Conference Agenda

The three papers in this symposium illustrate the value of Margaret Archer's theoretical contribution for their studies of Higher education in Europe and internationally. We demonstrate how Archer has provided a conceptual framework that can be used to generate critical analyses of intersecting gender inequalities that are specific to the existing social and cultural context and the forms of intersectional inequalities studied. The papers focus on genders and disability in UK Higher Education, genders and sexualities in Croatia and international humanities and social science academics who start work in the UK, with some movement to working in Europe and internationally.

Archer died in 2023. She is renowned in the field of critical realism. She is the author, editor and contributor to numerous books in the field of critical realism (see Centre for Social Ontology, 2024, for a full list) Some of her works were translated into Italian, Spanish and Japanese. Her theoretical concepts are widely used by critical realist scholars but also in education, business and management, health, sociology, psychology, environmental studies and more (e.g. Alderson, 2021; Case, 2012; Thorpe, 2019). She is perhaps best known for her theorization of agency and for the concept of morphogenesis which is what our papers focus on (see especially, Archer, 2007, 2012, 2014). In this, she built upon and was in discussion with the critical realist work of her colleagues (e.g. Bhaskar 1990; Sayer, 2010).

In three empirical and theoretical studies, Archer described how enacting agency was becoming compulsory as each generation’s educational, employment, home, social and cultural contexts were becoming more unique and there was not an appropriate blue-print for life to be passed on from natal contexts (Archer, 2012). She proposed that life projects (people's plans around their central concerns) and the process of decision-making (through reflexivity) were becoming more central to shaping individual lives and generating transforming social and cultural structures. Although as a dialectical process, it is important to note that agency and decision-making take place in the context of current social and cultural conditions, which does shape and facilitate different types of decision-making. Archer categorised different forms of reflexivity that underpin peoples’ decisions regarding when and how to enact different forms of agency (Archer, 2003)). Some forms of reflexivity and decision-making reproduce society and individual lives in similar forms over time (morphostasis) others transform lives compared to previous generations and play a role in changing culture and society (morphogenesis).

In developing her articulation of the concept of morphogenesis, Archer (1982, 2014) distinguished her thinking from other theoreticians concerned with increasing individualisation in societies. She took issue with Antony Giddens (1986) notion of structuration, and, post-structuralist and post-modern conceptualisations of individualisation that were associated with a breaking down of social structure (e.g. Beck and Beck-Gernsheim, 2002). She also believed that Bourdieu’s (e.g., 1998) notion of habitus was only suitable for describing reproduction (Archer, 2012). Therefore, she developed concepts that could capture how phenomena, culture and social structures emerged from materially diverse and structurally differentiated dialectical processes of mutation and change, that included individuals' agencies.

The intersectional identities and structural processes of transformation and stasis, we find in decision-making in higher education contexts are conceptualised as emergent from the complex set of causal mechanisms and relationships embedded in the different contexts of higher education we have studied.

This paper uses Margaret Archer’s theory of social morphogenesis/morphostasis which explains the temporal interaction between and within structure, culture and agency that brings about the transformation or reproduction of society (Archer, 1995). This theory is utilized to explain the changing function of the social model of disability. The claim is that the social model, which began as an ‘oppositional device’ (Beckett and Campbell, 2015) for the emancipation of disabled people, has been repurposed in higher education as a policy tool for reinforcing a neoliberal system. The “British social model” of disability (Shakespeare 2014, p.1) was developed in the 1960’s and 1970’s by the disability rights movement (DRM). Disability activists from the DRM challenged the cultural emergent properties of the past which saw disability as a medicalised individual problem or “personal tragedy” (Oliver and Barnes, 2012, p.20), and reconceptualised disability as the social construction of an oppressive society. Originating as a causal relationship at the socio-cultural level (Archer, 1995), the social model framework eventually “took on a life of its own” (Oliver, 2013) becoming a component within the Cultural System (Archer, 1995) with causal powers that bolstered the disability rights movement, underpinned national and international disability rights legislation and was a force for change in the UK (Hunt, 2019). Over time, the social model became commonly recognised as having limitations (Shakespeare, 2004; Oliver, 2013) and a wider human rights model of disability was endorsed by the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) (2022). Despite its recognised limitations, higher education institutions in the UK currently allege that they are taking a social model approach, both in policy and in their aspirations (Office for Students (OfS), 2020; Williams et al., 2019). However, the research underpinning this paper suggests that the extent that policies based on the social model can be effective in universities is constrained by structural, agential and cultural factors inherent in a marketised higher education sector. This paper uses Margaret Archer’s (1995) theory to highlight and explain the mechanisms over time that led to the appropriation of the social model for neoliberal purposes. It also considers to what extent policies based on the social model, a component of the current cultural system, are interacting with agents to reproduce ongoing constraints on disabled staff and students that are empirically evidenced by wide-ranging, persistent and embedded barriers in higher education.

