was established as a co-operative in 2011 and is founded on ideals of democratising intellectual labour. Like FUB, LSSC is a voluntary-­ run initiative with an open membership structure, but involves members, referred to as “scholars”, who engage in forms of Bachelor’s to PhD-level education premised on a vision of the co-­ operative knowledge-productive process as a collective and collaborative inquiry. 3. Leicester Vaughan College (LVC) is another distinctly different example of co-operative HE.  As explained in Chap. 7, LVC emerged in direct response to the disestablishment of the Vaughan Centre (the

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department of adult education) of the University of Leicester in 2017. The 150-year-old legacy of Reverend Vaughan’s adult education, means adult-centred night classes and the supportive and flexible Vaughan approach, has a strong rootedness in Leicester’s local community. Legally established as a Community Benefit Society, LVC hopes to address a lack of provision of adult education through the continuation of Vaughan as an independent, financially sustainable co-operative.

Collage as Method The methodological approach used in this research was to hold collaging workshops for members of the co-ops. As a data-generative method, workshops allow responses to be explored collaboratively,10 enabling a sense of co-production in research. Arts-based methods, in turn, enable participants to communicate meaning unconstrained by available verbal language,11 and as such were considered appropriate for this research project; ideas undefined by the educational and institutional discourses of today may be more easily uncovered. Hoping to avoid internalised scripts members may have unconsciously adopted by practised explanation and advocation of their initiatives, collage proved a particularly useful craft as it constrains possibility to available materials, forcing a reflective productive response. Collage is assembled gradually and additively; as they worked participants continued to flick through and cut out materials, stimulating rich and unpredictable discussion. This continuous revisal prompts original intentions to give way to unexpected responses through a reflective process.12 Finally, the craft originated as a form of  See Caretta, M. A., and E. Vacchelli. 2015. Rethinking the Boundaries of the Focus Group: A Reflexive Analyses on the Use and Legitimacy of Group Methodologies in Qualitative Research. Sociological Research Online 20 (4). 11  See Butler-Kisber, L., and T. Poldma. 2010. The Power of Visual Approaches in Qualitative Inquiry: The Use of Collage Making and Concept Mapping in Experiential Research. Journal of Research Practice 6 (2); Davis, D., and L. Butler-Kisber. 1999. Arts-Based Representation in Qualitative Research: Collage as a Contextualizing Analytic Strategy. Annual Meeting of American Educational Research Association, Montreal. 12  See Butler-Kisber, L. 2007. Collage as Analysis and Representation in Qualitative Inquiry. In The Art of Visual Inquiry, ed. G. Knowles, A. Cole, L. Neilsen, and C. Luciani. Halifax, NS: Backalong; 10

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twentieth-century critique; through collage, surrealists resisted the brackets of what could be considered art (Davis and Butler-Kisber 1999).13 As such, its process and its history make the collaging workshop an appropriate method for this inquiry; it is able to generate in-depth thoughtful data and, through its critical, transitional, collaborative and productive character, can be considered in line with co-operative pedagogy, process, practice and tradition. An open-call via each co-op’s existing communication method was used to recruit participants. At FUB, I posted in the online learning portal, at SSC it was a group email address, at LVC a gatekeeper spoke to members directly. A total of 15 individuals participated in the study: 4 FUB members, 6 LSSC members and 5 LVC members. Four two-hour audio-recorded workshops were held, one workshop in Brighton, one in Leicester and two in Lincoln. In each workshop, the researcher took the role of facilitator and presented a stimulant question: “What does [name of co-op] mean to you?” After 30–50 minutes of discussion in which subjective and collective understandings were explored, participants were invited to create collages to express the meaning of their co-ops using materials including magazines, newspapers and university prospecti. At FUB, participants worked side by side, assisting one another, but focussing on personal meanings. The Lincoln workshops resulted in a combination of two collaborative and two individual collages. In Leicester, participants chose to create three “inseperable” collages, expressing “what LVC is not”, “what LVC has been” and “what we hope LVC to be”. The final 20 minutes of each workshop involved participants describing and explaining the visuals.

Butler-Kisber, L., and T. Poldma. 2010. The Power of Visual Approaches in Qualitative Inquiry: The Use of Collage Making and Concept Mapping in Experiential Research. Journal of Research Practice 6 (2); Caretta, M. A., and E. Vacchelli. 2015. Rethinking the Boundaries of the Focus Group: A Reflexive Analyses on the Use and Legitimacy of Group Methodologies in Qualitative Research. Sociological Research Online 20 (4); Vacchelli, E. 2017. Embodiment in Qualitative Research: Collage Making with Migrant, Refugee and Asylum Seeking Women. Qualitative Research 18 (2): 171–90. 13  See Davis, D., and L. Butler-Kisber. 1999. Arts-based Representation in Qualitative Research: Collage as a Contextualizing Analytic Strategy. Annual meeting of American Educational Research Association, Montreal. Retried from https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED431790.pdf

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Findings Data for this research comprise 11 visual collages and eight hours of transcribed audio-recorded dialogue. Despite considerable differences across the three co-ops, this study showed significant commonalities in how each was expressed by its members. Commonalities existed not only in the images chosen but also in the metaphor and meaning attached to them as well as the discussion and process the groups took. Explored as “themes” and noteworthy aspects of meaning, the five commonalities that emerged are as follows: 1. Co-ops expressed as situated in and against a problematic context. In their responses to “what does [name of co-op] mean to you?”, participants of each co-op expressed a problem in the contemporary local context. Although images of monarchy, parliament and wealth disparity demonstrated the focus of criticism to include wide sociopolitical contexts, dissatisfaction with contemporary institutional education was of consistent importance. Verbal and visual data from all workshops expressed criticism from inequality of access to non-transformative outcomes. For example, members of each co-op identified fees, entry requirements and institutional culture to be barriers to participation in mainstream university education. Yet, further critique of institutions having “abandoned their civic mission” (Charles14 LVC) and using approaches that teach students “to uphold a system and not to question it” (Lianne FUB), and become “complicit worker bees” (Dan, LSSC), suggested a satisfactory solution would not solely be about widening participation, but would need to tackle the education itself. With regard to expressing the meaning of the co-op, therefore, this first thematic served as both a point of distinction and of justification, and in doing so situated meaning within an underlying narrative of immanent necessity (Fig. 12.1). 2. Co-op expressed as freedom. Images of unlocked doors and uncaged birds and text reading 100% FREE, OPEN TO ALL and ESCAPE were all described through stories  Names used in this chapter are pseudonyms.

14

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Fig. 12.1  “What LVC is not”, participating members of Leicester Vaughan College

of a lived sense of freedom. This freedom was discussed in reference to co-ops’ accessibility, whether due to open and democratic structure at LSSC, a welcoming and inclusive culture at FUB, and a supportive pedagogical approach at LVC. In addition to freedom of access, responses also suggested a freedom from the external world, where the co-op is positioned as refuge. For example, members of LVC and FUB described how teachers’ who were constrained in university roles enjoyed teaching “how they want” (Sue), an LVC collage read SANCTUARY, and LSSC was described as a place for members who “are very angry with the current situation in the world and are in education…to let off steam” (Annabelle). Finally, presented in images ranging from a “big powerful moon” (Lianne) to a microphone, members of each co-op described their escape from constraints as enabling the freedom to contribute to a range of activities, from campaigning to protect provision to engaging in research. The experience of being listened to, supported and valued prompted

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belief in themselves as knowledge workers; Cara learned to feel “more confident to say yes I am a scholar” and contribute to LSSC’s dialogical approach; Lianne, whose past had taught her “to keep quiet”, realised that at FUB “[she] can say [her] opinion again, and people listen, and [she] won’t be told off for being embarrassing or stupid”; for Heather, LVC was an “escape from” her “self-doubt”, which prompted an engagement in academia that she “would never have dreamt” to have. As such freedom appears to be a consistent element in what these co-ops mean to participating members. Given that its expression attended to a sense of constraint prior or external to the co-operative, freedom seemed situated in relation to the first thematic; freedom is not a liberal opportunity but an emancipation from (internal and/or external) oppression (Fig. 12.2). 3. Co-op expressed as a work-in-progress. Providing a directional relationship between the first and second thematic, images of experimentation, cultivation (as growing) and creation

Fig. 12.2  “What FUB means to me”, Yvette (member of Free University Brighton)

