Reports of looting and riots in North London in August 2011 came as no surprise to me. In July ’11 I had left a country that was economically in recession, with rising youth unemployment,  and led by a government that looked to be finding its way with Thatcherite and pro-business policies. Cutbacks to public services were severe and unemployment rising.

The scale of the ensuing looting and urban mayhem across England was shocking. It instantly made me think; when is trouble going to kick off in the flashpoint of  Eltham, on the other side of the Thames in South East London?  It did not take long. Between 9th-11th August, a motley assortment of football supporters and members of political groups (largely the nasty English Defence League) descended on Eltham, apparently to “protect” the town from looters. This led to a rather confusing scenario of police and citizens ostensibly trying to do the same job, but resulting in street clashes.  The media reported this widely, camera crews were sent, and there are many videos on the web of youths and middle aged men swearing at the police and at supporters of rival soccer clubs, and uttering racist epithets. Looting did not happen, although there has been some of that nearby.

There is not yet enough evidence to say whether the risk of looting was real and that these “vigilantes” were actually there for a genuine reason. To my knowledge Eltham High Street is in a pretty sorry state these days, decimated by falling retail trade and the closure of anchor chains like Woolworths and the department store. I am not sure what a loot would really yield. It seems, instead, as though the EDL was making a political point – this is a largely working class, largely white suburb, infamous for unfortunate reasons and bound to attract major media attention.

I grew up there from the 1960s until my parents sold up in the late 1990s. I knew generations of Elthamians. Early in the c20th my grandmother had survived diphtheria in a flat above a shop in the High Street, and a family house was bombed in WWII a mile away in Mottingham.   The town has some impressive historic buildings and a Palace, a few famous residents past and present (Jude Law, Kate Bush, Bob Hope, Boy George, Edith Nesbit) and a proud local society. Although it contains multi-million pound homes, much of Eltham is relatively poor, particularly to the north and west. It is home to many council estates (public housing), many built to re-house inner London residents, both sides of WWII. Not that this necessarily breeds racist views – but as I showed in 1999, these were quite prevalent. Don’t forget SE London hosted the British National Party hq in Welling as well, a short distance away.

Its recent notoriety came from the murder of Stephen Lawrence on 22 April 1993. He was a black teenager killed in the town by a gang of racist white youths, most from Eltham.  This followed a string of stabbings and altercations in and around Eltham in the preceding 2 years, some racially motivated. The official  Inquiry into the Lawrence murder made the accusation that the police suffered  ’institutional racism’ because  they failed to to bring successful prosecution, and bungled evidence. This, plus the murder itself, gave Eltham a very bad name. The characters of the accused youths is discussed in the 1999 Stephen Lawrence Inquiry, specifically here. As of 2011 they are still not in jail but prosecution is again being made against two of the suspects. [in Jan 2012 they were found guilty and sentenced to 14 and 15 years]

Looking back, in 1999 I wrote a listserv posting on the Critical Geography Forum that described conditions in the town just after the publication of the Inquiry. A lot of comments were made on that text. I think many of the questions that I raised there about Eltham are still unanswered. Specifically – the geographical issue - why Eltham? It seemed likely that this town would somehow become involved in the rapid spread of rioting, because unemployment and disenfranchised younger people on the estates always made it a bit ‘edgy’, but I had not imagined instead seeing the EDL turning up, and a racist image dominating the media once again. I feel very sorry for those subjected to this once again – South East London has always had to work harder than the rest of the city to embrace multiculturalism and ‘connection’ to the rest of London. Some like it that way, while others (like me) regret it deeply.

The claim is often made that the Lawrence murder was a random event, and could have occurred anywhere. But I am not so sure.

Here is my response to the public consultation, which ended in July, very lightly edited. There is not going to be a Public Inquiry on this - the government no longer offers many of those, which means it can push through large proposals more quickly and with less public consultation. But there is, and will be, massive protest I am sure, from all sorts of people, rural and urban residents, and political orientations.