Archer, M., 1995. Realist social theory: the morphogenetic approach. Cambridge: Cambridge university Press. Beckett, A.E., Campbell, T., 2015. The social model of disability as an oppositional device. Disability and Society, 30(2), pp. 270-284. Hunt, J., 2019. No Limits. The Disabled People’s Movement - A radical history. Great Britain: TBR Imprint. Office for Students, 2020. Effective Practice Advice [Online]. s.l.:Office for Students. Available from: https://www.officeforstudents.org.uk/advice-and-guidance/promoting-equal-opportunities/effective-practice/disabled-students/advice/ [Accessed 24 January 2024]. Oliver, M., Barnes, C., 2012. The New Politics of Disablement. 2nd ed. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. Oliver, M., 2013. The social model of disability: thirty years on. Disability and Society, 28(7), pp. 1024-1027. Shakespeare, T., 2004. The Social Model of Disability [Online]. s.l:Academia.edu. Available from: http://www.academia.edu/5144537/The_social_model_of_disability [Accessed 25 January 2024]. Shakespeare, T., 2014. Disability Rights and Wrongs Revisited. 2nd ed. Oxford: Routledge. United Nations, 2022. Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disability (CRPD)[Online]. New York: United Nations. Available from: https://www.un.org/development/desa/disabilities/convention-on-the-rights-of-persons-with-disabilities.html [Accessed 25 January 2024]. Williams, M., Pollard, E., Takala, H., Houghton, A., 2019. Review of Support for Disabled Students in Higher Education in England. Report to the Office for Students by the Institute for Employment Studies and Researching Equity, Access and Participation. [Online]. Brighton: IES and REAP. Available from: https://www.officeforstudents.org.uk/media/a8152716-870b-47f2-8045-fc30e8e599e5/review-of-support-for-disabled-students-in-higher-education-in-england.pdf [Accessed 25 January 2024].

Following the European strategic documents on gender and sexuality rights (European Commisson, 2023), Croatia has taken measures to improve the rights of LGBTQ+ persons, e.g. the right to a life partnership, adoption of children, etc. (NN 98/19). Despite progress at the legal level, Croatian society is still permeated with traditional and patriarchal values, especially when it comes to the LGBTQ+ community, who have been confronted with sterotypes, prejudices and various forms of discrimination (Pikić and Jugović, 2006; Puzić et al. 2020; Štambuk, 2022), even in the area of higher education, which is the subject of our research. The research was conducted in 2019 with 2 focus groups consisting of 11 LGBTQ+ students from two universities (the oldest and largest and the new and small) as part of a large project. In order to understand LGBTQ+ students as active human agents, whose properties and powers emerge from their relations and interactions with their environment, while also maintaining relative agential autonomy from their social context, we draw on Archer's social realist theory (1995, 2003) and its elaboration and application in educational research (Case, 2015; Clegg, 2016; Williams, 2012). The research is focused on the morphogenesis of students agency conditioned by the structural and cultural characteristics of students natal and university contexts. The aim of the research is to interrogate the ways in which universities offer enablements and constraints for the exercising students agency. Students internal conversation or deliberations on which university to enter and how to act within structural and cultural conditions of the university context show that LGBTQ+ students chose liberal and tolerant universities where they feel more accepted and free, with diverse contents and opportunities that allow them a more fulfilling and successful study experience and social life as LGBTQ+ persons, compared to their natal environment. Although the universities offer students more agential opportunities, the conditions for the morphogenesis of LGBTQ+ students' agency are still constrained. The universities need to enlarge their efforts to facilitate and support the development of full individual potential and free expression of gender and sexuality identities of LGBTQ+ students, if higher education is to be a place of equal opportunities for all individuals regardless of their gender and sexuality or any other characteristic that involves inequality.

