The never-ending decay of the academy

We are in a period where we are witnessing the transformation of international politics, and as both a trigger and a result of this, the evolution of the international economy. The pains of this evolution are being felt in every area of life, in every dimension, and at every level. We are talking about an ordeal that has been ongoing since 2020 for some, and since 2008 for others, though the main subject of this article is certainly not this change. However, this week I want to touch upon a driving force of the international economy and the crisis that is increasing in intensity both in our country and in the world: the AI-supported neoliberal order and its impact on the academy.

I recently had the opportunity to read the first issue of İzlek, the journal of the GSÜ Solidarity Network published in January 2026. There was an article in the journal that caught my attention in terms of both its subject and style. The title of this piece, signed by Tolga Çınar, is as striking as its content: “The Corpse of the Academy: A Manifesto of Disobedience”. 

Çınar has started with a formidable assault: “The student is, today, the most pathetic, the most ridiculous, and the most miserable figure in human history.” (p. 12) It is impossible not to agree or disagree. Young people, put through the mill by a series of international crises along with the struggle to make ends meet, are experiencing a period where the perception of reality has completely vanished. In the author's words, this mass is today “not even a consumer; it is a product that markets itself. It is a wretch that tramples its honor to polish its LinkedIn profile, to add a line to its CV, and begs for reference letters from those mediocre types it chases after by calling them ‘professor’.” (p. 13)

I must joyfully state that this article fills the void in our Turkish language and publishing world for these polemical expressions, and for the rousing style that reached its most perfect form in Karl Marx and his student, the late Yalçın Küçük. The author is troubled; the author is disgusted by the student; but of course, he does not place the sole blame on this mass. On the contrary, in the article he writes to “pull” the “meek” and “cowardly” ground from under the students, he addresses a youth that, as the title suggests, should not take orders from a corpse. He sees the remedy for the trouble in “being angry” and, again with reference to Marx, in taking up the “weapon of criticism”:

“I am not saying drop out of school (that would be an individual escape, and the system loves runaways). I am saying; stop defining yourself as a ‘student’. Do not see school as a space for ‘education/instruction’, but as a battlefield.

When you enter your classrooms, know that the person in front of you is not there to teach you something, but to domesticate you.” (p. 13) Indeed, in an era where artificial intelligence is about to dominate the entire system and access to information is easier than at any point in history, “when the mask of information transfer falls, what emerges from underneath is naked violence. The professor is no longer an ‘educator’; he is a jailer with an attendance sheet, a grade book, and a disciplinary regulation in his hand.” (p. 12)

Çınar builds his criticisms on very accurate points. First of all, he successfully diagnoses a problem that is no longer local but global. Everyone who is a part of this system is more or less aware of the decay of the Turkish academy. But the problem actually transcends Turkey's borders: The academy or the university is now, as Catherine Liu also puts it, a kind of club that liberals have completely monetized. Here, different lobbies, pursuing their own political agendas, have established dominance not only over professors and students but over the entire administrative system. The Western universities considered the most prestigious in the world are the institutions suffering the most from this. University administrations, eyeing millions of dollars in “donations,” approve of donors deciding almost everything from the curriculum to the chairs to be established. This is, of course, not just a problem of today. It is a product of the intellectual transformation experienced during the Cold War. 

In Turkey, this situation manifests in very different ways; especially in the social sciences, many liberal researchers and institutes who claim to be “independent” are directly hitched to the agendas of their colleagues in the West. In other universities where state dominance is felt, there are different complaints. But they all have one thing in common with the West, the Middle East, and South and East Asia: handing out diplomas as if they were distributing certificates. In Çınar's words, universities have turned into “a dilapidated ticket booth where entry tickets to the market are stamped.” (p. 12)

Information is everywhere, but where is the truth? In an environment where graduation theses are written with one or two prompts and these theses are evaluated with one or two prompts, everything is actually just theater. I do not want to use a harsh language like the author of the Manifesto. However, I wish for both students and faculty members to realize that they are part of this theater; and that this play has been staged for a very long time.

However, I do not think that the transformations taking place today signal that the end of the university has arrived. Yes, the digital transformation experienced over decades, with the support of artificial intelligence, offers us a richness in content production that Aristotle, Newton, or Einstein could not even imagine. Yes, in their current dysfunctional and bewildered state, universities have turned into internship preparation and diploma distribution centers. But why shouldn't this crisis environment bring opportunities along with it?

I must state that I am not as completely pessimistic about the future of the academy as the author of the Manifesto. As students of Süheyl Ünver, Cahit Arf, and Korkut Boratav, our job is difficult. But as Mao said, “There is great chaos under heaven. The situation is excellent.”

First of all, we should not sweep the entire academy into the trash in excitement; I think we must accept the fact that there are many students, academics, and administrators who are in a struggle with this body that has not yet turned into a corpse but is condemned to eternal decay. There are “fraudulent” professors, but I think generalizing this like Çınar is a great injustice.

The fact that information is everywhere and free also has a price: Now the researcher or the reader is afraid of the massive ocean of information and material in front of them. They are bewildered. To adapt the famous song, “so many books so little time”. When this is the case, the disciplinary function of the academy and the academic gains importance. But of course, I am not talking about the “discipline” of Foucault and his followers, which is inevitably mentioned in the Manifesto. 

The discipline of reading provides the knowledge of what to read, how to read, what to read together with what, and how to express one's thoughts orally and in writing. The one who can provide this best is again the professor. The professor inevitably devours the literature in their field of expertise over the years, or at least is obligated to do so. Until the university revolutions in the middle of the twentieth century, they also undertook the task of “transfer”. And what they transferred was not information. With the Enlightenment, they transferred the “method”. 

As Çınar admits, the Enlightenment has collapsed today. “The university was the engine of civilization. Now look around you. What progress? What future?” (p. 12) Perhaps a return can be experienced with the burial of postmodernism, which, in my opinion, poured poison on the roots of the Enlightenment, that is, rationalization. In a world where the rational student, the rational professor, the rational learning environment, and access to information are limitless, the academy has very important tasks. Ticket booths must exist, and information and practice should perhaps now part ways. For this reason, instead of creating epistemological obstacles and suggesting resignation from being a student, I think the task that falls not only to students but to all of us is to rebuild this academy.