As one of the pioneers and leading advocates of neoliberalism, Britain, and in particular England, has radically transformed its higher education system in recent decades. What was once a public good has turned into a market in which universities are required to perform like businesses, with students being increasingly referred to as customers. The Idea of Higher Education and the Student investigates precisely this relation between the changing function of higher education and how we see the student. But instead of offering yet another critique of neoliberalism and marketisation, it widens the view beyond the present.

Based on a detailed analysis of policy documents and publications by academics and students, the book explores how the student has been conceptualised within the debate on higher education, from the birth of the British welfare state in the 1940s until today. It thus offers a novel assessment of the history of higher education and shows how closely the concept of the student and the way we comprehend higher education are intertwined. Unprecedented in its reach and focus, The Idea of Higher Education and the Student opens up a new and critical perspective on higher education that can critically inform public debate and future policy in Britain and beyond.

The book should be of great interest to scholars, researchers and postgraduate students in the areas of higher education; educational policy and politics; and the philosophy, sociology and history of higher education.