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(building/drawing) emphasised the co-op as a productive project. Members of each co-op expressed meaning through memories, aspirations and immediate dilemmas regarding the realisation of ideals. This created a sense that the co-op was unfinished, and as such a work-in-­ progress. In expressing the meaning of LVC, for instance, participating members opted to create one collage solely focussed on envisioned futures. The collage included text reading BURSARIES, DEGREES & DIPLOMAS and members discussed aspirations that were “more than [they] can manage right now” (Charles) and included a “flat pay structure…full-time teaching salary…[and] break[ing] down the barrier between teaching and admin” (Charles). The changing nature of FUB was expressed not in collages, but rather in the discussion they prompted. As participating members used imagery to express diversity, openness, and distinction from “elitist” (James) universities, they reflected on the extent FUB met those ideals. Prompted by these reflections, workshop discussion involved consideration of barriers to participation and brainstorming of ideas (including changing the name) to further their ideals. As such, in attempting to express the meaning of FUB, participating members communicated that the vision was not yet realised and, as  Yvette’s stated,  “FUB is evolving and growing stronger”. In both Lincoln workshops attention was paid to the immediate dilemmas the group faced, describing an uncertainty of what exactly the co-op meant at that time. Yet this thematic was evident not as a temporary state but rather something innate to the co-op’s meaning; Liam described the co-op as a “fluid space” and Dianne and Annabelle’s collaborative collage (below) referenced learning to swim and an experiment as prominent features of the co-op’s meaning (Annabelle). For members, dilemmas prompted “fascinating” (Dianne) and “stimulating” (Annabelle) discussions, and are “a positive thing because it’s about creating something which hasn’t been created before” (Kevin) (Fig. 12.3). 4. Co-op expressed as a social/collective endeavour. Expressed in text reading COMMUNITY, FRIENDS, CARE and images of groups, people and hands connecting, a fourth common ­articulation of co-ops’ meaning refers to its social and mutual character.

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Fig. 12.3  “What LSSC means to us”, Dianne and Annabelle (members of Lincoln Social Science Centre)

In explaining these images, participating members of all co-ops described the non-hierarchical relations both in teaching roles and in the co-­ operative community as a whole. Again, this theme existed through its connections with the previous themes. For example, the sense of community at the co-ops was emphasised as distinct from members’ critiques of university education and was discussed as integral to members’ escape from self-doubt. Explaining his commitment to taking on administrative roles at FUB, James stated: “we’re all members and we all join in”. In explaining that LSSC was not service, Annabelle echoed James’ sentiment: “we’re making it for ourselves and each other”. Finally, in explanation of the grassroots nature of the co-op as a new institution for adult education in Leicester, Charles said “we are doing the thing for ourselves”. Thus, although the product of co-operation varied from knowledge to employment, the sense of common endeavour was a significant shared feature of articulated meaning (Fig. 12.4).

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Fig. 12.4  “What LSSC means to me”, Cara (member of Lincoln Social Science Centre)

5. An intrinsic significance or meaning “beyond”. Although articulations of each co-op included critique of contemporary educational institutions and the pursuit of a values-based alternative, it was apparent that the meaning of the co-ops did not lie in education alone. An additional significance, unique to each co-ops narrative and beyond tangible outcomes of co-operative education, was the way participating members discussed meaning of their co-ops. Attention to the value of Vaughan’s provision, for instance, was expressed always within a context of critique of the university management’s decision to disestablish the centre. From the continuous referral to the “big university that doesn’t really care” (Rebekah), the meaning of securing Vaughan’s provision was politicised. Evident not as three fragmented collages, a s­ignificance existed in the narrative relationship between them; critique, experience and aspiration together creating a determined affirmation of value that is a refusal to submit to Vaughan’s university-sanctioned disappearance.

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Although FUB’s importance was emphasised through its highly accessible, critical and political curricula, discussion suggested a significance beyond the content outcome. Discussing the role of accessible online resources, Lianne explained, “We all share the opinion that it’s wonderful to meet people that we would never normally meet and so sitting at home with the online thing, it defeats the purpose”, suggesting the “purpose” is not solely in educational content but in the process of being together. Certainly, while all participants were on the Freegree programme, none indicated that completion of the four years would end their involvement in FUB and all emphasised joy in both learning and friendship to be prime motivators.15 It was apparent that the meaning of FUB was beyond straightforward education, and rather as a social experience of building a community of practice. Finally, in Lincoln, Annabelle explained that “the notion of that [‘Do it Ourselves’] course was more important than its outcomes”. This notion was given further meaning in the second workshop when Liam and Kevin both described LSSC as an “idea”. Described as existing “above the empirical reality” (Kevin), the co-op, as an alternative form of organising knowledge work, had meaning as a critique that prompts reflection on existing forms and ideas of what education can be. In doing so, one meaning of LSSC was intrinsic to being alternative and beyond the actual happenings or outcomes of the co-op. Thus, whether as a defiance in validation, a joy in the social participation, or an idea in being alternative, meaning existed not in the outcome, or desired outcome, of the co-op as an educational institution, but rather as something intrinsic to the act of co-operation (Fig. 12.5).

Discussion Considered as definable elements in the common understanding of co-­ operative HE across members of variant cases, these five common features provide implications for co-operatives as new and alternative forms  http://freeuniversitybrighton.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Freegree-Courses-2018-19.pdf. Accessed 1 March 2019.

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Fig. 12.5  “What FUB means to me”, Lianne (member of Free University Brighton)

of educational institution: a sense of freedom, community and possibility (as expressed in the works-in-progress theme), stand against stories of stress, immobilisation and the consumer relation at the modern university.16 What is more, the non-hierarchical, participatory and social nature of the co-ops, central to members’ understanding of the meaning of these initiatives, fit long-standing principles of democratising pedagogies; such conditions are thought conducive for an education capable of cultivating critical citizenship and collective emancipation.17 As such, as a reclaiming of the university for the public good, the findings show a number of ways  See Amsler, S., and J. Canaan. 2008. Whither Critical Education in the Neoliberal University? Two Practitioners’ Reflections on Constraints and Possibilities. Enhancing Learning in the Social Sciences 1 (2): 1–31; Canaan, J. 2010. Analysing a “Neoliberal Moment” in English Higher Education Today. Learning and Teaching 3 (2): 55–72; Read, J. 2009. University Experience: Neoliberalism Against the Commons. In Toward a Global Autonomous University, ed. The EduFactory Collective, 151–3. New York: Automedia. 17  See Dewey, J. 1916. Democracy and Education. New York, NY: Macmillan; Freire, P. 1970. Pedagogy of the Oppressed. New York: Seabury; Freire, P. 1997. Pedagogy of the Heart. New York: Continuum. 16

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in which the meaning of co-operative HE resists and transcends education as a tool of capitalist reproduction; the meanings members ascribed exposed possibilities for democratisation in process and in outcome of knowledge work. The alienation and individuation of capitalist work is explained in Marxist theory through a value-in-motion process that translates concrete labour (doing) to abstract labour (exchange value) and which separates workers from their productivity.18 Existing literature forwards the workers’ co-operative model and questions the need for traditional “academic” and “student” roles and champions the creation of HE practices that promote the idea of knowledge as a form of social wealth.19 Yet, this research points to additional possibilities. The fifth theme retains significance untranslatable for exchange; the enjoyment of being together, the idea of being alternative and the refusal to be made invisible, all retain an intrinsic value in concrete labour and thus disrupt a capitalist agenda. Similarly, an understanding of the co-op as an unfinished social project, rather than say an established education provider, negates the dislocation of members’ from their co-operative productivity. Research findings also prompt ways of thinking about socially transformative educational institutions beyond being solely a space in which learning happens. Firstly, Kevin’s understanding of LSSC as an idea “to be argued about” positions the co-op as curricula in itself; as a critique, LSSC generates reflection as to the inevitability of contemporary educational forms not among its members but in the wider public. Secondly, the five themes can be read not as pedagogical conditions or learning outcomes but rather as narrative, by which the co-op becomes not solely a space for learning but, as others have suggested,20 a process of problem-­ based learning itself. Indeed members’ attention to stimulating and fascinating dilemmas and a realised sense of mutuality and collective possibility  See De Angelis, M. 2007. The Beginning of History: Value Struggles and Global Capital. London: Pluto; Dinerstein, A. C., and M. Neary. 2002. The Labour Debate: An Investigation into the Theory and Reality of Capitalist Work. Aldershot: Ashgate. 19  See Neary, M., and J. Winn. 2016. Against Academic Identity. Higher Education Research & Development 35 (2): 409–12. 20  See Macpherson, I. 2015. Mainstreaming Some Lacunae: Developing Co-operative Studies as an Interdisciplinary, International Field of Enquiry. In Co-operation, Learning, and Co-operative Values, ed. Tom Woodin. New York: Routledge. 18

