Over recent decades the European science and higher education sectors came under increasing political pressure. The growing international competition in the fields of science and education, the high levels of youth unemployment, the sovereign debt crises and the general drive towards Europeanization and globalization of the sector have forced many policy changes at the national level. This changes were met with a mix of compliance and resistance on the part of academic community.

The reform process in Poland was determined by factors similar to those described above. The main difference is that Poland, along with other Central-Eastern European countries, experienced de-privatization (Kwiek, 2015) – a fall in private provision and cost-sharing – rather than the privatization of higher education. The fall in tuition income changed the balance of power between the higher education institutions (HEIs) and the state. In effect the state, after decades of inaction, started to regulate the scientific and educational activities of the HEIs.

The falling demand for higher education, had a particular severe impact on the “soft” disciplines – the humanities, social sciences and law. Instead of softening the blow, the policy changes and regulations introduced in the years 2008-2014 aimed for further reduction of the number of students attending the courses in “soft” sciences. The discourses of “knowledge-based economy” and “middle income trap” were used to legitimize large investments in the educational and research potential of the science and technology sector, while decreasing the amount of public funds available to the “soft” disciplines.  This changes were met with growing resistance on the part of, formerly disorganized, academics. Between 2014 and 2015 this resistance took organized forms and forced the state to withdraw from some parts of the reform agenda.

The aim of my research was to analyze the discourses that allowed for the emergence of organized forms of resistance against the reform. Both sides of the conflict utilized a wide variety of narratives to legitimize their actions. The government, the pro-government media and the academic management dominated the early policy process because of their superior access to resources and superior organization. On the other hand, the participants of the “humanist rebellion” (as it was called in the media) had to find ways to organize and create narratives that transcended the subjective perspectives of individual academic workers. Discourses that provided them with alternatives to the dominant, highly legitimized account of the state of higher education and science sectors played an important – if not the decisive – role in the emergence of organized resistance. 

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