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HS2 consultation response         Tuesday, 26 July 2011

 Dr Simon Batterbury  www.simonbatterbury.net

 Disclaimer I am British but do not own property in the UK. I have been visiting Wendover for 17 years, living there Jan-June 2011. I had daily discussions about the project, attended an HS2 roadshow, and read most of the hundreds of pages of official HS2 reports and analyses.

 Question 1: Do you agree that there is a strong case for enhancing the capacity and performance of Britain’s intercity rail network to support economic growth over the coming decade?

 No, there is not a strong case. The economic case for the line has been overstated using speculative economic modelling, with insufficient attention to non-economic factors.[1]  Estimates of job generation from transport are by the consultants’ admission, difficult to model and only estimates exist. 

 But we know that HS2 will funnel more jobs into London, rather than spreading them more widely. This is basic spatial economics combined with gravity modelling. Nobody involved in the debate seriously believes a reverse flow of jobs to the Midlands, Scotland and the North of England will occur anytime soon after construction.

 However the main issue is spending £34billion to Scotland (plus likely overruns) on a megaproject during a major recession when public services are being cut back. To allocate much of this sum to provide more train capacity and a quicker journey to and from Birmingham, really stretches credibility. Since there will be no commuter stops along the line, it is of no economic or social benefit to 90 percent of the people along its route.

 There is a real risk of poorer services by the franchises running the existing lines since they will lose long distance business (85% of HS2 passengers are predicted to come from existing lines) and there will be echo effects on other lines.

 Crucially the DoDs report published in June (pro HS2, business-backed) surveyed a panel that included  British transport professionals, and ranked their priorities.[2] They found ;

 “HS2 came behind the electrification and modernisation of existing rail lines (at the expense of High Speed), improving our national roads network and, in the case of transportation professionals, was even ranked as being less important than both an integrated freight network and the proliferation of light rail.”  (June 2011).

 Moving more freight on the railways….there’s a thought! No mention in the HS2 documents. This is not encouraging. Leisure, tourism and long distance communing trips would of course be easier, but tickets are likely to be costly, as HS1 has shown, depending on franchise arrangements.

 Question 2: Do you agree that a national high speed rail network from London to Birmingham, Leeds and Manchester (the Y network) would provide the best value for money solution (best balance of costs and benefits) for enhancing rail capacity and performance?

 No. I echo the views of some campaigners here – although I am  not a member of their group. The question asks for views on the whole route between London, Manchester and Leeds without providing detailed information  on the whole route! I need to see other route options to Scotland to answer this question at all. What other options have been considered?

Others have analysed the business case in great detail. Here are the major flaws:

• Many people do not need to be sitting at their office desk in London or Birmingham to conduct part of their business. I am one of these people.  Business travellers do work when sitting on our existing trains, often for one or two hours. You have not factored this in to your analysis. In other words, you have ignored teleworking, web based activity, and mobile communications.
• Too much value is placed on small time-savings on each individual journey, which have been converted into ‘cash benefits’ to enhance the business case. There are cheaper alternatives which would address our needs in the future, for example longer trains on the West Coast Main Line, and some minor infrastructure enhancements. John Whitelegg has analysed these in detail.
• It seems unlikely that we will see huge additional demand for rail travel, unless flying in the UK is banned or becomes uneconomic, or road use is rendered unfeasible for some reason. The point that flying would be avoided by building HS2 seems erroneous on the London to Birmingham stretch, since hardly anybody makes that journey by plane, but has some validity from  Scotland to London.
• Other planned developments which will improve capacity over the coming years are not discussed e.g. Chiltern Railways Main Line project south of where I used to live.

Question 3: Do you agree with the Government’s proposals for the phased roll-out of a national high speed rail network, and for links to Heathrow Airport and the HS1 line to the Channel Tunnel?

•  We already have a good high speed rail service between London and Birmingham. Links between the rest of the UK and London are already good, with cross London routes in place and another under construction.  How the links to Heathrow will be made, linking to a very fast train, are unclear to me. Access to Heathrow has already been significantly enhanced in the last decade.
• Further options should be explored before any money is committed to a high speed network.