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do account for such educational possibility. Finally, the critical pedagogical tradition suggests that critical consciousness prompts democratic subjectivities and a resulting mobilisation. While participants at FUB did mention spin-off groups in the community, members’ actions were not primarily manifested in external collective action but rather in investment in the co-ops themselves; Brian joined a campaign to support Vaughan, James took on administrative tasks to support FUB, and members of LSSC actively engaged in dilemmas over democratising labour in the co-operative. As such, different from a means to igniting social action, as liberatory education is often positioned, these co-ops presented social action in themselves as forms of reclamation (LVC), emancipation (FUB) and prefiguration (LSSC). Nevertheless, contradictions do exist within the common themes that raise important issue for understanding co-operative HE and wider efforts to form new educational institutions. Members of LVC’s interest in accreditation contradicts members of Lincoln SSC’s belief that avoiding traditional qualifications was important for being “a real alternative” (Kevin). The fact that “bite-size” video resources facilitated the sense of freedom that Lianne experienced at FUB seems incompatible with the freedom expressed by participating members of LSSC; such videos were an explicitly used example of the “digestible education” (Dan) that members sought to escape. Furthermore, while in all cases members emphasised a sense of equality, the practice that it was attributed was paradoxical, the freedom and community sensed by members of LVC were attributed to a valued adult-focussed pedagogy and required professional educators for whom a fair wage was an “absolute red line”(Charles). The voluntary basis of FUB, on the other hand, contributed to James’ sense that “teachers are the same” as student members, which prompted a sense of both equality and responsibility central to his expression of the co-op’s meaning. Finally, members of SSC’s attention to co-operative effort in knowledge production avoided categorical distinctions all together. These contradictions are neglected when dislocated from contextualised meaning for thematic comparison, yet attending to the findings as localised narratives gives meaning to difference as coherent narratives of autonomy. While creating a free and open HE was of importance to participants in the Lincoln workshops, attention was paid primarily to

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“­ creating something which hasn’t been created before” and avoiding consumer culture. As its in-depth and collaborative approach to inquiry was expressed as in contrast to education as a service, it is cogent that LSSC avoids traditional roles and state-accreditation, and that members emphasise the labour and commitment required. At FUB, however, a lack of obligation to do assessments enabled members to try subjects that they would otherwise have avoided (due to lack of confidence or motivation), and to meet people from different backgrounds. Consequently, a sense of mutual responsibility, as expressed by participating members of FUB, was not a constitutional imperative but rather something learned through lived interdependence as a co-operator. Members’ articulations of FUB situated the co-op within a critique of institutional education and a wider social context that does not encourage critical reflection or disruptive enquiry. This lack of critical consciousness was referred to as a form of imprisonment; members expressed concerned that without critical education people learn to accept the news they read as fact and wealth disparity as norm thus exacerbating social and political polarisation. By presenting meaning within a narrative of exclusion and imprisonment, easing access seems not subsumption into consumer culture but an act for democratisation. Finally, members expressed the meaning of LVC through a critique that agendas of profit and employability threaten part-time adult education. Escaping both the university “that doesn’t care” and a mature students’ self-doubt, freedom was an affirmation of adult education. A context of dismissal creates the politicised significance of this affirmation of value and consequently the critical nature of both waged profession and accredited learning; the co-op affirms adults as valued students and adult education as a valued profession. As such, in a context of a ­disappearing adult education, the affirmation of traditional roles becomes evidence not of subsumption to capitalist values but rather of autonomy in the validation process. Considering both the inconsistencies and the contextualised significance that defined elements and their interdependence, the meaning of co-operative HE seemed best understood not as a form of knowledge work (of research, dialogical education or teaching adults), but rather the pursuit of autonomy in knowledge work; understood as a story of co-­

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operative problem-solving. These three co-operative experiments tell of three very different struggles; FUB responds to exclusion by widening access; LSSC responds to consumerism by sharing labour and LVC responds to its disestablishment by the mainstream university by affirming its existence and legitimacy. In a context of inequality, consumerism and institutional managerialism, these co-ops illustrate different forms of resistance against educations’ neoliberalisation; autonomy in participation (FUB), autonomy in social organisation (SSC) and autonomy in value-process (LVC).

Concluding Thoughts By promoting competition and consumerism, the neoliberal agenda has been considered a significant threat to practising HE conducive for the advancement of democracy. As a values-based reconfiguration of the institutional form, the co-operative model has, in contrast, been viewed with some optimism as both an immediate response to, and a radical reimagination of, contemporary British HE.21 This research sought to identify and inform a common understanding for the co-op HE network as well as the wider movement seeking to liberate education from its role in capitalist reproduction. Qualitative research explored how members of three highly variant co-­ ops understand the meaning of these initiatives. Data in the form of collage and dialogue presents both hope and dilemma. Five commonalities were evident in responses of members of Lincoln Social Science Centre, Free University Brighton and Leicester Vaughan College; in each workshop, considerable attention was paid to critique of contemporary context (in regard to both HE and wider sociopolitical issues), which situated the meaning of the co-op in a narrative of responsive innovation.  See Hall, R., and J. Winn. 2017. Mass Intellectuality and Democratic Leadership in Higher Education. London: Bloomsbury Academic; Neary, M., and J. Winn. 2017. There Is an Alternative: A Report on an Action Research Project to Develop a Framework for Co-operative Higher Education. Learning and Teaching: The International Journal of Higher Education in the Social Sciences 10 (1): 87–105; Ridley, D. 2017. Institutionalising Critical Pedagogy: Lessons from Against and Beyond the Neo-liberal University. Power and Education 9 (1): 65–81. 21

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Additionally, articulations of each co-op included attention to community, freedom and a sense that the co-op is unfinished in its current form. Finally, despite the first four themes presenting co-ops as living institutions in which autonomous groups engage in a problem-based process of democratising knowledge work, in all cases, members emphasised significance beyond the co-op’s educational activity. The five themes suggest a meaning for co-operative HE that stands in contrast to education defined by competitive achievement, consumerism or progression within a social hierarchy. As such, these pre-eminent educational initiatives seemed to transcend the neoliberal norm, meet the needs of critical education and show how collaborative intellectual work survives beyond the capital relation. The considerable contradictions that existed across these projects reflect the complexities associated with the meaning of democracy and autonomy in education. Although the actual trajectory of ‘co-operative Higher Education’ differed significantly within contextually specific visions of autonomy, a common sense of community, freedom, critique and the ongoing pursuit of equality were evident. Co-operative HE thus seemed not a matter of particular pedagogical practice but of consciousness; while thematic articulations seemed concurrent with ideals of critical pedagogies and the co-operative movement, their subversive nature relied on the meaning beneath them. As such, in order to attend co-operative values, a network can find its common and subversive meaning in seemingly incompatible manifestations by suspending assumptions of practice and hearing narratives of struggle in which they exist. Through doing so, these themes and their paradoxical manifestations become living pursuits of democratisation of, and through, intellectual labour.

