Abstract: American higher education faces an existential tension between market-driven priorities and its foundational academic mission. This analysis examines the structural transformation of universities through corporatization—characterized by administrative expansion, contingent faculty proliferation, and outcomes-focused accountability—and its consequences for academic careers, liberal arts education, and institutional purpose. Drawing on empirical evidence and organizational case studies, the article documents how market logics have reshaped faculty working conditions, eroded shared governance, and commodified learning. Despite documented performance costs including faculty attrition, student wellbeing challenges, and mission drift, the article identifies evidence-based organizational responses including governance recalibration, sustainable staffing models, and integrated mission frameworks. The analysis concludes that institutional resilience requires rebuilding the psychological contract between universities and stakeholders, strengthening distributed leadership structures, and operationalizing values-driven accountability that honors both market realities and academic purpose.
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