Critical thinkers or work drones?

INDI VARUTTI explores how UK universities are in danger of churning out compliant employees at the expense of intellectual growth

Have you noticed that in degrees designed to promote skills in critical thinking, communication, and analysis, (e.g. English Literature or Language), module learning outcomes are increasingly aimed at being ‘work-ready’? In fact, in some cases, key competencies associated with such degrees are completely overlooked to satisfy students' employability, and I cannot help but question why.

Recent reports by the British Academy document that local access to Humanities, Social Sciences and Arts (SHAPE) degrees (e.g. History, Sociology, Media Studies, English), etc.) are disappearing across the UK. Some news media have accused university funding of being the sole cause, inadvertently benefiting far-right movements by advertising democracy as ‘failing’.

Arguably, there are other factors, such as the economic struggles of students affording university, and a drop in course admissions in those deemed ‘low-value’. However, these issues plausibly relate to the politics surrounding universities in the twenty-first century. Essentially, modern censorship is insidiously implemented via the education system. The current defunding of university Humanities courses threatens the impartation of skills that promote critical thinking and questioning, risking a future without autonomy where far-right movements co-opt democracy unopposed.

Humanities 'cold spots' hit disadvantaged

While changes in the HESA coding (the Higher Education Statistics Agency) make comparisons of figures pre- and post-2019 challenging, the British Academy records depict a clear tale of decline. Between 2012 and 2019, the number of first-degree students submitting to the code ‘English Studies’ decreased by 20%. Similarly, between 2012 and 2021, UCAS figures for ‘English Studies’ and ‘Imaginative Writing’ fell by 33%.

Critically, figures for undergraduates resemble those for lecturers. The British Academy records a 6% decline in staff research publication submissions in English Language and Literature between 2018 and 2021. Notably, these figures are not evenly spread across the UK - with Scotland having seen an increase in English submissions - nor across all institutions.

As a result of ‘cold-spots’ (geographic areas that lack local access to universities or specific degree subjects within a commutable distance), students seeking to study in disciplines such as the Humanities may currently need to relocate more than 200km (approximately the distance from London to Cardiff), leaving them unable to access defunded subjects. This especially impacts those from a disadvantaged background wishing to stay home for financial or personal reasons.

Censorship and the oppression of truth?

Historically, the systematic oppression of literature, both fictional and non-fictional, has been utilised globally as a tool to gain authority and manage the narrative that those in power want society to accept. Undeniably, such cultural erasure is established via colonisation but was seldom recorded until the terms ‘genocide’ and ‘ethnocide’ emerged in the twentieth century. 

Significantly, in 1643, Parliament enacted a Licensing Order that prohibited the printing or sale of a book without first obtaining official approval. English poet John Milton responded to such stipulations in For the liberty of unlicenc'd printing, arguing that the destruction and censorship of texts amount to the unlawful killing of innocence, an innocence which Milton declared as ‘truth’. He illustrated truth as a ‘streaming fountain’, where if stopped, the water would ‘sicken into a muddy pool of conformity’. Such conformity would shape society into one that is ‘ignorant’ and ‘slavish’, leaving them unquestioning and intellectually passive, overseen by an authority which is ‘oppressive’ and ‘tyrannous’.

Despite his eloquence, the Licensing Order remained enforced until 1695. Yet, Milton’s message was clear: You cannot have a free people while restricting and censoring their intellectual property.

The destruction of books and the suppression of free thinking

Similarly, nearly three centuries later, writer Robert Musil shared similar sentiments in his collected works, Literature and Politics (2023), conveying the hardship of writers under totalitarian rule. He believed the arts could act as a catalyst to elevate culture and eradicate the desperation that incites historical upheavals, ultimately pioneering a conflict-free society. Musil declared that for a writer to be coerced into ‘isolation’ was an ‘obituary in advance’, signifying a death of voice, which in turn uproots the societal core.

Although Musil was writing during Nazi rule, a time now infamous for its biblioclasm (the deliberate and systematic destruction of books typically via burning), it bears questioning how comparable this technique is to what we are seeing today through the oppression of skills such as critical thinking.

Author Rebecca Knuth refers to the destruction of books as ‘Libricide’ in her academic writing, Libricide: The Regime-Sponsored Destruction of Books and Libraries in the Twentieth Century (2003), aligning such an act with ethnocide. She explores how literature (both academic and creative) is needed to inform individual and community cultural identity for future societal progression. The censorship and destruction of books become sanctioned practices, specifically with regard to totalitarian regimes, as those in authority deem certain texts the ‘tool of the enemy.’ Literature is thus portrayed as an influential weapon where physical destruction becomes a recourse to maintain dominance when censorship fails.

