An Echo from X

I was reading an economist’s blog, and he linked to this random X post, from someone named ShoreKnight who clearly hasn’t got a clue about 21st century universities:

Academic life would improve if universities would dispose the 19th century decorum and be run like a business with clear roles: pure administration, pure research, pure teaching. Administration needs actual MBAs not theoretical physics PhDs.

You may recall my past post on Pournelle’s Law in this regard. However, someone else responded to this post directly on X, using words that I can hardly improve on:

Academia already did what you’re proposing. Universities are now run like businesses with professional administrators, branding strategies, risk management, consultants, and KPI dashboards. The result hasn’t been better research or teaching. It’s been the transformation of universities into brand-management and lifestyle companies, where prestige, expansion, and revenue extraction matter more than scholarship or education. Research and teaching don’t reliably maximize short-term financial returns, so they get crowded out. What grows instead is administration because once an administrative class is established, its primary function becomes self-preservation and expansion, not mission fulfillment. This is exactly what happens when a nonprofit adopts corporate logic without corporate accountability. You don’t get efficiency. You get mission drift and an institution optimized to look successful rather than to be successful.

The responder is known on X as Jason Locasale. Don’t know who he is, never heard of him, but – you got it right, Jason.