Question 4: Do you agree with the principles and specification used by HS2 Ltd to underpin its proposals for new high speed rail lines and the route selection process HS2 Ltd undertook?

•  On the Planning process used: the project is not subject to a full Planning Inquiry as other mega-projects like Heathrow T5  have been. The only chance to comment on the proposal is through a limited  written ‘public consultation’, with no other promises of public input. [3] This is not a best practice approach. The public still want to know and comment on alternatives to the whole scheme. Although denying this the government seems to have its mind made up already by limiting us to the chosen route and scheme.
•  On the supporting case so far: The principles adopted by HS2 Ltd were flawed. There has been an overwhelming emphasis on speed and time saving in the documents.  The decision to design the line for 250mph trains means that the line of route has to be pretty straight, and there is no opportunity for it to bend and avoid sensitive environmental features and settlements including AONBs, SSSIs, endangered species habitat and monuments. We are not in competition with China to have the fastest trains. I am told you do not yet have signalling technology for 250mph trains. What is the timeline and cost of that?
•  A new design should be commissioned for trains running at HS1 speeds – ie up to 186mph. There is no need to go faster. This should enable the line to follow an existing transport corridor. Slow it down and show us what could be delivered with a speed saving. Any new rail line should follow existing major transport routes e.g. the M1 or M40 corridors. The A413 is too minor .

 Question 5: Do you agree that the Government’s proposed route, including the approach proposed for mitigating its impacts, is the best option for a new high speed rail line between London and the West Midlands?

 HS2  is really a motorway to London, without the lorries, with fewer exits. So – No.

 The ‘preferred’ route through the Chilterns affects an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty and, the Metropolitan Green Belt, and a range of other sites. Even if extensive  underground tunnelling takes place, which is currently only programmed for the affluent sections to the immediate west of London, there will still be new cuttings, noise, loss of ancient woodland, and closure of tracks and lanes (over 100). There are churches only 200m from the proposed route, and crucially, a colony of endangered Bechstein bats in north Buckinghamshire.

Clearly, avoiding Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty, green belt, high-quality farm land, footpaths, ancient monuments and listed buildings was not given enough weight in the decision-making process. I would like to see the tunnel proposal for Wendover reinstated. If a decision is taken to proceed with the scheme, a tunnel right through the Chilterns AONB should be offered to mitigate the noise and visual impacts.

HS2 has failed to provide detailed noise impact data.  Noise demonstrations organised by HS2 in their recent Roadshows were unconvincing and thousands of homes will experience serious noise, some without compensation because they are just under a threshold.  There has been no real attempt to show how noise  impacts will be addressed.

 Question 6: Do you wish to comment on the Appraisal of Sustainability of the Government’s proposed route between London and the West Midlands that has been published to inform this consultation?

 Yes. I have read it in detail. There is no Environmental Impact Assessment or Strategic Environmental Assessment available for public consultation, only this  briefer ‘Appraisal of Sustainability’ that is sketchy on cultural preservation and focuses on economic ‘regeneration’ benefits. The lack of a full independent assessment for a project of this scale, prior to a decision to build or not to build, is telling.

 On the Appraisal of Sustainability there are several main areas for concern:

