In an era marked by the relentless pursuit of efficiency and quantifiable outcomes, a tenured professor at a prominent Canadian U15 university has voiced profound concerns about the "hollowing out" of academic life. Elysée Nouvet, an associate professor at Western University, draws a direct parallel between her personal observations of an increasingly mechanistic and competitive academic environment and the recently issued encyclical Magnifica Humanitas by Pope Leo XIV. The papal document, released on May 15, 2026, critiques the pervasive "technocratic paradigm" and a "culture of immediacy," themes that Nouvet argues are actively undermining the core values and intended purpose of higher education.
Nouvet, who holds three fully funded graduate degrees in anthropology and has engaged in extensive international research responsive to community and health personnel needs, acknowledges the deeply rewarding aspects of her career. These include enriching friendships, intellectual discovery, collegial collaboration, and the opportunity to travel and encounter diverse perspectives. However, she articulates a growing disquiet with the prevailing atmosphere within academia, describing it as "grey and flat," with diminishing space for creativity, reflection, and genuine human connection—with students, colleagues, communities, and family.
"Our academic system is organized around neoliberal values of optimized efficiency, private responsibility for well-being, and normalized competitiveness," Nouvet stated in her reflection, highlighting the systemic pressures that prioritize measurable output over intrinsic academic pursuits. This sentiment finds a powerful echo in Magnifica Humanitas, which, referencing Pope Francis, identifies the "technocratic paradigm" as a significant threat to human society.
The Pervasive Influence of the Technocratic Paradigm
Pope Leo XIV’s encyclical, released to the global Catholic Church and broader society, defines the technocratic paradigm as a worldview where "the logic of efficiency, control, and profit alone" dictates what holds value and what is deemed disposable. Nouvet asserts that this logic has infiltrated nearly every facet of university operations. Consequently, the definition of valuable scholarship has narrowed to encompass only that which is monetizable or amenable to ranking systems. Intellectual labor that is inherently relational, time-intensive, pedagogical, collaborative, or deeply engaged with communities often struggles to gain traction in performance evaluations.
While academics, particularly within publicly funded institutions, are ostensibly tasked with exploring the purpose and beneficiaries of knowledge, Nouvet observes a stark disconnect between this ideal and the reality on the ground. The prevailing incentive structure, she contends, rewards research that directly generates financial returns for the university. This pressure for perpetual increases in productivity, prestige, and grant funding is described as relentless, even for tenured professors. Nouvet admits to a constant underlying anxiety about administrative scrutiny, where her value is predominantly measured by grant acquisition and publication metrics, rather than the broader impact or intellectual depth of her work.
The academic landscape, as depicted by Nouvet, is characterized by a near-permanent state of acceleration. Professors are engaged in a perpetual cycle of grant application preparation while simultaneously managing overloaded teaching schedules, mentoring students, and absorbing administrative tasks previously handled by professional staff. The sheer volume of emails and reporting requirements further exacerbates this demanding environment.
"The language of collegiality and community persists, but conditions for collegial life are few when you are working 50 to 60 hours a week," Nouvet observes. The pursuit of "excellence," often defined by outperforming equally overworked colleagues, comes at a significant cost. An environment demanding more with less, and channeling time into narrow definitions of productivity, inevitably compromises creativity, intellectual risk-taking, reflection, and essential rest. The ramifications of this pressure, she warns, inevitably seep into the classroom, impacting the quality of education.
The Erosion of Learning Through a Culture of Immediacy
Building on the critique of technology’s pervasive influence, Pope Leo XIV addresses the "culture of immediacy and hyper-stimulation," which he links to fatigue, boredom, and apathy. This phenomenon, he argues, erodes the foundational practices and conditions necessary for deep reflection and meaningful learning. Nouvet, like many of her colleagues, feels a profound responsibility to provide students with transformative educational experiences that foster not only disciplinary expertise but also personal growth as human beings and engaged social citizens.