13 Seeking a Co-operative University: Reconstructing Adult Education and Reclaiming Higher Education as a Public Good Malcolm Noble and Cilla Ross

In this volume, we have attempted to show how 2019 can be seen as a climacteric moment for Co-operative Higher Education (CHE). This final short chapter considers the prospects for this alternative way of teaching, learning, and research. We consider this in two ways, both of which stem from events a century ago. Firstly, the publication of the 1919 Ministry of Reconstruction Report on  Adult Education, and secondly, the establishment of the Co-operative College in Manchester as part of the movement’s long-held ambition towards delivering CHE. The experiments discussed in this volume offer ways to realize many of the ambitions of both the 1919 Report and the College. Our reflexions are, however, neither nostalgic nor introspective, but show how the past may be used to prepare for an unknowable future. M. Noble Leicester Vaughan College, Leicester, UK e-mail: [email protected] C. Ross (*) Co-operative College, Manchester, UK e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s) 2019 M. Noble, C. Ross (eds.), Reclaiming the University for the Public Good, Palgrave Critical University Studies, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-21625-2_13

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In 1919, the Co-operative College was formed to fulfil the co-­operative moment’s fifth principle: providing education and training to its members.1 As Yeo notes, however, a usable past may be drawn upon by those seeking to develop not only CHE but also a future Co-operative University. Firstly, he points to the fact that traditional collegiate scholarly communities echo co-operatives in their self-governance and their arrangements for ‘membership and fellowship’.2 The language of recent Office for Students paperwork on the acquisition of Degree Awarding Powers (DAPs) focus on building a ‘self-critical scholarly community’ and whilst this might echo New Public Management ideology, co-­operation is well aligned to effectively fulfil these ambitions. Secondly, the co-operative nature of the nineteenth-century informal, working-­class associational culture and the sense of belonging this generated might be recast in the age of high technology, the co-operative commons and networks; and finally, ‘the primacy of social relations in learning’, points to the Workers’ Educational Association (WEA), co-operative and trade union movement education and the Open College Network as powerful examples of this.3 In this tradition, we draw upon the spirit of 1919—the Report and the founding of the Co-operative College, in order to draw some conclusions about the contemporary and historical relevance of CHE. The Co-operative College, based in Holyoake House in Manchester, provides education and training to the UK and global co-operative movement. It was established by the Co-operative Union, the forerunner of Co-ops UK. A plaque on the exterior of the building (Box 13.1) erected in 1911, indicates how, in part, this development stemmed from a defensive perspective, during a time when co-operation was under sustained attack from capitalism, which deemed it a threat. The plaque suggests that this ‘federation of co-operative societies’ would provide education to the cooperative movement of a broad character—not just professional and technical training, but also literary—something like liberal arts—education.  On the history of the Co-operative College, see books forthcoming; on the history of the movement’s ambitions and the historical antecedents of the current campaign for a co-operative University, see Tom Woodin in this volume; and Yeo, S. 2015. The Co-operative University? In Co-operation, Learning and Co-operative Values: Contemporary Issues in Education, ed. Tom Woodin, 131–46, especially, 138–40. Abingdon: Routledge. 2  Yeo, 138–40. 3  Yeo, 138–40. 1

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Box 13.1 Erected in 1911 The Co-operative Union Limited The Co-operative Union is a federation of the co-operative societies in the United Kingdom for the purpose of propagandist and defensive action. Its objects are: . To establish & organize co-operative societies. 1 2. To diffuse a knowledge of the principles of co-operation by advice and instruction, – literary, legal and commercial

In 2016, the Co-operative College founded a Co-operative University Working Group (CUWG), which met monthly until the establishment of an Co-operative University Project Interim Academic Board in 2019. In the summer of 2018, the College submitted an application to the Office for Students for Degree Awarding Powers and contingent access to student loan finance. It intends to begin offering degrees in the academic year 2020–2021, delivering not only its own programmes but through federated partners, additional academic  programmes  elsewhere in the UK.  Some of the Higher Education Co-operatives such as Leicester Vaughan College are working towards teaching students in this first wave.4 Others are developing their own specialist programmes which if successful in acquiring DAPs, the College will soon be able to accredit. This project would see the Co-operative College offering a range of services to enable small-scale co-operatives to deliver CHE, access student loan finance, and provide central support ranging from back-office functions through to quality and pedagogic support. Proposals for training teachers in co-operative education at all levels suggest ways of securing and embedding the co-operative character of CHE—the thing arguably missing from a significant number of co-operative schools.5 This pushes firmly against the neoliberal usurpation of the key functions of the university: its epistemological and pedagogic activities.6 The New Public  It might be noted that this is highly conditional, and any aspects may have changed by the time of publication. 5  Facer, K., J. Thorpe, and L. Shaw. 2012. Co-operative Education and Schools: An Old Idea for New Times? Power and Education 4 (3): 327–41. https://doi.org/10.2304/power.2012.4.3.327 6  For example, see Busch, L. 2017 [2014]. Knowledge for Sale: The Neoliberal Takeover of Higher Education. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. 4

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Management insistence on counting and cataloguing manifested in the UK in the Research Excellence Framework and its younger sibling the Teaching Excellence Framework, sees research outputs, research ‘impact’, and every aspect of student satisfaction and success measured. In a Co-operative University autonomy and independence are guaranteed by member democracy and accountability, and through self-governance.

A New Kind of Higher Education The challenges faced by humanity mandate a new kind of education for a new kind of society. The impending ecological cataclysm faced as a result of relentless externalization and exploitation by industrial processes over two and a half centuries, has heralded the Anthropocene as a rapidly heating planet faces disaster. For many critics of the neoliberal university, this is exactly the kind of task which requires well-resourced public-­interest institutions and a clarity of thinking unhindered by managerialism.7 We do not look back on the university of the mid-twentieth century with rose-tinted spectacles: only a small proportion of the population went to university, which was largely young, white, disproportionately male, and overwhelmingly middle-class. They received a traditional education—particularly in England, and were trained for careers in professions such as the law, medicine, and finance. Adult learners were served largely by often excellent but adjunct extramural departments. CHE offers instead an education which is radical, community-based, for individuals, collectives and the common wealth. Rather than preparing students for today’s world of work, it enables thinking about managing and building possible post-work futures, allowing students to assert agency through specific pedagogic approaches: learning to be, learning to make, and a values-based, interdisciplinary education. In so doing, this offers a solution to the tensions within the neoliberal university by looking forward rather than feeling backwards. Students are producers rather than consumers, engaged for education rather than learning.8 For staff, decent employment is  secured through workers’ co-operatives in a federated model which sees different co-operatives aligned but with respect for local autonomy through subsidiarity.  Busch, Lawrence; Murphy, S. 2017. Zombie University: Thinking Under Control. Repeater.  On Student-as-Producer, see Mike Neary, forthcoming.

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Fundamentally, CHE must be a heterodox, pluralistic education for the post-capitalist economy, secured through institutional praxis, pedagogies, epistemologies and knowledges which are radical and broad. This education is not pursued simply as an end in itself, or for career advantages, but has in its sight a transformation of the world. By default, the curricula must be that which challenges the normative and the orthodox: ways of seeing the world which are amongst others, feminist, queer, indigenous, anarchist, and decolonized.

 econstructing Adult Education After R Neoliberalism A century after the publication of the 1919 Report on Adult Education, the work of that Commission remains disappointingly contemporary. Lifelong Learning supplanted adult education in universities, and after a decade of generous funding, and cuts in the early part of the millennium, all that seemed so solid melted into air. Adult Education Departments disappeared and the adult education offer made by Local Authority Education Committees has been savagely attacked through funding cuts. The 1919 Report remains vital however to highlight how the diverse initiatives and perspectives offered in this collection present a way to reconstruct and rethink adult education and to reclaim Higher Education as a public good—as something essential for the collective benefit of society and not just individuals. CHE offers a way to achieve many of the 1919 Report’s aims. Most powerfully  is the prospect of reclaiming education for democracy and achieving a strong civic purpose through educating adults. This common thread has been addressed by all of the chapters in the volume quite fundamentally with a view to achieve education for the benefit of society, or as a public good. The Report is clear that a critical, educated adult population is an imperative for democracy. One of the most famous passages comes from the premises on which the Report is based and appears in block capitals in the Report for emphasis:

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…ADULT EDUCATION IS A PERMANENT NATIONAL NECESSITY, AN INSEPARABLE ASPECT OF CITIZENSHIP, AND THEREFORE SHOULD BE BOTH UNIVERSAL AND LIFELONG.9 THAT THE OPPORTUNITY FOR ADULT EDUCATION SHOULD BE SPREAD UNIFORMLY AND SYSTEMATICALLY OVER THE WHOLE COMMUNITY, AS A PRIMARY OBLIGATION ON THAT COMMUNITY IN ITS OWN INTEREST AND AS A CHIEF PART OF ITS DUTY TO ITS INDIVIDUAL MEMBERS, AND THAT THEREFORE EVERY ENCOURAGEMENT AND ASSISTANCE SHOULD BE GIVEN TO VOLUNTARY ORGANIZATIONS, SO THAT THEIR WORK, NOW NECESSARILY SPORADIC AND DISCONNECTED, MAY BE DEVELOPED AND FIND ITS PROPER PLACE IN THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM.10

The raison d’être of the Higher Education co-operatives discussed in this volume are precisely realizing this notion of education for citizenship, with various inflexions. Gary Saunders highlighted how ‘radical informal learning spaces’, which can sit in communities and civic spaces, constitute sites of learning which are themselves democratic, including the Social Science Centre (SSC); members of the SSC have written collectively in this volume on the struggles and challenges of democratic decision-making within their co-operative. For Pablo Perez and Mike Shaw, the Edinburgh Student Housing Co-op—not an education co-op per se—is engaging with one of the fundamental civic and social needs, housing. This co-op challenges power relations and inequalities through its democratic formation and constitutes a valuable site of pedagogy. By participating in the processes of management and by acquiring the capabilities  this mandates, co-operative  members are prepared and learning for, the post-capitalist economy. The case we attempted to make in the introductory chapter was that this is a particular moment in which education must and can be reclaimed for democracy  and that  co-operation is one mechanism through which this might be achieved. Other co-operatives in this volume demonstrate how they  PP (1919) [Cmd. 321], 5.  PP (1919) [Cmd. 321], 5.

