’Peter Murphy has written a cogent and compelling indictment of the costs to society and education of the bureaucratization of the university. The fatal unintended consequence of the mass expansion of universities since 1970 has been the swamping of the university’s core functions of teaching and research by policy, process, and performance management. The destruction of academic autonomy by a proliferating parasitic administration is at the heart of the systemic crisis of the signature institution of post-industrial knowledge society. Peter Murphy’s book is essential reading for all who care about the future of universities.’ David Roberts, Emeritus Professor of German, Monash University, Australia ’Peter Murphy’s new book is a bold, courageous and unintimidated attempt to offer a fresh perspective on the role, contribution and nature of the institution of the academy. It combines historical analysis with ideological critique, statistical data and academic performance against the background of the changing cultural and philosophical trends that have shaped individuals and practices over the last forty years. Murphy argues for a new kind of university: resourceful, entrepreneurial and creative, an institution that will challenge conformism and conformity with new ideas, solid knowledge of the past and openness to innovation and critique. This is a very opportune book: it exposes the current stagnation but at the same time envisions new horizons. It is also a necessary book - for all academics, students and governments. It shapes a new cultural and epistemic paradigm for the function of the most important Western institution of learning and acting.’ Vrasidas Karalis, Sir Nicholas Laurantus Professor of Modern Greek, University of Sydney, Australia ’If there is a myth which universities have woven around themselves, it is that they are centres of innovation and world-changing research. Peter Murphy’s excellent new book both punctures those illusion