When the dust settles China (and Asia) will still be standing. Where Australia will stand is hard to say. Certainly the mining boom has brought to the fore the worst kind of consciousness, where the world is seen simply as what Heidegger called a reserve. Historically the cultural attitude to mining and technology placed them outside dominant cultural norms because of their nihilistic cultural effects. Nineteenth-century capitalism brought them, as well as markets, in from the cold, placing them close to the centre of things. Capitalism today, now joined by the powers of the techno-academy, has completed this process. The result is a threat to so ravish our world that it will be permanently impoverished, while also effectively destroying local economies. However this plays out, the whole social environment that places Australia on the edge of Asia will be utterly The Mining Equation John Hinkson Mining Universities Kristen Lyons and Carol Richards Kristen Lyons and Carol Richards work at the School of Social Science at the University of Queensland. academic staff. Mining Education Australia has also established a venture between a number of universities to establish a National Mining Engineering School, with outcomes that aim to ‘recast the way they teach’ undergraduate programs. Fossil fuel companies have also positioned themselves in universities via the active sponsorship of university chairs and academic posts, including the founding of the somewhat ironically named Alcoa Curtin Centre for Stronger Communities. Despite the awkward fit between corporate investment and rigorous, independent research, the Australian government endorses university–private sector collaboration. In the 2009 Powering Ideas report, for example, the Department of Innovation, Industry, Science and Research (DIISR) stated the aim of fostering a doubling in the level of collaboration between Australian universities and business over the next decade. In this article we describe the circumstances that have led to this convergence, as well the extent to which this represents the capture of the tertiary sector by mining interests. We conclude by examin- ing what this means for research independence and integrity. Universities as the New Corporate Partners Universities have a long-standing tradition of engaging in research for the ‘public good’ and for supporting academic freedoms, including critical and independent thinking. Yet enthusiasm for the role that universities might play in ensuring a healthy public life is not matched in funding terms, with Australian universities experiencing a downward turn in public funding since the 1980s. While tertiary sector funding was significantly whittled transformed over coming decades and Australia will need much more wisdom than is currently apparent to emerge in a way that is viable. It will have no hope if it maintains its present commitment to the illusions that fuel contemporary society and economy. For the moment there are no socially oriented movements with broad enough concerns to be able to see through the unprecedented developments of the last forty years. Our ruling elites are nervous, and so they should be. But nerves are one thing; the real social upheaval will come if we learn how to get our feet back on the ground. 06 2013–07 2013 Nº 124 Can we count on the integrity of research coming out of today’s mining-funded tertiary sector? Australia’s economic growth and national identity have been widely celebrated as being founded on the nation’s natural resources. With the golden era of pastoralism fading into the distance, a renewed love affair with primary industries has been much lauded, particularly by purveyors of neoliberal ideology. The considerable wealth generated by resource extraction has, despite its environmental and social record, proved seductive to the university sector. The mining industry is one of a number of industries and sectors (alongside pharmaceutical, chemical and biotechnological) that is increasingly courting Australian universities. These new public–private alliances are often viewed as the much-needed cash cow to bridge the public funding shortfall in the tertiary sector. However, this trend also raises profound questions about the capacity of public good institutions, as universities were once assumed to be, to maintain institutional independence and academic freedoms. The mining sector is now present in Australian universities in unprecedented ways. For example, since 1992, the Australian Coal Association Research Program has funded $145 million to over 929 projects. In 2005–6 it directed a further $13.1 million into eighty new projects. Similarly, the Minerals Council of Australia has allocated $15 million to the Minerals Tertiary Education Council, and approximately a further $1.2 million per year, to develop course materials and employ 7 • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • Mining Universities Kristen Lyons and Carol Richards ......................................