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seek to build democratic capacity in their students and members alike: for Porter and Walsh, this means training and skilling trades unionists in a time of precarity and increased automation; at the Centre for Human Ecology, and through Massive Open Online Courses, a strong sense of ecological democracy and citizenhood is invoked; at Leicester Vaughan College, the focus has been more narrowly focused on local needs—the regional economy and civil society. In a rather different way, Swann proposes a democratization of the research process in how this is funded, managed and produced through the idea of a platform co-­operative for researchers. The democracy of a co-operative is rooted in the sovereignty of its membership, which holds its directors, managers, and workers to account for their actions, and ultimately decides policy. The underpinning assumption too is that co-operatives generally work only up to a relatively modest scale. A key question then is of scale and replicability. This is shown by the broad range of exemplars and experiments—internationally, informally and in all the examples discussed in this volume: none are large, but  all might be replicated elsewhere. The 1919 Report prefigures this in pointing to a broad range of initiatives which it encourages those concerned with adult education to embrace. As far back as 1831, it is noted, Salford co-operators ‘took a couple of large rooms and opened a school’ for children and arranged ‘concerts and lectures for the benefit of their adult members’.11 This serves as an illustration of the authenticity of the richness of working-class intellectual culture in the period, and to the centrality of co-operation to adult education.12 Nearly 200 years later, this might be harder to appreciate, but the full story of adult education is one of small-scale, often informal efforts fundamentally co-operative and associational in their character. Small Higher Education co-operatives can form together in a federated model as advocated by Cook and others  and those co-operatives seeking to offer degrees through the Co-operative College—many of which are not written about in this volume and which are in the early stages of exploring what is possible and feasible—are doing just that. Again, we have drawn on the proof-of-concept models from overseas and  Dobbs, 216, 221; PP (1919) [Cmd. 321], 21.  The best account of this is found in Rose, J. 2010 [2001]. The Intellectual Life of the British Working Classes. 2nd ed. New Haven: Yale UP. 11 12

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point to the ambition of the various co-operatives to offer degrees through a federation, whilst drawing support, services and solidarity from their communities and each other. Many reading the 1919 Report for the first time might also be surprised to see a discussion of precarity. Under discussion of conditions, it notes that for ‘tutors who have adopted tutorial class teaching as their profession…it is a very grave disadvantage, since it makes their income highly precarious’.13 The production of decent livelihoods and non-­exploitative conditions of work, with some security of employment not contingent upon recruitment to a course, for example, is surely moral purpose enough for any Higher Education co-operative. Leicester Vaughan College hopes to offer secure employment  as many of its prospective tutors are currently paid casually on hourly rates at the University of Leicester; The Research, Education and Development Co-operative for Social Change (RED) promises more stable work to those facing the loss of permanent employment. Swann’s rumination on the possibilities for research co-operatives offers greater agency and equity than the typical short-term contracts for positions attached to short research contracts in existing universities. Academics and other employees are not the only ones to suffer from the fragility of economic life in the neoliberal university and the pernicious effects on undergraduate students of soaring accommodation and other living costs are mitigated by the student housing co-operative discussed by Perez and Shaw. University management accounting has supplanted any notion that universities might provide student accommodation at a loss or at less than market rates and at the time of writing, new student housing co-operatives which offer feasible, scalable alternative to the current for-profit arrangements are under development in a number of major UK cities. The research by Hannah Bland highlights how both academics and students have been treated by universities, and how this has framed and shaped their participation in CHE. The contrast between the neoliberal discourse of lifelong learning and the career-orientated training for economic aspirations is framed differently in the Report, which speaks of the value and desire for classes of a ‘non-utilitarian character’, or of ‘humane education’ which might ‘contribute to good citizenship by preparing [people] for the exercise of pub PP (1919) [Cmd. 321], 124.

13

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lic spirit in their social relationships’ and posed in contrast to ‘technical and vocational instruction’.14 This is the same dichotomy established by the opposition of lifelong learning to adult education, and in particular to liberal arts education. The historical pedigree of this non-career education and its association with the co-operative movement and co-operative education is discussed by Woodin.15 The broader education is very clearly reclaimed in the informal spaces discussed by Saunders and at the SSC in Lincoln, as well as at Leicester Vaughan College. This raises, however, in turn, the question of qualifications. Each autonomous learning co-­operative must determine for itself as a democratic institution whether or not it wishes to pursue offering accredited programmes which formally, and indeed legally, count as degrees; this is the only way to access student loan finance, and in reality returns to the issue of livelihoods. The authors of this chapter have seen no convincing proposal for a Higher Education co-operative which creates good employment without recourse to public funds. Leicester Vaughan College is actively pursuing the accreditation and access to student loan finance route through the Co-operative College, and the Centre for Human Ecology and RED express similar ambitions in this regard in the near future; other, newer co-operatives have come forward and expressed interest in both accredited and non-­accredited CHE since this collection was begun. The international examples offered by Benson and Ross demonstrate that Co-operative Universities can and do function elsewhere, and particular aspects of the Mondragon model are similar to the federated structure proposed by the Co-operative College for its Co-operative University Project. The Report, yet again, prefigures this, with its suggestion that ‘there is no reason why, as the number of adult students grows, each of the Universities should not become the metropolis of a group of colleges planted in the surrounding town and affiliated to it’.16 The Report points too, towards ‘a regular interchange of staff between [the peripheral colleges] and the parent university’.17 The place of where academics and their labour sit within CHE, what their professional training and status is, and how it might relate to the broader Higher Education  PP (1919) [Cmd. 321], 53, 57, 149.  On the supplantation of lifelong learning for adult education, see, for example, Bowl, M. 2017. Adult Education in Neoliberal Times. Basingstoke: Palgrave. 16  PP (1919) [Cmd. 321], 101. 17  PP (1919) [Cmd. 321], 101. 14 15

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sector is important. The notion of two-way traffic—that scholars and professional services staff might move freely between the sub-sectors—is an important one. It is incumbent upon the emergent CHE movement to ensure that staff in the sector are given the resources and support they need so as to continue to maintain profiles as serious researchers, using this as part of engaged teaching with adequate professional development. Fundamentally, the points of contact between co-operative classroom strategies, their underpinning pedagogies, and indeed epistemologies of co-creation, with the neoliberal agendas of student engagement and coproduction are considerable, even if they have fundamentally different motivation, approaches, and meaning. Few things can be better calculated than to support every aspect of professional development than a collegiate culture; support for background research activities and dissemination of the kind completed by lecturers employed on increasingly elusive contracts is easily within the reach of the CHE movement. The Co-operative College should take a lead on supporting the pedagogic and professional development of those teaching and working within CHE. Insofar as an edited collection can present a uniform argument, our contributors have attempted to show that CHE offers a scalable, reproducible, alternative to current mainstream Higher Education. A concept with considerable history has immense potential at this juncture thanks to regulatory reforms lowering the barrier to degree awarding powers and access to student finance. Importantly, however, this is not simply a question of the ambitions or needs of the co-operative movement, or the terms and conditions of staff and students within higher education but of something much greater. If post-capitalist futures are to be even imagined, less still realized, the reclamation of Higher Education, its teaching, and its research, as public goods, is imperative. The gravest longue-durée challenges of the Anthropocene may then be faced: an uncertain future which promises little more than ecological collapse and the potential for dystopias characterized by inequalities, algorithms, bio-engineering, artificial intelligence  and robots, can be confronted. CHE offers a powerful education for such uncertain technosocial futures. It also offers us the prospect of learning to make a different future as a resource of hope. In the language of the 1919 Report, for this transformative education, there is a universal and unlimited need.

