Higher education ecosystem and academics in Turkey as the construction of neo-liberal subject

This thesis focuses on the higher education ecosystem in Turkey and analyzes the field of higher education and academic labor on the neoliberal political economy axis. As a result of neoliberal policies, universities have undergone a global transformation in administrative, financial and academic terms and have taken the entrepreneurial university approach, which is described as Anglo-American, as a model. Similarly, the entrepreneurial university model, which was put into practice in Turkey, started to surround the higher education ecosystem with a market-oriented rationality, and the university medium went through a series of structural transformations in line with the company ideology. Entrepreneurial university understanding, which includes company organization, structuring and linguistic processes, is tried to be hegemonic for the goals of neoliberal policies, and the field of higher education enters the commodification process as a new capitalist production model. The commodification of higher education means that academic labor also acts in accordance with the demands of the market. In this respect, neoliberal policies and entrepreneurial university understanding have also transformed academic labor, bringing entrepreneurial academic subjects to the forefront and displacing traditional academic culture. The effects of the neoliberal transformation that started in Turkey after 1980, the function of YÖK, the globalization of the competition system, the less autonomous identity of universities, the loss of qualifications, the industrial-style establishment and management of universities, the transformation of the right to education into a salable commodity, the erosion of public interest awareness, and the statefoundation context of universities as a result of neoliberal policies in Turkey are discussed. The legislation of YÖK, the fact that academic labor became increasingly insecure after 1980, the erosion of university autonomy removes the public benefit mission imposed on universities, and universities are tried to be transformed into a capital-style factory model. As a result of the transformation of university existence into a factory model within the framework of knowledge economies, academic labor has also been added to new exploitation relations. In this context, this study focuses on the entrepreneurial university understanding of neoliberal rationality within the higher education literature, focuses on how the entrepreneurial university model transforms academic subjects and establishes it with a new management mind, focuses on Turkey's current higher education ecosystem and the existential conditions of academic labor through fieldwork, and opens higher education to criticism through neoliberal ideology.