Audit culture and anthropology: Neo-liberalism in British higher education

Anthropology as a profession is particularly dependent on universities, ins titutions that throughout the industrialized world have been undergoing maj or structural readjustments over the past two decades. Central to these ref orms has been the introduction of mechanisms for measuring 'teaching perfor mance', 'research quality' and 'institutional effectiveness'. baking Britis h higher education as a case study, this article analyses the history and c onsequences of government attempts to promote an 'audit culture' in univers ities. It cracks the spread of the idea of audit from its original associat ions with financial accounting into other cultural domains, particularly ed ucation. These new audit technologies are typically framed in terms of 'qua lity', 'accountability' and 'empowerment', as though they were emancipatory and 'self-actualizing'. We critique these assumptions by illustrating some of the negative effects that auditing processes such as 'Research Assessme nt Exercises' and 'Teaching Quality Assessments' have had on higher educati on. We suggest that these processes beckon a new form of coercive and autho ritarian governmentality. The article concludes by considering ways that an thropologists might respond to the more damaging aspects of this neo-libera l agenda through 'political reflexivity'.