14 Afterword: A Student Responds Sally Birch

I believe the idea of ‘Reclaiming the University for the Public Good’ is essential within these turbulent economic and political times. When the average working person will probably be working well beyond traditional retirement ages, and likely be obliged to retrain several times over their careers, it seems somewhat perplexing that universities in the UK seem to be cutting their ties to adult education. The idea that lifelong learning no longer fits into leading universities’ manifestos suggests that they are realigning their core principles, with a focus on traditional full-time undergraduates and international research, with the result that they seem unable to find a place for mature learners. I started studying for my five-year part-time degree in 2015 at the Vaughan Centre of Lifelong Learning (VCLL), part of the University of Leicester. When the University consulted on proposals to close down VCLL, as discussed by Faire and Gill in Chap. 7, I was involved in an active campaign to resist this. In this short afterword, I respond to the prospect of Co-operative Higher Education (CHE) as a student in a mainstream university and as a member of a HE co-operative, Leicester Vaughan College. S. Birch (*) Leicester Vaughan College, Leicester, UK © The Author(s) 2019 M. Noble, C. Ross (eds.), Reclaiming the University for the Public Good, Palgrave Critical University Studies, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-21625-2_14

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Whilst the University decided to wind up the Centre and its teaching, the campaign was a catalyst which helped create Leicester Vaughan College  – a Community Benefit Society, a type of co-operative. It has already started to run courses within the city. What the campaign highlighted for me was how incredibly important adult education is and what it means to people—not just those studying, but for the greater benefit of society, establishing it as a clear public good. Adult education provides learning on every level, empowering students by giving them the opportunity to pursue knowledge and skills. This may be for social mobility reasons, it may lead on to further employment but it also nurtures and encourages a love of learning for the sake of learning, regardless of age constraints. Education has the power to transform lives and inspire futures regardless of background and is a vital tool in the fight to reduce inequalities within our society. It enables individuals to discover and develop their talents, which in turn allows people to improve the less successful areas of their lives. When adult education was in its infancy, universities were still for the élite and the average working person would not have had easy access to such establishments. Democratic spaces of learning proliferated, including working men’s colleges—of which Vaughan was one—and the co-­ operative movement. It seems we have come full circle. In a world of flux, many people feel such a divide within society. Adult education is something that can enable individuals to succeed and to change their own lives. Adult education is a vital part of our evolving society. All people should be made aware of the courses and options available to them. The key values upon which a co-operative system is based mirror the key values adult education requires in order to be successful: self-help, self-responsibility, democracy, equality, equity and solidarity. The idea of this partnership evolving into a new form of education which will have the power to transform lives and inspire individuals to empower themselves is something which has the potential to positively change the face of adult education, and by association society, forever. The prospect of creating a co-operative university which enables the focus to be on educating adults and not to find the most lucrative and profitable student profile is something which is needed desperately today and is in marked contrast to prevailing managerialism in Higher

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Education. The co-operative model of Higher Education explored by the various examples in this volume seems to offer the perfect antidote to the decline of adult learning, a model which whole communities can benefit from. Many adult learners are apprehensive or even fearful about returning to study, and it can be the greatest barrier and is the greatest hurdle that many people face. CHE offers a solution to this, as seen in various chapters in this volume. Co-operatives such as LVC have started offering taster workshops or courses which lower the threshold prospective students must cross to the lowest possible level. The institutional flexibility offered by small scale and co-operative values is powerful in this regard. Democratic spaces such as discussion groups allow individuals to slowly adjust to education and get them hooked into the inviting world of academia and co-operative approaches to adult education. Reverend David Vaughan did this over 160 years ago by setting up ‘reading rooms’ for the working men of Leicester, just like the Pioneers did in Rochdale, and in countless other educational movements which were a radical assertion of agency by their mere existence. This then gradually evolved to be much more than that. At that time, society had a need to educate its workers, to invest and to help educate them to enable them to feel the benefits of education and to have successful careers which in turn benefitted society. Against the demands of neoliberalism and its pressures on individuals to compete for employment, participation in adult education by asserting the agency of learners remains the key that it always has been. Transforming a life through education is both challenging and rewarding, but to change the way in which education is delivered and offered is nothing short of revolutionary. The prospect offered by the CHE, through the diverse approaches offered in this book will make a permanent change in the way adults access education. The idea of coming together for one common goal, and studying alongside other individuals that also foster that same idea, is something which could prove to be very powerful. From my own experience, I have found that as an adult, education could become addictive. Despite spending many frustrating hours in front of my laptop or sunny weekends inside a library, I still find myself coming back for more. The quip that ‘education is wasted on the young’ is often attributed to Wilde; there is no doubt that as an adult I have learned to appreciate the value of studying. The knowledge and skills learnt is one

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part of adult education, the other being how you grow and develop as an individual. And in this sense, participation in a co-operative is an important way to gain skills—this is illustrated by Perez and Shaw, in their reflexions on the housing co-operative as site of pedagogy. From my own experience, the development through participation in an institution and in a campaign has proved to be invaluable and unexpected. CHE would have fulfilled these needs productively by meaningfully engaging students with the design and delivery of all aspects of their education and the institution which provides it. With diminishing provision of face-to-face part-time study, as old extra-mural departments are closed by many universities, adult learners are often pushed towards an abundance of online learning. Whilst these meet the needs of some, for many learners, such as myself, this does not provide the experience of learning together, which has proved so valuable. I believe the experience of learning together with a group of people who may come from any walk of life and learning about them and their lives adds to the rich tapestry which transcends simply ‘studying’. Adult learners are full to the brim with experiences, views, opinions, politics, passions and history, and this always makes for an interesting debate within a classroom. Just as working in a co-operative provides more than just a living, so learning in one provides more than a qualification. At a recent workshop on adult education, I was stuck that one of the most valued things about which former students and teachers spoke was the shared experience, the use of a common room, and conversations between staff and students outside of the classroom. Discussing topics and essay plans within a relaxed environment, building relationships and friendships, which develop and grow as you study is something that cannot be replicated outside of this environment. They add to the unique student experience, one that is genuine and valuable to each individual. Learning is not just about knowledge gained but it is also about the wellbeing and development and nurturing of a growth mind-set. CHE, as shown in these examples and essays in this volume, provides the right environment in which individuals can become confident and empowered by a new-found belief in themselves. This comes from a sense of belonging to an institution that at the heart of what it does, wants to meet the needs of adult students, run by people that want the student

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experience to be one that develops all of these qualities and that is not mortgaged to making huge profits. The co-operative university fits this bill exactly, and it is precisely what is needed within education right now. Adult learners need to feel valued and empowered to be celebrated and then the passion for learning, self-confidence and recognition of one’s own abilities and intelligence start to radiate through for the benefit of society. This development of character then influences how they perform at work and how they inspire their own friends and families by proving what can be achieved with hard work and effort. The co-operative nature of CHE is almost ideally placed to meet these needs: having a shared vison and common goal can only add to the feeling of success and self-worth. From first-hand experience, I have been able to see what education can provide for individuals. With the combination of tuition, knowledge and a shared learning experience with what a co-operative model can offer, lifelong learning is about to be brought into the twenty-first century. As an adult learner, there could not be a more exciting time to be part of adult education.

Index1

A

Ableism, 101 Abram, David, 163 Academics under neoliberalism precarity, 6, 15, 180, 182, 229, 254 workload, 70, 115, 192 Acland, A. H. D., 31, 32 Albert, Michael, 33, 163 Alienation, 6, 70, 242 Altuna, Jon, 56 Arts-based inquiry, 22, 227–246 Ashworth, Jon, 140 Asylum seekers, 196 Austerity, 129, 130, 162 Autonomous learning spaces, 67–89, 92

Autonomous prefiguration, see Autonomous spaces Autonomous spaces, 72, 85 B

Bank of Ideas, 71–72 Basque Parliament, 50 Becoming a co-operative, 49, 63, 64 Bird, Kelvy, 210, 212 Birmingham Radical Education, 73–75 Brecht, Bertolt, 20 Brexit, 160 Brighton, 27, 75, 231, 233 Browne Review, 67 Brundtland Commission, 147 Bundle of CHE, 4 Byline, 195, 198

 Note: Page numbers followed by ‘n’ refer to notes.