•  No psychological or cost-benefit assessments have been made of different routes and scenarios (at least these have not been released to us-there are rumours some have been conducted). No regard appears to have been taken for the landscape that the proposal will impact. I was taught landscape impact techniques when at University two decades ago – nothing has been used, not even geo-visualisation of alternative routes.
• The information on jobs “created” is sketchy. It does not clearly identify them as transfers from elsewhere in the country (or indeed from other construction projects and rail operators).
• Construction site compounds and construction traffic would blight the countryside for years. Property blight will, in my estimation and those of local estate agents in Buckinghamshire ( I talked with 4) ,  run into decades.   There is no information as to how noise, dust and vibrations would be controlled during the construction process.
• Carbon emissions: normal high speed  trains produce 35% more emissions than equivalent car journeys, and HS2 even more – 50% more than Eurostar. [4] The project, as presently conceived, might just be carbon neutral but constructing the line will incur huge carbon emissions that are not sufficiently budgeted, unless you have redone the figures recently.
• Estimates of flight and car use reductions that it would generate are optimistic, to say the least. The Transport Studies Unit at Oxford have pointed out that total journey time, and energy use (factoring in getting to and from the stations in the first place), is more important to survey than the much-touted  ’travel time reduction’, which  is the main  selling point for HS2.  Heavy car use is anticipated to reach the very few stations.  As Christian Wolmar says” To oppose HS2 is not to be anti-rail”[5]. We need more north-south train seats, for sure. But the ‘capacity increases’ from HS2 will only benefit those close enough to the stations, or able to access them easily (probably by car).
• Noise: High noise levels will be inflicted on residents both during construction and operation of the line. We need to see detailed noise maps, better than the ones handed out at the HS2 roadshows. How will noise targets be policed and operators controlled if they exceed them?
• Biodiversity and the ecosystem: It will cut through 23km of high grade farmland.  There will be huge visual impacts, especially with viaducts over flood plains.
• Up to 2 million cubic metres of waste would arise from tunnel and cutting excavation, some passing through aquifers and chalk river systems still not fully understood, like the Misbourne.  The proposal also impacts national paths (e.g. The Ridgeway) and closes 79 rights of way in Bucks.

 Sustainable transport policy should involve slower stopping trains, better use of existing cuttings and lines, affordable and regulated fares, and be based on whole-journey analysis. It should not involve the construction of a thundering non-stopper, scything through the British countryside and our towns and cities.  As John Whitelegg said in Feb 2011;

 “The proposed HS2 trains would burn 50% more energy mile-for-mile than the Eurostar. HS2 would produce more than twice the emissions of an intercity train. HS2 is a ‘rich person’s railway’ – the business case assumes that a third of passengers will be on incomes of £70,000 or more.”[6]

Question 7: Do you agree with the options set out to assist those whose properties lose a significant amount of value as a result of any new high speed line?

 It is unclear who has already benefited from compensation  and  how much has been given. Property blight is already significant in Wendover, having talked to agents over the last  6 months. The market is stagnant.

 Detailed noise corridors are not fully researched, and thus the level of support that may be given in the unlikely event that the project proceeds, is still unclear.  Many other communities along the route are already suffering in the same way.

 There is no apparent compensation for the construction process, which will be extremely unpleasant.

The political case: While the project is endorsed by Labour (who announced it in March 2010), it is quite odd that it has become a cornerstone of Coalition policy. But hundreds of thousands along the route and further afield now oppose it strongly, including those that vote Conservative. Politically it would be wise to consider their views, outside of a formal consultation. This is standard impact assessment practice. In addition the Major of London, Boris Johnson,  and the Greens are opposed to the current plan, as are the astute transport gurus Christian Wolmar and John Whitelegg.

A few interesting posts and articles have emerged in the last few months about the ‘smartphone culture’ – the presence of mobile phones that do a vast number of things, including video, music, internet, email, photos, games and running location-based software. Although you can use one just as a mobile phone, for calls and text messages, most people opt for a full wireless web connection enabling a myriad of features, and an ever increasing number of ‘apps’ – for example for GPS navigation, choosing a restaurant (as you are walking down a street), translating a piece of text written in a foreign a language using the camera, etc. The IPhone vies with Android and Blackberry phones, and the whole debate about what to buy is a bit tiresome. One article (Amanda Bown, Jun 2011, womensfitness magazine) cites a YouGov survey – 33% of the British population had a smartphone in early 2011.

True ‘smart’ phones have been around for several years, but were previously regarded in western countries as a bit special and expensive. By 2009/10 they just seemed to be everywhere, despite the high network charges to run them in Australia (lower in the UK and USA).

An historical allegory.  We have dealt with sudden gadget arrival before. When mobile phones came in earnest in the 1990s, there were a number of research projects about the social changes they were bringing. As David Harvey said about modern life in general, mobiles ‘compressed’ time and space, making communication and everyday life a little bit easier (and the potential for overexploitation of one’s labour easier too – calls from the boss at midnight, etc.). At the same time, they have been a boon for keeping in touch and for poor households in Africa and Asia, providing knowledge of markets, road conditions, emergencies etc.

