I am happy to announce an open post-doc position in the research project I lead at the Scholarly Communication Research Group at Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań. The project, funded by the National Science Centre (SONATA BIS 12), is titled “Origins and Development of Peripheral Academic Capitalism in Poland (1990–2021)” (you can read more about it here).
The project aims to critically investigate how academic capitalism took shape in a post-socialist, semi-peripheral context. While the concept is typically applied to Anglo-American systems, we ask what it means to speak of academic capitalism in a country like Poland—where public universities dominate, private capital enters in specific ways, and neoliberal reforms were implemented under the conditions of systemic transformation and shock therapy.
The selected researcher will join a team of scholars engaged in archival research, theoretical work and policy analysis. We are interested in how global structures (e.g. World Bank, OECD, commercial publishers) influenced the reorganization of science and higher education in Poland, but also in the specific social conflicts, resistances and institutional responses that shaped these processes locally.
I am looking for a colleague with a solid grounding in critical social theory—broadly understood—and a deep interest in the political economy of higher education. Familiarity with Marxist, world-systems, or postcolonial approaches will be an asset. So will experience in historical, comparative or policy-oriented research.
This is a good opportunity for someone who wishes to contribute to the development of a conceptual framework for understanding academic capitalism from the periphery—and to engage in collaborative, critical, and meaningful research.
The full call is available here.
Feel free to share with anyone who might be interested. And of course—get in touch if you have questions.