1

© The Author(s) 2019 M. Noble, C. Ross (eds.), Reclaiming the University for the Public Good, Palgrave Critical University Studies, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-21625-2

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264 Index C

Capitalist realism, 19 Cashflow for co-operative startups, 10 Castle Rock Edinvar, 175 Celtic bardic techniques, 147 Centre for Co-operative Entrepreneurship and Innovation, see Moshi Co-operative University Centre for Human Ecology, 19, 145–153, 156, 167, 253, 255 Chomsky, Noam, 149 Christianity, 33 Christian Socialism, 31–33 Civic university, 134 Civilizational renewal, 207–208, 214–216 Club of Rome, 147 Coaching circles, 212, 213, 222 Collaging, 230, 232, 233 Colombia, see Misak leaders Communication Workers of America, 198 Communities of interest, 157, 160 Community Benefit Societies (CBS), 125, 137, 139, 141, 258 Consensus decision-making, 92, 100, 101 Contributoria, 195, 198 Cook, Dan, 5, 25, 253 CoopAfrica, 49 Co-operative character of institutions, 65 Co-operative college, 3, 5, 7, 9, 19, 20, 22, 35–38, 45, 47–49, 53, 88, 110, 111, 247–249, 253, 255, 256

Co-operative College (CCM) Moshi, Tanzania, 51 Co-operative College of Kenya (CCK), 52 Co-operative Commonwealth, see Utopia Co-operative Congresses 1872, 35n46 1883, 31n34 1898, 31n32 1904, 35n46 1910, 35n46 1911, 32n37, 35n46, 36n47 1918, 36, 36n48 1919, 36n49, 36n50 Birmingham, 1871, 27n17 Edinburgh, 1948, 39 Peterborough, 1898, 30n31 Co-operative curricula, 23, 47, 55, 56, 58, 61, 100 Co-operative education, 3, 6, 8, 24, 26, 27, 37–39, 47, 54, 62, 110, 122, 145, 146, 155, 157, 166, 167, 206, 208, 213, 221, 222, 239, 249, 255 Co-operative Higher Education (CHE), 2–6, 8, 42, 45–66, 88, 91–107, 166, 171, 185, 186, 189, 192, 196, 201, 202, 208, 246, 247 Co-operative Party, 36 Co-operative pedagogies, 61, 63, 143, 155, 156, 183, 221–225, 233 Co-operative research, 53, 119, 187, 189, 192, 196, 199–201 Co-operatives as site of pedagogy, 21, 169–183, 260

 Index 

Co-operative sector, 8, 51, 58, 63 globally, 10 in the UK, 58 Co-operative traditions, 55 Co-operative university in the UK, 46, 65, 66 Co-operative University of Kenya (CUK), 52, 53, 57, 61, 63, 64 Co-operative University Project (CUP), 64 Co-operative University Working Group (CUWG), 88, 110, 123 Co-production, 50, 93, 114, 188–193, 201, 220, 232, 256 Courtauld, 79 Crichton Smith, Ian, 158 Critical education, 77, 244, 246 Critical University Studies, 11, 18, 169 Crowd-funding, 194 Curricula gender, 41, 84, 102 negotiating, 180–182 philosophy, 76, 79n52, 84, 86, 87, 93, 155, 156, 186, 188, 192 social sciences and humanities, 76, 189 Curriculum for Excellence (CfE), 150 D

Davie, G., 150, 154 Dawson, Lillian, 37, 38 Decolonizing the university, 98, 251 Degree awarding powers (DAPs), 5–7, 9, 25, 50, 87, 88, 136, 138, 140, 230, 248, 249, 256

265

Degrowth, 166 Deliveroo, 198 Democratic intellect, 145, 148, 155, 157 Denver Co-op, 198 Department for International Development (DFID), 49 Diversity in students, 17, 221 Do-it-yourself approach to education, 86 E

Ecological systems thinking, 209 Ecology, 3, 148, 209 Economics, 6, 8–11, 16, 17, 27, 33, 37, 38, 41, 48, 50, 52, 59, 62, 64, 69, 72, 76, 77, 82, 101, 103, 119, 129, 147, 154, 166, 254, 257 Edge fund, 196, 198 Edinburgh, 39, 73, 80, 151, 165, 173–175, 213 Edinburgh City Council, 174, 175 Edinburgh College, 208, 212, 215, 217, 221, 222 Edinburgh Napier University, 175, 176 Edinburgh Student Housing Co-op (ESHC), 21, 171, 177–181, 183, 252 Edinburgh University Settlement Project, 80 Edinburgh University Students Association (EUSA), 174 Eigg, Isle of, 164 Eisenstein, Charles, 163

266 Index

Emancipatory tradition, 227, 228 Embodied activist, 114 Empire, 30 Employment, 16, 17, 55, 59, 64, 115, 133, 160, 186, 187, 198, 201, 202, 204, 229, 238, 250, 254, 255, 258, 259 Employment terms, status, 55, 193, 255 Environment, 19, 69, 103, 115, 127, 129–135, 142, 143, 152, 155, 159, 160, 162, 182, 221, 260 Epistemic disobedience, 181 Experiment, 18, 20, 21, 72, 78, 82, 88, 172, 174, 194, 195, 198, 207, 212, 222, 225, 237, 245, 247, 253 Expertise, 73, 114, 119, 141, 142, 175, 201 F

Fabianism, 33 Federated models, 21, 51, 65, 250, 253 Ferret, 195, 198 Fisher, Mark, 187n3 Folkehøgskole (folk school), 162 Free University Brighton, 73, 75, 76, 87, 138, 230, 231, 236, 241, 245 Fry, Charles, 26 Funding, 17, 42, 59, 83, 92, 98, 121, 126, 129, 130, 132, 140, 186–188, 193–196, 198–203, 212, 223, 231, 251

G

Galgael Trust, 163 Garden cities, 172 Garment Workers’ Union, 172 Geddes, Patrick, 154, 156 Gig economy, 6, 197 Govan, 19, 152, 153, 161–163, 165 Govan Folk University (GFU), 161–163, 165 Govan Together, 162 Governance crisis, 2, 16 Governance structures of CHE, 58 Governmentality, 91 Gramsci, Antonio, 113, 114, 123 Greening, Edward Owen, 35 Green Taxi, 197 Gresham College, 79 Griffiths, Jay, 163 H

Hackney, 79 Hall, Fred, 36, 70, 78 Hand, see Scottish Generalist Tradition Harvie, David, 82 Head, see Scottish Generalist Tradition Heart, see Scottish Generalist Tradition Higher, 23, 25, 31, 33, 36, 39, 132, 139, 171, 195 meaning of, 3, 24, 227, 242, 244, 246 Higher Education Act 2004, 14 Higher Education and Research Act 2017, 6 Higher Education as a public good, 19, 251

 Index 

Horizontal learning, 86, 162, 193 Housing co-ops (non-student) Brentham Garden Suburb, 172 Ealing Tenants Co-partnership, 172 East River NY, 172 Germany, 172 Hubs, 72, 162, 211–213, 215, 222 Hughes, Thomas, 32 Human ecology radical, 145–167 systems thinking, 157, 209 I

ICA statement on values, 26 IF project, Summer schools, 73, 78, 79 Illich, Ivan, 161 Imperialism, see Empire Ingold, Tim, 163 Interim Academic Board (IAB) of the CUP, 9, 249 International examples of CHE, 47 International labour & trade union studies (ILTUS), 110, 111, 115, 117 Internet delivery/online learning/electronic learning, 4, 233, 260 J

Jackman, Valerie, 19, 21 Janitors, 80 Jones, Ben, 30–32, 132 Journalism, 195 crowd-funding of, 194

267

K

Kenya, 21, 51–53, 55, 64 Killon, Thomas, 36 Kindon, Sara, 163 King, William, 27, 98 L

Labour University, a, 38 Land reform, 148, 151, 152, 164 Learner readiness, 223 Learning by doing, 21, 60 Leeds, 73, 81, 82 Leicester, 126–128, 131, 137, 144, 232, 233, 238, 259 Leicester Vaughan College (LVC), 19, 20, 125–144, 230–237, 243–245, 249, 253–255, 257–259 Lifelong learning, 13, 17, 55, 129, 130, 251, 254, 255, 257, 261 LifeMosaic, 164 Lincoln, 20, 73, 83, 91–107, 136, 138, 230, 231, 233, 237–240, 243, 245, 255 Livelihoods, 9, 20, 99, 122, 183, 203, 254, 255 Living wages, 33, 116 Local Authority, 251 Loening, Ulrich, 147 London, 73, 78, 79, 116 London Free University, 72 Ludlow, J. M., 30 M