In London, where I was living at the time, they quickly became an annoyance. Commuting to the city in the 80s and 90s I winced every time a loud phone conversation took place on a crowded train, or when people took a call during a face to face conversation. This sort of behaviour is more accepted today. Generally, hostility to mobiles has mellowed with time, and a ‘technography’ (to use anthropologist Paul Richards’ phrase – it means research  “on complex interactions between social groups, collective representations, innovation processes, technical artefacts, and nature“)  would show an increase in social acceptance of mobiles over 20 years. Recently, teaching a class of 120 university students, we dis a quick poll -  everybody had a mobile phone!

So, while I have reservations, mobiles did not have the power to destroy face to face  communication.  The implications of smartphones are somewhat different I think. They are much more powerful. There is a technological leap, such than many everyday electronic activities – including many of the functions of a laptop computer – can be done with a gadget that fits in your pocket and is available  any moment of the day and night.  Location based software is changing things rapidly.  This article from 2010 suggest ownership of a smartphone is inevitable. I disagree. Not all of the implications are good.   The positives, like finding out where you are when lost, are all pretty obvious. Let me focus on the negatives.

• They are addictive, in the sense that many find it hard to put them down or leave them alone for long periods. Way more than standard mobiles. I recently watched three students sit down for coffee. Having ordered, they did not speak for over 10 minutes – all of them were scrolling and typing on their IPhones. Why meet in the first place?
• Their ease of use can reinforce a belief that online communication is as valuable, and worthwhile investing time in, as the alternative – actually talking face to face or on the phone (it isn’t, in my view). This trend started with computers, of course. Just heard about a guy who messaged he girlfriend in Sydney to break up with her after a long relationship. Impossible and unthinkable 20 yrs ago. (the parents got together about it to get proper communication)
• Too much reliance on technology – people often say their ‘whole life’ is on a smartphone, and how then ‘love’ them.  Some of my friends have them and have expressed this sentiment. They check them constantly and don’t put them down. Many people cannot leave the things alone for five minutes. Perhaps the worst feeling is giving a lecture or a talk, and looking up to see an audience of heads bowed and fingers scrolling on phones. It was bad enough with laptops, and I was guilty of that, but this is worse.
• Rapid technological advance is an issue for theorists of capitalism.  We are become beholden to Apple and their ilk for new tech, and these gadgets become objects of desire for professionals and academics- on a MUCH shorter cycle than 5 years ago when you might just replace your cell phone and laptop  every few years. I am unconvinced by activist friends who spend thousands on resource-intensive Iphones, tablets and gadgets – there is some contradiction there, surely.
• Screen time. I would like to be looking at as screen, as opposed to conducting myself in real life away from one, about three hours a day, max. This also goes for parenting – minimising kid’s screen time, encourage other forms of learning and outdoor activities.  These gadgets, along with changing workplace practices, are just helping to make this almost impossible for teenagers in particular.
• Spatial awareness and navigation – people are losing this basic skill, particularly in the US where smartphones are very present (and navigation skills already leave a little to be desired anyway), because they think they always have mobile Google Maps or a GPS app to help them out. Learn to read a map first. Is that too much to ask? As a geographer, I say let the technology aid the brain, without actually replacing its functions.
• Music, podcasts, video. Why do we need these available 24 hrs a day, and in our ears when we are travelling? Why not take the headset out and listen to the world instead?

Recent postings about this issue that I have made on a couple of academic listservs brought no responses; I think this was a guilty silence from my smartphone-owning colleagues. It is remarkable how little critical literature exists on the topic. I suspect many academics love these things – they can continue working all the time, even if they are just looking up data or sending an email, and they maintain connectivity even when it is manifestly unnecessary to have it. Those spare 10 minutes sitting on a bus or having a cup of tea can now be filled with scrolling.