1. Archer, S. Margaret (1995) Realist social theory: The morphogenetic approach. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 2. Archer, S. Margaret (2003) Structure, agency and the internal conversation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 3. European Commission (2023) Progress report on the implementation of the LGBTIQ Equality Strategy 2020-2025. Publications Office of the European Union. 4. Jannifer M. Case (2015) A social realist perspective on student learning in higher education: the morphogenesis of agency. Higher Education Research & Development. Volume 34, Issue 5. 5. Law on Life Partnership of Persons of the Same Sex. NN 98/19. 6. Pikić, Aleksandra and Ivana Jugović (2006) Violence against lesbians, gays and bisexuals in Croatia: research report. Zagreb: Biblioteka Kontra, Knjiga 2. 7. Puzić, Saša; N. Baketa; B. Baranović; M. Gregurović; T. Matković; M. Mornar; I. Odak and J. Šabić (2020) On Underrepresented and Vulnerable Groups of Students: Contributions to the Enhancement of the Social Dimension of Higher Education in Croatia. Zagreb: Institute for Social Research in Zagreb. 8. Štambuk, Marina (2022) Let's support inclusive education - building a safe future" Zagreb/Rijeka: The Lesbian Organization Rijeka "LORI" and Rainbow Family. 9. Williams, Kevin (2012) Rethinking ‘Learning’ in Higher Education. Journal of Critical Realism. Volume 11, Issue 3.

We illustrate how Archer's (2003, 2007, 2012) notion of morphogenesis and critical realist ideas around agency, culture and structure, frame a biographical and longitudinal study of academics’ careers. This positions the research as addressing the wider issues of universities’ roles in generating (in)justices across society (Alderson, 2021). We studied 14 academics in social sciences and humanities, through a life-grid methodology and a series of four biographical interviews with each participant, over eleven years. This focus is on the biographical data from seven academics who were born outside the UK and who were from Eastern, Northern and Western Europe, North America and Asia and who had a range of intersecting gender identities. We sought to understand the impact of the 2010 new funding regime for UK undergraduate degrees on universities’ capacity for generating greater justice. In increasingly internationalised and globalised societies, where geographically mobile students are more numerous, it is important to consider the way the system does (not) empower international staff to facilitate a process through which current international injustices, for example, regarding unequal national participation and success in knowledge production, can be addressed (Kim, 2017). Our research is based on the notion that to address such injustices a diverse social science and humanities academic workforce is needed. These disciplines are at the foreground of tackling injustices and inequalities but to address global and national problems diverse staff need to participate in the creation of knowledge, development of teaching and in administrating and leading universities (Ahmed, 2021; Bhopal, 2016; Blackmore, 2022; Dolmage, 2018; Lipton, 2020; McLean et al, 2019; Walker, 2010). In the UK, where this study is set, a growing international workforce provides opportunities for generating justice through their work (e.g. Eslava, 2020 on teaching). However, as we show there are contradictions between the international (and sometimes national) call for greater collaboration across institutions and countries and the institutionally and nationally competitive agendas associated with league tables and these targets associated with the neo-liberal funding models (Kim, 2017). Studying the decisions and actions of academics reveals whether universities are moving towards or away from social justice (Galaz-Fontes et al, 2016). The Archer-informed analysis provides a lens and a language which draws out the process as enacted by the academics and also facilitates articulation of the way that the different levels of the university and society can produce emergent environments, relationships and artefacts that overall hinder efforts towards global justice.

Alderson, Priscilla. (2021) Health, Illness and Neoliberalism: An Example of Critical Realism as a Research Resource. Journal of critical realism 20.5: 542-556. Ahmed, Sara, (2021) Complaint!, Durham, USA: Duke University Press Bhopal, Kalwant. (2016) The Experiences of Black and Minority Ethnic Academics: A Comparative Study of the Unequal Academy. Abingdon, Oxon; New York, N.Y.: Routledge, Routledge Research in Higher Education. Blackmore, Jill. (2022) Governing Knowledge in the Entrepreneurial University: A Feminist Account of Structural, Cultural and Political Epistemic Injustice. Critical Studies in Education 63.5: 622-639. Print. Eslava, Luis. (2020) The Teaching of (Another) International Law: Critical Realism and the Question of Agency and Structure. Law Teacher 54.3 (2020): 368-385. Galaz-Fontes, J.F., Arimoto, A., Teichler, U., Brennan, J. (2016). Biographies and Careers Throughout Academic Life: Introductory Comments Biographies and Careers Throughout Academic Life: Introductory Comments. In: Biographies and Careers throughout Academic Life. The Changing Academy – The Changing Academic Profession in International Comparative Perspective, vol 16. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-27493-5_1 Kim, Terri. (2017) Academic Mobility, Transnational Identity Capital, and Stratification under Conditions of Academic Capitalism. Higher education 73.6 (2017): 981-997.. Lipton, Briony. (2020) Academic Women in Neoliberal Times. Cham: Springer International Publishing: Imprint: Palgrave Macmillan, Palgrave Studies in Gender and Education.