The new University of California logo and the slickfication of everything

The furor over the new University of California logo signals both the profound transformation in the "business" of higher education as well as the unease with the increasing pattern of rationalization that results in "institutional isomorphism" (DiMaggio and Powell, 1983)  - or the situation where different organizations with very distinctive goals, practices and histories acquire formal similarities. As the "image consultants" laugh all the way to the bank and plan to be back in a few years for more,   the venerable UC logo that used to feature an open book, with a light shining on it accompanied by the words "let there be light" is now a deep blue U and a barely decipherable bright yellow C. The staple of all university logos - a motto expressing some overall value, is missing. Not even a slick, marketing slogan. During these cash-strapped times for public universities, perhaps the C stands for the not so implicit "let there be cash"?

The new UC logo

a sad sign for higher education

DiMaggio, Paul J. and Walter W. Powell. 1983. "The Iron Cage Revisited: Institutional Isomorphism and Collective Rationality in Organizational Fields." American Sociological Review 48:147-160.