Baroness Susan Greenfield, the renowned neuroscientist from Oxford, has been one of the first to break ranks. She has been arguing since 2009 that the ensemble of instant communication and social media enabled by new communications technologies (including smartphones) is changing neural pathways, accustoming the smartphone generation to short choppy communication, originally based on texts and Facebook entries but now including Twitter and much more, and reducing the development of extended arguments and reasoning. The latter is particularly compromised by video games, she says. Studies at Notre Dame are underway. Ian Price argues in his book  The Activity Illusion  that constant messaging “overstimulates our brain’s dopamine system and neurologists are beginning to recognise this impairs our cognitive ability, reduces our ability to concentrate and often makes us tired and frazzled“. If they are  right, and I have not seen any refereed  papers yet (although the New York Times has summaries from 2010), then we are all in real trouble – our kids are growing up with less capacity to concentrate for long periods. It is not just smartphones that does this of course, they are just the medium for the new internet-hungry modes of knowledge acquisition. But  they do enable new styles of social interaction and  learning.

Again there is no particular reason that everybody falls prey to smartphone seduction even if they have one, i.e. accessing them constantly. My dad, who likes gadgets, had a huge first generation mobile the size of a brick.  Now in his late 70s, he has a Blackberry smartphone. He does answer emails on it. He sends us one or two photos.  But the point is that it  hardly rules his life. This is the safer way to use technology – sparingly. At a recent event in Melbourne where artists met climate scientists, I raised the phone communication issue. One person said  that organising a major art festival with multiple venues and events would not be have been possible without  smart phone – needed for hooking people up, emailing images, organising venues and so on. Fair enough.

There a major issue here for scholars. For those of use who continues to teach face to face in actual classrooms  (occasionally aided by some multimedia and online resources) and who set standard student assessments- essays, exams, book reviews – we could find poorer student results occurring over time as the new learning styles set in. Already, cribbing other people’s text off the web infests many assignments.  I don’t agree with Cathy Davidson from Duke, author of Now You See It: How the Brain Science of Attention Will Transform the Way We Live, Work, and Learn (Viking, 2011)  who argues for  acceptance of the internet age by lecturers, which means modification of academic assessment and learning styles to accommodate it. Some specific technologies can augment learning, for sure – Dr Mike Smith, a geographer at Kingston University  in London, expert on spatial data, advocates use of numeracy apps for schools and is adapts at IT to demonstrate how the planet works.  There are also the protest support programs (countering police harrassment of demonstrators with realtime info) and evidence that phones were useful during the Arab Spring demonstrations. But I think our problem generally is now too many knowledge sources for students. We still need to teach about how to  sift through it and  make  judgments, to argue a case and to form opinions (these claims were made when the internet began, too). Knowledge acquisition, Greenfield says, is altering as mobile internet use and video games make massive inroads into everyday life. But if you are a scientist, or a writer, actual work is always required – emailing and phoning does not cut it. A technography of smartphones is well overdue.

personally speaking...For me, phones are for talking on, and computers have replaced typewriters (but not pen and paper) as things to write on. This classifies me as a “Better-Never” in Adam Gopnik’s excellent article in the New Yorker (2011) “The Better-Nevers think that we would have been better off if the whole thing had never happened, that the world that is coming to an end is superior to the one that is taking its place, and that, at a minimum, books and magazines create private space for minds in ways that twenty-second bursts of information don’t.“  But with a laptop and a lot of online teaching materials, and running a web journal,  not sure I fit that profile completely.  I generally reuse second-hand technology, to help cut down the waste stream. I have gone as far as a mobile phone in my life, having first got a second-hand one in 2001. That is only ten years ago.  I still use the same sim card when in the UK. Mine rings perhaps once a day, often less. I may get a couple of text messages. And yet I have a very busy job, just like many smartphone people. I can handle communication about meetings, as well as family issues and emergencies, easily.  The last thing in the world I want is any more communication with the office, or any more access to emails in particular. A laptop is quite enough, accessed occasionally throughout the day. On it, you can write on a keyboard that fits your hands, and look at a screen 25cm+, not 4cm across. With 100+ emails a day, why would I want them disrupting me  on a smartphone? Nothing is worth the personal cost of that compression of time and space  into constant scrolling and expectations of instantaneous response.

