CONCEPT
The Institutional Logic of More
The self-reinforcing pattern by which universities and organizations absorb every efficiency gain as an opportunity for increased output rather than increased depth, ensuring that no technology—however powerful—can create the conditions for genuine thought unless the institution deliberately chooses to allow it.
The pattern is remarkably consistent across five decades. A new technology arrives in the university. It promises to save time. It does save time on the specific task it was designed to address. And then the institution, rather than granting the saved time back to the scholar as space for thought, fills it with new demands calibrated to the technology’s capabilities.
Maggie Berg and Barbara Seeber documented this pattern with the methodical care of scholars who recognized they were describing a system, not a series of accidents. Email was supposed to streamline communication; it generated the obligation to respond instantly to every query, multiplying the volume of communication rather than reducing its burden. Learning management systems were supposed to reduce administrative overhead; they multiplied the number of administrative tasks a teacher was expected to perform and called the multiplication an improvement. Each technology delivered on its promise. The institution absorbed the dividend.