One of the threads in the discourse on the reform of higher education concerns the problem of the enslavement of academics. Enslavement should be understood here as a feeling expressed in the discourse that the rights and liberties traditionally attributed to the academic community are being limited. Thus, it is the perspective of the scientists who assess their own condition and express the emotional attitude to enslavement (and enslaving practices).

Within the discourse of enslavement the following threads appear:
1. The link between enslavement and actions undertaken under the banner of the reform of Polish science and higher education (a side effect, the intentional activity of reformers)
2. The aim of the practices leading to enslavement (optimization of the system, compensation of low financial expenses)
3. The tools of enslavement (new legal regulations, reporting and evaluations, parameterization)
4. The western models propaganda towards actions leading to enslavement (marketization and bureaucratization of the system, the problem of effectiveness, international rankings)
5. Enslavement and a sense of humiliation, senselessness, superficiality of activities and depravity
6. Individual and collective responses to enslavement (forms of verbal protest, obstruction, emigration: professional and mental/denial)

The paper refers to the post-Foucauldian discourse analysis, although the adopted perspective places it on the periphery of this approach. The notion of control has been replaced by the category of enslavement. This is accompanied by the change in perspective towards a personal one – the discourse is constructed largely by the voices of the enslaved (see below). Enslavement is also an emotionally colored concept. The materials include texts published in the national press (7 most influential papers) in the years 2011-2014. The articles were written by Polish journalists and scientists. The texts also share the common theme: they all concern the package of the reforms of higher education implemented in Poland at that time (also known as Kudrycka’s reform after the name of the Minister of Science and Higher Education).

Identifying the conditions which cause that the reform becomes a form of oppression and leads to enslavement Characteristics of attitudes towards the reform of higher education in Poland

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