Transformation of higher education in Turkey within the framework of the concept of administrative dispositif

The thought on higher education has a very long historical background. In addition, as an independent discipline, the field of higher education research, has also been shaped with a policy-based approach after the Second World War. In order to make a theoretical and practical contribution to the field of higher education studies, it seems functional to address the field through the methods and concepts of Michel Foucault, one of the most important thinkers of the last century. The aim of this study is to investigate how Michel Foucault's important concepts such as subject, knowledge, resistance and power relations can be used in the field of higher education research within the framework of historical method and discourse analysis and the concept of dispositif. The concept of dispositif focuses on the nature of the relationship between discourses, institutions, administrative decisions and resistances. In this context, it is claimed that higher education can be considered as a dispositif. This thesis focuses on the transformations in Türkiye's higher education in the post-1980 period In the first part of the study, the literature on higher education studies is focused, Foucault's method and concepts are emphasized and an evaluation is made on how it can be used in the field of higher education. In the second part of the study, depending on the literature created in the first part, the transformation of higher education in Türkiye in the post-1980 period is handled as dispositif. In this context, the subject is discussed with three different periodizations as higher education dispositif after 1980, higher education dispositif after the 28 February National Security Council (MGK) decisions, higher education and dispositif during the AK Party's political powers. This thesis is important in the context of discussing the field of higher education studies with a Foucaultian perspective and discussing it in Türkiye. İn addition, this thesis is also important because it opens up a field for other studies to be done in the field of higher education as well as for new researches to be made with the Foucaultian method in different fields of study.