Tolerable Suboptimization: Racial Consequences of Defunding Public Universities

We argue that the public defunding of public higher education and turn to private revenue streams—for example, non-resident tuition, grants, philanthropy, and corporate sponsorship—generates organizational racial resource disparities. We draw on a year-long qualitative case study of a University of...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Sociology of race and ethnicity (Thousand Oaks, Calif.) Calif.), 2021-10, Vol.7 (4), p.561-578
Main Authors: Hamilton, Laura T., Nielsen, Kelly, Lerma, Veronica
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Case studies
College students
Colleges & universities
Higher education
Leadership
Low income groups
Marginality
Mental health
Neoliberalism
Philanthropy
Racial segregation
Resource allocation
Sponsorship
Students
Systemic racism
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Summary:We argue that the public defunding of public higher education and turn to private revenue streams—for example, non-resident tuition, grants, philanthropy, and corporate sponsorship—generates organizational racial resource disparities. We draw on a year-long qualitative case study of a University of California campus with a majority Latinx and low-income student body, including ethnographic observations and interviews with administrators, staff, and students, to argue that these disparities may impede majority-marginalized universities’ abilities to serve their student body. Our data demonstrate how limited organizational resources impact the provision of academic advising, mental health, and cultural programming for racially marginalized students. We articulate a racial neoliberal cycle of resource allocation: Colorblind constructs of “merit” lead to racial segregation and generate racialized organizational hierarchies that result in unequal organizational access to private resources. University leadership at resourced-starved majoritymarginalized universities may respond to fiscal constraints by accepting and normalizing suboptimal support for students—what we refer to as “tolerable suboptimization.” Tolerable suboptimization may also be unevenly applied within universities, such that supports accessed or needed by marginalized students are the most impacted. As a consequence, institutional racism can take on the appearance of financial necessity.
ISSN:2332-6492
2332-6506
DOI:10.1177/23326492211015697