My logic has not really convinced anybody I know – (except perhaps until the London riots of 2011). The general feeling is that if there is decent  technology about, it must be better, more efficient, and worth buying. I am not all that sure. Admittedly, smartphones have passed through the early product cycle phase where consumer testing can obliterate bad ideas, and they are unlikely to be consigned to a technological dead end, like videodiscs and palm pilots. Their numbers will grow. But if Greenfield is right, the implications for our lives are major, not at all of them positive, and are rolling in on the next consignment of phones from China and S Korea.

As Adam Gopnik  says  “Our contraptions may shape our consciousness, but it is our consciousness that makes our credos, and we mostly live by those.”  ……  I hope – in other words, smart people need to manage smart phones carefully and not give into the seduction of their time-wasting addictive character. Will Davidson and Greenfield’s views be properly debated  one day?

—–

PS I have not even touched on the issue of ‘conflict minerals‘  in the phone manufacturing process. Mind you, Australian mining would love slave-mined tantalum from the Congo to be banned, since they also hold reserves themselves.  The use of Blackberry messaging systems by rioters in London In Aug 11 is now well documented and may lead to phone networks being shut off, or changes to software to make it less anonymous.

Or the cartoons. and videos! Silly one here

Of more concern to me was that the professors listed as teaching are not abandoning their existing jobs at all (except for Grayling) and thus they are only available to students during the hours or days they are in London and willing to work. I was  expecting to see a long list of hired academic staff, but the list of those is currently very short.  On the issue of fees – I am afraid £18,000 is almost what an international student would pay for full time study at our university in Australia. (Australian dollar is currently very strong).  Brits are not accustomed to these sorts of fees, which are also commonplace in North American private institutions.  In the unit I run, we are simply not allowed to profit from our students and all revenue is closely managed and kept by those responsible for the teaching, to pay for basic costs. For that price, which is unremarkable in decent research and teaching universities, you get access to an actual university.

In sum, the New College has attracted a bad press for the wrong reasons – mainly the fee issue. More important is the issue of the how, exactly, teaching will occur and how it will be delivered. This is a ‘quality’ question. We wait to see and, since the College says they will make a loss in the early years, the jury is out as to whether it will succeed in the long term.

Will it? I have had experience of this. I was at the University of Arizona when the closure of its small and innovative public liberal arts college offshoot, Arizona International College, was announced after five years, well before it had consolidated its programs. There are parallels that Grayling would be wise to look into.  The pretext for closure was budget cuts. Jobs were lost. Here is a section for an article in the CHE that documents the closure.  

U. of Arizona Closes Experimental College. The Chronicle of Higher Education. Vol. 48, Iss. 10; pg. A.33 2001.

 A great account of how, in the USA, decent long-term or tenured academic jobs are giving way to temporary teaching positions occupied by “adjuncts”. This suits American university managers – who now hold more power than ever, and are generally well paid – just fine, since it reduces wage bills and costs.

One criticism: Bousquet seems to miss in the parts I read,  that outside the USA, the tenure/non-tenure track/untenureable divide is less strong, or even absent. It is my view that tenure in the USA disadvantages contingent, adjunct lecturers and teachers. In the UK and Australasia, non-permanent staff with no chance at a permanent job at least get paid a decent wage and there is some prospect of further contracts and mobility in the sector. Also the ‘permanent’ staff can still be kicked out with persistence, if they do little or no work. This is fairer. We all end up on not-so-great-wages, but there generally more equality.

The book should really be renamed “How the American University Works”. In general, very few commentators on academic labour in the USA seem to acknowledge that different labour systems, often without the tenure/no tenure divide, operate elsewhere. I work in one. They aren’t necessarily better, but the absence of a ‘tenured class’ outside the USA reduces the awkward fact that, in the States, only a chosen few get to the top of a greasy pole that many people with PhDs never even get to approach. Life for the latter is not all that great.