Education, Individualization and Neoliberalism

Valerie Visanich is Lecturer in the Department of Sociology at the University of Malta, Malta.

• Introduction1. The Extension and Expansion of Education2. The Currency of Academic Credentials, Consumerism and Financial Burdens3. Unemployment in the Graduate Economy4. Neoliberal Subjectivity: A Way of Doing Things5. Shock-Absorbers for Youth in the South 6. ‘Slow Motion’ Changes in the South: The Case of a Small Southern European State 7. The Meanings and Feelings of Tertiary Educated Millennials in the SouthSummary and ConclusionsBibliographyIndex

Once the preserve of a small elite, higher education in many countries today has become available to large numbers of young people. At the same time, it has become heavily commodified - opened up to market forces, rather than supported by public funding. Students are incurring huge levels of debt, against the backdrop of pronounced uncertainty in future labour markets, given the pace of change being created by technological innovation and AI. Millennials, Visanich makes clear, are caught up in a vast social and economic experiment whose outcome is largely unknown but fraught with risk and uncertainty. The book is of especial interest since it analyses these issues against the background of Southern Europe, where the individualism promoted by a market-driven ethos runs up against more traditional forms of social and cultural life.'