Macmillan, Margaret, 35 Macpherson, I., 62, 66, 119, 156, 179

268 Index

Mahagonny, 20 Managerialism, 12, 15, 22, 148, 169, 245, 250, 258 Mansbridge, Albert, 33, 34 Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), 149, 207, 208, 211, 212 Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs), 21, 207, 208, 211, 212, 221, 253 Mature students, 128, 131, 133, 135, 138, 140, 143, 244 decline in, 130, 259 McGlynn, Moyna, 163 McIntosh, Alastair, 147, 148, 151, 157, 158 Mental health crisis, 70, 101, 171, 208, 220 Mignolo, Walter, 181 Mill, John Stuart, 79 Miller, David, 149 Mills, C. Wright, 103 Ministry of Agriculture, Co-operatives and Environment (MoACE), 52 Ministry of Reconstruction, 7 Ministry of Reconstruction Adult Education Committee (see 1919 Report) Misak leaders, 164 Monbiot, George, 148, 163 Mondragon, Spain, 21, 49, 50, 52, 55–59, 61–65, 88 Moshi Co-operative University (MCU), 51, 52 Moshi, Tanzania, see Co-operative College (CCM) Moshi, Tanzania

Moshi University College of Co-operative and Business Studies (MUCCoBS), 51 MSc Human Ecology, 147, 156, 159, 165 Muelas, Liliana Pechene, 164 Mull, Isle of, 164 N

National Health Service (NHS), 12, 213, 223 Neale, E. V., 32 Neary, Mike, 94, 136, 209 Neoliberalism (generally), 13, 91–92, 98, 106, 107, 154, 170, 182, 207, 228, 251–256, 259 Neoliberalism in HE liberalization, 89, 93, 110, 227n1, 229n8 privatization, 6, 69 See also Managerialism Neoliberal university, 3, 11–20, 22, 65, 94–96, 98, 100, 104, 105, 250, 254 New co-operativism, 231 New Public Management (NPM), 2, 12, 69, 129, 248, 250 NGOs, 19, 112 1919 Report, 247, 251, 253, 254, 256 Non-hierarchical learning spaces, 99 O

Office for Students (OfS), 6, 16, 88, 141, 248, 249 Open College Network (OCN), 248

 Index 

Open University, 40, 52, 149, 158 Owen, Robert, 26, 27, 35 Owenism, 26, 41 Oxford, 73, 77, 78, 150 Oxford Summer Schools, 30

269

Q

Quality, 9, 17, 18, 25, 40, 43, 53, 54, 68, 87, 136, 142, 176, 204, 249, 261 R

P

Participatory Action Research, 98, 190 Part-time education, 17, 125, 144, 244 Part-time learners, 132 decline in, 17, 130 Part-time students, 131, 132, 140 Pearce Institute, 153, 162, 163 Personal risk-management, 229 Place, 5, 12, 13, 16, 20–22, 31, 56, 57, 63, 70, 72, 78, 80, 84, 85, 93, 96, 100, 115, 116, 122, 123, 132, 134, 140, 143, 150, 153, 157–164, 166, 172, 177, 178, 180, 181, 183, 192, 200, 204, 213, 214, 217, 220, 221, 230, 235, 252, 255, 257 Place of humanities in HE, 13, 70 Platform, 21, 163, 188, 194–199, 203, 212, 253 Platform co-operatives, 197–200 Post-capitalist economy, 21, 171, 251, 252 Presencing Institute, 207 Private Eye, 135 Privilege, 12, 57, 96, 102, 114 Punk principles, see Autonomous spaces Puppetry, 163

Radical education, 32, 109, 111, 112, 124, 182 Radical human ecology, 145–167 Rae, W. R., 32, 35 Ragged Schools, 80 Ragged University, 73, 80, 81, 138 Rancière, Jacques, 15n48 Really Open University, 73, 81–83 RED learning co-op, 109–124 Reflexive practice, 63 Reform Act 1867, 30 Regional centres, see Moshi Co-operative University Reimagine the University Conference, 82 Research co-ops, 3, 185–204, 254 Research Excellence Framework (REF), 15 Resistance, 72, 85, 106, 113, 148, 181, 245 Riddoch, Lesley, 163 Rochdale pioneers, 11, 26, 29, 41 Roundtables, 7–9, 160, 162 Runciman, Walter, 35 Ruskin College, Oxford, 111, 120 S

Savings and Credit Societies (SACCO), 60

270 Index

Scharmer, Otto, 207, 208, 210, 212, 223 School of Man-Made Future, 146 Sciences, 12, 18, 27, 28, 38, 39, 92, 140, 148, 149, 156 crowd-funding of, 194 Science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM), 131, 186, 188, 191 Scottish Generalist Tradition, 150, 156, 157, 209 See also Geddes, Patrick Scottish Higher Education, 146, 148, 150, 151 Shaw, Hudson, 30, 48 Skype, Isle of, 164 Social Centres, 93 Social enterprise, 112, 137, 161, 213 Social Science Centre (SSC), 20, 73, 83–85, 87, 136, 138, 230, 231, 233, 238, 239, 243, 245, 252, 255 Societal transformation, 167 Southbank Centre, 79 Space Project, 82, 83 Spanish HE reform, 50 Srnicek, Nick, 198, 203 Stanford Hall, 38, 47 Stocksy, 197 Strathclyde, University of, 146, 149, 158 Strikes, see USS pension strikes 2018 Stuart, James, 29 Student as Producer, 84, 86, 94, 106, 143, 209, 223 Student debt, 6, 14 Student housing, 170–174, 176, 182, 183, 254

Student Housing Co-ops (SHCs), 171, 173 Students, 1, 2, 6–9, 14–17, 21, 22, 34, 37–39, 43, 47, 50–53, 55–60, 63–66, 68, 70, 71, 74, 76, 78, 83–86, 91–96, 99, 101, 102, 106, 110–114, 117–120, 122, 123, 126, 128–135, 137–144, 149, 151, 152, 158, 159, 166, 170, 171, 173, 174, 178, 179, 182, 183, 186, 203, 205, 207, 208, 213, 217, 218, 220–225, 227, 229–231, 234, 242–244, 249, 250, 253–260 money, 71n19, 75, 170, 229 Sustainable Development Goals, 49, 61 Systems thinking, 157, 209 T

Tanzania, 21, 48, 51–55, 61, 63, 64 See also Co-operative College (CCM) Moshi, Tanzania Tanzania University Commission, 52 Tate Modern, 79 Tawney, R. H., 32 Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF), 15, 17, 169, 250 Tent City University, 71 Theory U, 19, 21, 157, 207–214, 216, 218, 223 Toynbee, Arnold, 31 Trade unions (TU), 9, 11, 37, 109–112, 114–118, 120, 121, 123, 128, 197, 198, 202

 Index 

Transdisciplinarity, 147, 147n5, 156, 159, 163, 167 Transition to co-operative, 50 Transition Towns, 93, 100 Travis, Henry, 27 Tuition fees, 1, 67, 85, 93 Twigg, H. J., 26 U

Uber, 197, 198, 200 u.explore, 205, 208, 217–219, 222–224 UK Research and Innovation (UKRI), 188 Ullune, Jeremias Tunubalá, 164 u.lab, 207, 208, 211–216, 218, 222–224 Under-preparedness, see Learner readiness UNICOOP, 88 United Nations, 49, 66 University extension movement, 29 University of Edinburgh, 146, 148, 149, 158, 174 University of Leicester, 1, 232, 254, 257 (Un)learning, 181 U-process, 209–211, 218, 223 USS pension strikes 2018, 2 Utopia, 20n57

271

V

Vasey, George, 27 Vaughan, Rev. David, 133, 134, 137, 139, 143, 144, 232, 239, 243, 259 Vaughan Centre for Lifelong Learning (VCLL), 126–136, 138, 143, 257, 258 Vaughan College, 126, 127, 134–143 Voluntary basis, 87, 243 W

Waddington, Conrad Hal, 147 Willetts, David, 1, 2 Workers’ Educational Association (WEA), 32, 33, 139, 248 Working conditions, 12, 116, 133–134, 169 Working-class autodidact traditions, 11 Working men’s colleges, 258 World Bank, 48, 53, 190 Wright’s Houses, Edinburgh, 175 X

Xenophobic increasing character of British immigration policy, 160 Y

Yukelson, Adam, 212