ABSTRACT

This discussion paper draws attention to developments outside and within 'the university paradigm' in the United Kingdom that are impacting upon the ways universities are, and can be, understood.

As universities attempt to cling to the status quo in face of dynamic change, the changes that they seem to be seeking to embrace have much to do with adopting corporate modelling and business imperatives rather than the quest for knowledge and better understandings.

In the wake of what is presented as pragmatic approaches to emerging problems, and the mounting costs being visited upon students, 'industry' and students are looking for new ways to gain knowledge, experience and 'credentials'.

Universities as we knew them all so often are a fading memory and the mantra "trust us we're a university" is, sadly, an increasingly hollow cry in the wilderness that is/was the 'knowledge economy'. Nonetheless, universities tend to define places, indeed make cities, in much the same way as cathedrals once did.