http://bura.brunel.ac.uk/handle/2438/8608 Tue, 14 Apr 2026 06:36:18 GMT 2026-04-14T06:36:18Z http://bura.brunel.ac.uk/handle/2438/33134 Title: Hysteresis in the neoliberal academy: inside- and outside-track academic lives under authoritarian neoliberalism Authors: Özbilgin, MF; Erbil, C; Akçomak, S; Temel, S; Karaosmanoğlu, E; Ünlü, H Abstract: Hysteresis in the neoliberal academy emerges as inherited academic dispositions collide with performance-driven governance under authoritarian neoliberalism, producing inside- and outside-track academic lives. We examine how neoliberal reforms in higher education in Turkey have restructured academic performance, generating uneven experiences for academics positioned within (inside-track) and against (outside-track) the dominant political orthodoxy. Drawing on Bourdieu’s concept of hysteresis, we show how the rapid transformation of institutional logics has produced temporal disjunctures between academic habitus and field conditions. Our qualitative analysis of responses from 2,023 Turkish academics reveals how inside-track academics tend to justify and benefit from the performative turn, while outside-track academics resist or are marginalised by it. This study makes an original contribution by revealing the embodied dynamics of field misalignment and offering a novel conceptualisation of insider/outsider positioning in academic careers under neoliberalism. We show how performance regimes govern voice as well as productivity, reproducing patterned orientations of orthodoxy and heterodoxy with implications for governance, leadership, and evaluation design in higher education. Thu, 02 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT http://bura.brunel.ac.uk/handle/2438/33134 2026-04-02T00:00:00Z http://bura.brunel.ac.uk/handle/2438/33133 Title: “Cis Hell” Authors: Sehlikoglu, S; Özbilgin, MF Abstract: This paper develops the concept of cis hell to describe the regulatory normativity over all bodies based on gender biopolitics as a global political pandemic. Centring the recent UK Supreme Court’s 2025 Equality Act ruling and connecting it to similar examples across the world, we demonstrate how biopower operates through social movements inspired by the new authoritarianisms to establish transnational regimes of bodily control. Drawing connections between trans exclusion in the UK, USA and pronatalist policies in Turkey, Hungary, and Russia, we argue these seemingly disparate developments represent coordinated manifestations of biopolitical logic reducing human worth to reproductive capacity. Authoritarian innovation threatens and destroys modest progress towards human rights for vulnerable groups. ‘Gender-critical’ activism, despite protection claims, functions within a broader masculinist restoration project threatening collective prosperity by constraining human potential and re-centring white, male, and cis supremacy. The purported ‘safety’ of cisgender categorization creates a hell of rigid taxonomies undermining human flourishing across the gender spectrum, necessitating a radical reimagining of gender justice as essential to global prosperity through participative co-design processes inherent in new social movements theory focusing on social identity, human potential, and affect. Fri, 03 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT http://bura.brunel.ac.uk/handle/2438/33133 2026-04-03T00:00:00Z http://bura.brunel.ac.uk/handle/2438/33073 Title: Navigating Challenges, Embracing Opportunities: An Assessment of Women’s Leadership and Career Advancement in Africa, with a Focus on Nigeria Authors: Adeoti, A Editors: Ologunoye, OT; Mordi, C; Olatunji, DA Abstract: A gendered ideology and a gendered hierarchy are prominent components that impact African women’s leadership and career advancement. By considering extant literature, empirical evidence, and expert insights on this topic, the aim of this chapter is to understand the dynamics surrounding women’s leadership and career advancement in Africa, specifically Nigeria. It delves into Nigeria’s history and culture, examining the impacts of gender roles, societal expectations, customs, and legal barriers hindering women’s leadership and career advancement. Providing insights into preconceptions of females based on their gender, this chapter’s assessment reveals that sociocultural practices, female gender bias and marginalisation, a lack of education for young girls, poor access to education, a lack of legal provisions encouraging women’s empowerment, geographical factors, and religious proscriptions determine or unfavourably impact women’s leadership and career advancement. While this assessment focuses on women’s leadership and career advancement in Nigeria, thereby limiting its generalisability, it considers how to create sustainable leadership and career advancement opportunities for women, strategies for fostering a more inclusive and supportive environment for women, and recommendations for promoting gender equality, empowering women leaders, and inclusive career pathways. Thu, 17 Apr 2025 00:00:00 GMT http://bura.brunel.ac.uk/handle/2438/33073 2025-04-17T00:00:00Z http://bura.brunel.ac.uk/handle/2438/33072 Title: The BBC is a partisan battleground – why does Japan’s public broadcaster escape the same fate? Authors: Pickering, S; Hansen, ME; Sunahara, Y Abstract: Public service broadcasters are supposed to be the most trusted news outlets in democratic societies. Funded through models like licence fees and free from advertising, they are meant to stand apart from commercial media Thu, 16 Oct 2025 00:00:00 GMT http://bura.brunel.ac.uk/handle/2438/33072 2025-10-16T00:00:00Z