Universities and the neoliberal agenda

Authors’ responses to censorship throughout history define a reciprocal duty between a text and its creator; the text immortalises the author and cultural history, while the author critically examines society and communicates such insights. Such a responsibility is keenly felt by academics today, experiencing the onslaught against higher-education subjects designed to impart such critical analyses and thinking skills to the next generation.

Professor William G. Tierney is one such academic. In his book Higher Education for Democracy: The Role of the University in Civil Society (2021), he declares that following the twentieth century, the function of universities has shifted towards neoliberalism. Prior to this, attending university to learn a specific skill, leaving you ‘work ready’, was not a core motivation - the role of the university was not to churn out students ready for employment. Yet, nowadays higher education is increasingly reduced to a ‘transport vehicle for jobs’.

Under the neoliberal framework, market principles are applied to public and nonprofit institutions, such as universities. In other words, students must secure gainful employment; otherwise, the institution is deemed to have failed. Education should optimise profit, not intellectual growth and as such students are treated as a commodity, making academics themselves disposable intellectual objects. Tierney suggests that in framing universities ‘by simple utilitarian measures that accentuate neoliberalism […] larger society loses a check on the worst tendencies of capitalism.’

Too many 'Mickey Mouse courses'?

As you have probably guessed, courses have been deemed ‘low-value’ based on student employability after receiving their degree, a view promoted by several political parties. Suella Braverman, the Reform UK party's Shadow Education and Skills Secretary, claimed in this LBC interview that ‘a dud degree is something that does not lead to graduate employment ’.

She also asserted in this speech that ‘700,000 graduates are unemployed’, meaning students are ‘wasting three years of their lives on Mickey Mouse courses all while we have a chronic shortage of nurses, builders and care workers’.

Yet, ironically, the Royal College of Nursing Cymru has reported that ‘a shortage of jobs means as many as half of all new nursing graduates could be left without work’, with ‘newly qualified paramedics being advised to look for work abroad because of a recruitment freeze’ (BBC, 2026).

Similarly, Conservative MP Rishi Sunak, when Prime Minister in 2024, reported ‘1 in 3 graduates are on non-graduate jobs’. In response to this, he declared ‘the regulator will be given the powers to look at underperforming degrees, looking at the progression rates, the dropout rates [and] the earnings of people on those degrees’.

Laura Trott, the current Shadow Secretary of State for Education (Conservative Party), confirmed they are ‘going to stop the government funding dead-end university courses’ such as ‘creative arts courses’ (including Creative Writing) where ‘75% of the loans given out […] are not paid back’. It seems evident that the primary focus is, in fact, the government seeing a return on their investment – students receiving graduate jobs to pay off their loans.

How useful is university 'work experience' and 'skills training'?

As a mature student who has already had a career in management within hospitality and a career in law as a paralegal, neither of which demanded a degree, I can agree that the age-old motto of ‘you must go to university to get a good job’ is outdated. However, while a degree may not be essential for many career paths, access to higher education must remain available. Universities should not be reduced to factories simply rolling out the next workforce. Academia is a core part of our society, which goes beyond a paycheck at the end of the month. Disciplines such as the Humanities help address modern and political issues by using past events as a road map, clear communication and evidence-based arguments.

It appears that many UK universities are embedding work experience and ‘skills’ training into the majority of their academic programme modules, including specialist ones. But many students would prefer not to do work experience for a range of reasons: they have already worked for much of their lives (if mature students); they do not wish to work for free; the opportunity to gain experience in the area they wanted was not available; or they simply wished to gain further teaching, knowledge and development from fellow academics. Where ‘work experience’ becomes a compulsory part of the degree curriculum, it can, of course provide valuable ‘real-world’ experience for those lucky enough to be given placements that match their work ambitions, but there is also a danger it becomes a box-ticking exercise to state that we are prepared for the workforce.

The dangers of privileging economic utility

So, in answer to my question as to why critical competencies associated with the Humanities are being systematically replaced by those purely aimed at a student's employability - while capitalism does not inevitably lead to fascism, shifts in capitalist structures could function as a precursor for an authoritarian movement to take hold; an issue of imperative relevance as far-right movements gain increasing global popularity.

The contemporary marginalisation of SHAPE degrees eradicates key societal defences as academics are educated for economic utility rather than intellectual critical thinking, leaving right-wing movements to advance unopposed. English culture is rooted in its literary prestige; if we allow our literature to come under siege, then we also allow our culture to perish. Eloquently stated by novelist Toni Morrison in Burn This Book (2009), ‘[u]npersecuted, unjailed, unharassed writers are trouble for the ignorant bully, the sly racist, and the predators feeding off the world’s resources.'

Written by INDI Varutti (BA Creative Writing and English Literature student), University of Chester, UK)