Actually, I think the entire privatization and subcontracting features of the Rumsfeld doctrine have long been a norm in collegiate life. The metamorphosis of college teaching into short-term contract labor predated many of these innovations (as did the idea that this was somehow unseating the old boy net...). In fact, I don't know who pioneered it before academe....maybe migratory farm labor.
But it's no accident that this trashing (self-trashing) of higher education coincided with the ascendancy of the theorizing...which, at least, was different than the quantitative methods fad that preceded it.... ML PS: Btw, I should say that I'm writing this as one of the lucky few who eventually go a tenured job and tenure.
