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Full marks to Mary Evans for highlighting the compliance culture suffocating universities (Soapbox, THES , May 31).

Fear and apathy feed this. Young, new academics are reluctant to challenge the "new world order of universities" because they fear for their jobs.

Established or tenured academics have long recognised that the cost of compliance in terms of time, effort and inconvenience is often lower than rocking the boat. Those who speak out against bureaucratic rituals masquerading as "good practices" can be socially isolated by colleagues who do not wish to be associated with "oddballs" or "troublemakers". Thus dissent is quashed. It is shameless that a compliance culture has been imposed on academics. But it is shameful that we have let it happen.

A. Diamantopoulos
Chair of marketing and business research
Loughborough University