Academic capitalism and doctoral student socialization: A case study

In the last two and a half decades, the U.S. government has fostered cooperation between industries and universities in order to cope with funding gaps and global competitive markets by introducing a number of laws and programs that allow universities to patent their research and to engage in collaborations with the private sector toward opportunities in the new economy (Altbach, 2005; Slaughter & Leslie, 1997; Slaughter & Rhoades, 2004, 2005). Under this scenario, research universities have become a source of national wealth development through applied research rather than primarily a means for liberal education of undergraduates and warfare research (Gumport, 2005; Slaughter & Rhoades, 2004, 2005). At the turn of the 21st century, these initiatives have fostered entrepreneurialism in science and engineering fields through a variety of interdisciplinary centers and partnerships with the private sector around new technologies derived from disciplines such as biotechnology, materials science, optical science, and cognitive science. This entrepreneurialism in certain fields is based on the premise that faculty have the primary responsibility for obtaining their own research funds and running their own laboratories (Etzkowitz, 1999). In addition, research in these applied disciplines is usually expensive and depends heavily on external funds, which opens the way for political and commercial intervention (Becher, 1989). Based on these trends, Slaughter and Leslie (1997) defined academic capitalism as the marketlike behaviors on the part of faculty and academic institutions in order to seek alternative sources of funding.