Rethinking the Public: Universities as Scenes of Communitarian Engagement and Civic Socialization

Author(s):

Gyöngyvér Pataki(presenting / submitting)

Conference:

ECER 2017

Network:

20. Research in Innovative Intercultural Learning Environments

Format:

Paper

Session Information

20 SES 01, Session Zero: Framing and Reframing Universities and Network 20 in a Radically Changing Society; Rethinking Research Communities, Engagement and Civic Socialization

Paper Session

Time:

2017-08-22

13:15-14:45

Room:

W3.16

Chair:

Christian Quvang

Contribution

Within recent discussion about civic and political socialization there appears to be a tendency to analyze the fast expansion of non-democratic activity patterns in stable democracies (Feischmidt – Glózer – Illyés – Kasznár – Zakariás 2014; Holmes 2000; Halmai, Kalb 2011). Within this framework the paper is the final report of the Campus life project aimed to increase understanding of the roles played by universities as learning enviroments in generating new forms of communitarian engagement (http://campuslet.unideb.hu). Although some of the findings were already presented to the ECER community this paper specifically analyses forms, motivation and scenes of communities of student body at the University of Debrecen with an aim to understand the changing nature of communities (from communities of interpretation to communities of understanding) in a former collectivist country where the “rise of privacy” has fundamentally rewritten the forms of connectivity and the notion of communities (Halft, Krah 2012;Ritter 2008; Delanty 2003;Weintraub, Kumar 1997;Bauman 2000,). The public /private devide is central in higher education, however the concept of "the public sphere," is never settled and under constant strategic considerations (Williams 2016; Margison 2007). The core part of the paper is to expand the sociological imagination to think beyond the formal civic education in the higher educational sector and follow the process of institutionalization in the micro milieu of communities (Fraser 1990; Pollack, D. – Jacobs J. – Muller,O. – Pickel, G.2003). As a response to the increasing need for infrastructure parallel to the expansion of higher education 54 new institutions were established in Hungary in private – public partnership from 2003 to 2011. While many rely on macro perspectives in their account of how privatized higher educational institutions impact students’ behaviour in post-socialist countries, social scientists have rarely looked at how the seemingly irrelevant micro processes of the evolution of institutional culture add up to significant outcomes.

Method

The research used mixed method to approach this complex question from a multidisciplinary perspective (sociology, education, political sciences). Within this framework a quantitative and qualitative database was developed and a qualitative method (narrative stimulating story cubes) was invented (Pataki, 2014). In 2012 38 group interviews, 9 semi-structured interviews and 15 narrative interviews were carried out in the private rooms of two residential halls with contrasting funding and management structure at the University of Debrecen. The institutional private spaces offered an ideal opportunity to ask students about their attitudes towards the private/public divide. Due to the analytical tools of Maxqda 12 the qualitative and quantitative results will be jointly presented giving an insight into the differing discourses and practices of institutionally vs. culturally active or passive groups of students. In the light of the perception and representation of the surrounding public environment the thorough discourse analysis helped to detect the categorization of public issues in each subgroup of civic activity and informed us about attitudes towards real or virtual public spaces. At the same time the narrative interviews uncovered the way the public –private distinction integrated into personal life stories. The paper first analyses how public views and values are translated into forms of active participation and then the way these activities were discursively and institutionally embedded and shape the institutional settings of their surroundings.

Expected Outcomes

The data shows that parallel to the “rise of privacy” in the higher educational setting the level and way of commitment to institutions has changed and different identification strategies and institutionalization processes have emerged. The results declared that in a country that are emerging from Soviet-style state socialism the way the private/public distinction is conceived opens a strategic field and gains a specific action theoretical perspective. The peculiar evolutionary development of youth culture has led to a paradoxical situation in which institutional dependency and cultural independency coexist. Being aware of the multiple hierarchies of late modernity and the structural deficits of new capitalism young adults tend to strategically play with private/public devide to avoid identification with their institutional environment and to take advantage of the discrepancies in the different levels of the system. The argument substantiates Utasi’s findings that point to the process of the individualization of private communities rather than the alteration of public or semi-public communities (Utasi 2011, 2013). This process may be characterized by the fact that, under the circumstances of increasing institutional dependency and control, individuals paradoxically avoid integrating into macro groups and advocate for career opportunities. The public sphere and spaces are only understood through the lens of the private even in the politically active subgroup. This new form of generational orientation leads to new ways of perceiving connectivity and communality but also new forms of civic and political involvement. These include high level reflection, proficiency in communication and orientation, as well as the reconceptualization of reality and publicity. All of these forms of post conventional actions erode existing systems and institutions and question their legitimacy from an external perspective.

References

BAUMAN, Z. (2001). Community: Seeking Safety in an Insecure World. Cambridge: Polity Press DELANTY, G. (2003). Community. London, New York: Routledge FEISCHMIDT, M.– GLOZER, R.– ILYES, Z.– KASZNAR, V.K. and ZAKARIAS, I. (2014): Nemzet a mindennapokban – Az újnacionalizmus popularis kultúrája . Budapest: L’Harmattan HALFT, S. – KRAH, H. (2012). Privatheit. Strategien und Transformationen. Passau: Stutz HALMAI , G.– KALB, D. (2011): Headlines of Nations, Subtexts of Class; Working-Class Populism and the Rreturn of the Repressed in Neoliberal Europe. New York: Berghahn Books HOLMES,D.R. (2000). Integral Europe: Fast-Capitalism, Multiculturalism, Neofascism. Priceton: Priceton University Press LONGDEN, B.– BELANGER, C. (2013) Universities: Public Good or private profit. Journal of Higher Educational Policy and Management. 35(5),501-522. MARGISON, S. (2007). The public/private divide in higher education: A global revision. Higher Education, 53(3), 307–333. http://doi.org/10.1007/s10734-005-8230-y POLLACK, D. – JACOBS, J. – MULLER,O. – PICKEL, G. (Eds) (2003). Political Culture in PostCommunist Europe: Attitudes in New Democracies. Burlington, VT: Ashgate PATAKI, Gy. (2014). Narrative stimulating cubes: a qualitative method for analyzing the nature of democratic culture among Hungarian students, Sociological Review, 24 (4), 54-85. RITTER, M. (2008). Die Dynamik von Privatheit und Öffentlichkeit in modernen Gesellschaften. Wiesbaden : VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften UTASI, Á (2008). Vitalizing Relationships: The Effects of the Social Network on the Subjective Quality of Life. Budapest: ÚMK WEINTRAUB, J. – Kumar, K (Eds.) (1997). Public and Private in Thought and Practice. Perspectives on a Grand Dichotomy. Chicago, London: University of Chicago Press WILLIAMS, G. (2016). Higher Education: Public Good or Private Commodity? London Review of Education, 14(1)131-142. WODAK, R. (2014). Political Discourse Analysis: Distinguishing Frontstage and Backstage Contexts: A Discourse-Historical Approach. In Flowerdew, J. (Ed.), Discourse in Context (pp. 321–345). London, England: Bloomsbury.

Author Information

Gyöngyvér Pataki (presenting / submitting)

University of Debrecen

Insitute of Educational Sciences

Bocskaikert

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