When professors are empowered to pursue research aligned with their genuine interests or compelled by a sense of scholarly duty, they exhibit a palpable energy and passion. This enthusiasm, in turn, can inspire students and convey the inherent excitement and worth of asking questions, delving deeply, and engaging in the learning process. Conversely, when academics are pressured to prioritize fundable research or produce outputs they do not personally value, their energy wanes. This can lead to feelings of inauthenticity, frustration, and a corroding distrust in the university’s culture and leadership.
The fundamental question of the academic’s purpose—whether it lies in discovery and knowledge advancement, mutual respect for diverse ideas, or simply the relentless pursuit of higher rankings—hangs heavy in the air. Nouvet reports that colleagues frequently pose questions to university leadership regarding their ability to uphold commitments to quality education amidst escalating class sizes, diminishing teaching assistant support, reduced staffing, and the pervasive fatigue stemming from intensified productivity and reporting demands. These inquiries, she notes, are consistently met with managerial discourse about "hard realities" and "strategic priorities." The underlying message, Nouvet laments, is that the quality of education is no longer a primary concern.
Disarming the AI Arms Race and Reclaiming Academic Values
A particularly resonant point for Nouvet is Pope Leo XIV’s call to "disarm" artificial intelligence (AI). The Pope writes, "Disarming AI means freeing it from the mentality of ‘armed’ competition, which today is not limited simply to the military context, but is also an economic and cognitive phenomenon." This competitive drive manifests as a race for increasingly powerful algorithms and vast datasets, fueled by the ambition for geopolitical or commercial dominance. To disarm, he explains, means discrediting the assumption that technological prowess automatically confers the right to govern. It is not about rejecting technology, but preventing it from dominating humanity.
Nouvet sees a parallel need for "disarming language" within contemporary universities. In Canada, she observes, universities have become deeply entrenched in competitive logics—competing for funding, rankings, prestige, student enrollments, visibility, and institutional survival. This stands in stark contrast to the deeply held belief among many academics that knowledge is a collective and public good, that learning thrives on dialogue, debate, relationships, and time, and that scholarship is intrinsically linked to preserving humanity, addressing injustices, and deepening our understanding of diverse ways of being, thinking, and acting. This pursuit, she argues, is fundamentally about peace, not war.
Just as "disarming AI" does not equate to abandoning progress, "disarming" the university, Nouvet suggests, does not entail forsaking ambitious scholarship or thought leadership. Instead, it signifies a refusal to accept the premise that human worth is reducible to measurable productivity, that education’s primary purpose is economic benefit, or that life flourishes through competition and hierarchies.
The Imperative for Action to Avoid Dehumanization
While Pope Leo XIV may not have specifically targeted university professors in Magnifica Humanitas, his messages, according to Nouvet, are acutely relevant. The increasing tendency for corporations to influence or dictate norms of governance within academic institutions is viewed as detrimental to humanity’s broader interests. Avoiding dehumanization, she stresses, requires deliberate action and intentionality.
As the head of the Catholic Church, the Pope embodies a message that can invigorate those who might be tempted to abandon faith in the university’s potential to serve the collective good. His pronouncement: "Do not give up on the old institutions, and do not be afraid to rock the boat."
The prevailing logics of extraction, relentless speed, manufactured scarcity, and pervasive competition are not immutable forces of nature. Universities in Canada, Nouvet asserts, are not organized according to natural law but are the product of human decisions and choices. Consequently, they possess the capacity to be reorganized around alternative messages and norms—those of mutual care, solidarity, democratic governance, and a profound respect for humanity.
The initial step, she proposes, lies in guarding against one’s own "hollowing out." This involves introspection, prompting the same critical questions posed by the Pope: "Where are we going? Toward what goal do we wish to orient ourselves? What direction should we choose as a people and as a human community?" By engaging with these fundamental inquiries, the academic community can begin to chart a course away from the technocratic paradigm and towards a more humane and meaningful future for higher education. The implications of this shift are profound, potentially reshaping not only the academic landscape but also the very understanding of knowledge, learning, and human purpose in the 21st century.
