Infusing Ethics into Everyday Practice in Higher Education 93so-called ‘ivory tower’ model of the collegial university to become the
economic engine of societies whose future wealth and material well-
being is based on knowledge which has intrinsic value only as a
marketable commodity rather than as a cultural and scientific resource
(Santiago, Tremblay, Basri & Arnal, 2008). In this environment,
traditional collegial patterns of decision-making and loyalty to core
academic values have been blurred by corporate models of leadership,
governance and management (Sporn, 2006). Further, post-World War II
massification continues unabated (Altbach & Forest, 2006), which
places financial and infrastructural strain on institutions. Further,
technological development has introduced changes in pedagogy, course
delivery and communication in virtual academic communities (Scott,
2009). This has made the university an arena of competing discourses
implicit in the language and everyday practice (Foucault, 1985).
Discourses are value-embued and may be frequently ignored but
function nevertheless (Hook, 2001). Dominant discourses, which arise
from and drive the business university model generally adopted
worldwide, are characterised by performativity, instrumentalism,
corporatism and consumerism. Coexisting with these discourses are the
more appealing discourses of care, service, servant leadership, integrity
and trust, which are more likely to be overtly identified in mission
statements and other codes of behavior prevalent in university branding
and marketing (Visagie, 2005). However, it is arguable that the ‘softer’,
more appealing discourses are merely paid lip-service as they jostle for
recognition among the realities of a high-stakes accountability
environment, which is managed by hard systems of hard ‘control’ and
surveillance with their own rewards and penalties. Venter (2006a)
contends that this increasing subordination of higher education to the
forces of technicism and economism implies a reductionist view of the
university’s character and mission with far-reaching implications for
university educators and students. The intellectual enterprise of the