1 Welcome to the World Class University: Introduction.- Part I What's in a Word?.- 2 Disorderly Identities: University rankings and the re-ordering of the academic mind.- 3 Becoming World Class: What it means and what it does.- 4 Three Notions of the Global.- Part II World-Class Around the World.- 5 The Kafkaesque Pursuit of 'World Class': Audit culture and the reputational arms race in academia.- 6 Complicit Reproductions in the Global South: Courting world class universities and global rankings.- 7 Realizing the World Class University: Litigation and the state.- 8 World Class at All Costs.- 9 The Paradox of the Global University.- Part III Playing the World-Class Numbers Game.- 10 World Class Universities, Rankings and the Global Space of International Students.- 11 What Counts as World Class? Global University Rankings and Shifts in Institutional Strategies.- 12 The State Role in Excellent University Policies in the Era of Globalization: The case of China.- Part IV The Future of World-Class Universities.- 13 The Marketingisation of Higher Education.- 14 Contesting the Neoliberal Discourse of the World Class University: 'Digital Socialism', Openness and Academic Publishing.- 15 Spaces of Life: Transgressions in Conceptualising the World Class University.- 16 Realising the World-Class University: An Ecological Approach.