HIGHER EDUCATION IN A GLOBALISING WORLD

HIGHER EDUCATION DYNAMICS

VOLUME 1
Series Editor
Peter Maassen, University of Oslo, Norway, and University of Twente, Enschede,
The Netherlands

Editorial Board
Alberto Amaral, Universidade do Porto, Portugal
Akira Arimoto, Hiroshima University, Japan
Nico Cloete, CHET, Pretoria, South Africa
David Dill, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, USA
Jiirgen Enders, University of Twente, Enschede, The Netherlands
Patricia Gumport, Stanford University, USA
Glenn Jones, University of Toronto, Canada

SCOPE OF THE SERIES

Higher Education Dynamics is a bookseries intending to study adaptation processes

and their outcomes in higher education at all relevant levels. In addition it wants to
examine the way interactions between these levels affect adaptation processes. It
aims at applying general social science concepts and theories as well as testing
theories in the field of higher education research. It wants to do so in a manner that
is of relevance to all those professionally involved in higher education, be it as
ministers, policy-makers, politicians, institutional leaders or administrators, higher
education researchers, members of the academic staff of universities and colleges, or
students. It will include both mature and developing systems of higher education,
covering public as well as private institutions.
 HIGHER EDUCATION IN A
GLOBALISING WORLD
International Trends and Mutual Observations

A FestschriJt in Honour of Ulrich Teichler

Edited by

JURGEN ENDERS
Center for Higher Education Policy Studies,
University of Twente,
Enschede, The Netherlands

and

OLIVER FULTON
Centre for the Study of Education and Training,
University of Lancaster,
Lancaster, United Kingdom

SPRINGER-SCIENCE+BUSINESS MEDIA, B.V.

A c.I.P. Catalogue record for this book is available from the Library of Congress.

ISBN 978-1-4020-0864-1 ISBN 978-94-010-0579-1 (eBook)

DOI 10.1007/978-94-010-0579-1

Printed an acid-free paper

Ali Rights Reserved

© 2002 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht
Originally published by Kluwer Academic Publishers in 2002
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2002
No part of this work may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted
in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, microfilming, recording
or otherwise, without written permission from the Publisher, with the exception
of any material supplied specifically for the purpose of being entered
and executed on a computer system, for exclusive use by the purchaser of the work.
 TABLE OF CONTENTS

List of Contributors Vll

Preface
PETER MAASSEN xi

Foreword
JURGEN ENDERS & OLIVER FULTON xiii

Blurring Boundaries and Blistering Institutions: An Introduction

JURGEN ENDERS & OLIVER FULTON 1

PART 1: HIGHER EDUCATION POLICY AND SOCIETY

IN A GLOBALISING WORLD

The Stakeholder Perspective Historically Explored

GUYNEAVE 17

National Characteristics and Policy Idiosyncrasies

MAURICE KOGAN 39

Changing Patterns in Modes of Co-ordination of Higher Education

V. LYNN MEEK 53

Transformation or Reproduction?
Contradictions in the Social Role of the Contemporary University
JOHN BRENNAN 73

International Governmental Organisations and Research on Higher Education

JAN SADLAK & KLAUS HflFNER 87

PART 2: GLOBAL CHALLENGES AND VARIED RESPONSES

Globalisation and Internationalisation: Policy Agendas Compared

FRANS VAN VUGHT, MARUK VANDER WENDE
& DON WESTERHEIJDEN 103

Sorbonne, Bologna, Prague: Where do we go from here?

LADISLAV CERYCH 121

v
VI TABLE OF CONTENTS

Globalisation and Higher Education Reforms: The Japanese Case

AKIRA ARIMOTO 127
Intemationalisation in Mexican Higher Education
ROLLIN KENT 141
Globalisation, Regional Responsiveness and a Developing South
African Higher Education System
KALIE STRYDOM 159

PART 3: IMPLICATIONS FOR STUDENTS, STAFF AND LABOUR

MARKETS
Signs of Disengagement?
Responding to the Changing Work and Study Patterns of Full-Time
Undergraduates in Australian Universities
CRAIG MCINNIS 175

Higher Learning in an Age of Uncertainty

From Postmodem Critique to Appropriate University Practices
OSMO KIVINEN 191

Are Universities Ready to Face the Knowledge-Based Economy?

JEAN-JACQUES PAUL 207

Higher Education and the Transition to Work in Japan

Compared with Europe
KEIICHI YOSHIMOTO 221

Developing an Academic Career in a Globalising World

ELAINE EL-KHAWAS 241

ANNEX

Ulrich Teichler - Selected Major Publications 255

 LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS

Akira Arimoto is Professor of Higher Education at the Research Institute for Higher Educa-
tion (RIHE), Hiroshima University, Japan, which he served as Director from 1993 to 1999.
He is currently President of the Japanese Association of Higher Education Research
(JAHER). His publications include: International Comparisons of the Academic Profession
(Tamagawa University Press, 1996) (editor, in Japanese); University Reforms and Academic
Governance Reconsidered (RIHE, 2002) (editor); and 'Recent Developments of Higher Edu-
cation Research and Higher Education Policy in Japan' (chapter in Teichler, U. & Sadlak, J.,
Higher Education Research: Its Relationship to Policy and Practice: Pergamon, 2000).
Ladislav Cerych is former Director of the European Institute of Education and Social Policy
in Paris and of the Education Policy Center of the School of Education of Charles University,
Prague. He continues as member of the Boards of Governors of these two organisations and is
also member of the Advisory Board of CEPES (UNESCO).
John Brennan is Professor of Higher Education Research at the Open University, UK, where
he directs the Centre for Higher Education Research and Information (CHERI). He has pub-
lished many books and articles on higher education, especially concerning higher education's
relationships to the labour market and the effects of quality assurance systems. His most re-
cent book, Managing Ouality in Higher Education (with Tarla Shah), was published by Open
University Press in 2000. Prior to joining the Open University, he was Director of Quality
Support at the London-based Council for National Academic Awards.
Jorgen Enders is Professor at the Centre for Higher Education Policy Studies (CHEPS),
University of Twente, the Netherlands. He served for a number of years as Assistant Professor
and Executive Director of the Centre for Research on Higher Education and Work, University
of Kassel, Germany. Some important recent publications include his work on the changing
regimes of governance in higher education, the academic profession in the knowledge society,
and the relationship between higher education, science and the world of work. He is Secretary
of the Consortium of Higher Education Researchers (CHER).
Oliver Fulton is Professor of Higher Education in the Centre for the Study of Education and
Training at Lancaster University, UK, where he is also Dean for the Associated Institutions.
He has researched and published on many aspects of higher education policy and practice,
including admissions and access, the academic profession and the organisation of academic
work, implementing curriculum change, and policy formation and implementation more gen-
erally. He is General Editor of Higher Education Ouarterly. He has been Chair of the Society
for Research into Higher Education and was Chair of the Board of CHER from 1998-2001.
Klaus Hofner was Full Professor in the Department of Economics, Free University of Berlin,
Germany from 1980-2002. He has been Honorary President of the World Federation of
United Nations Associations (WFUNA) since 1993; a member of the Advisory Board of
CEPESIUNESCO since 1994, and its Chairman since 1998; a member of the Governing
Board of IIEP/UNESCO since 1995; and President of the German Commission for UNESCO
since 1998.
Rollin Kent has been Full Professor and Researcher in the Department of Educational Re-
search, Center for Advanced Studies, Mexico D.F., for the last fourteen years, and since 2002,
he is also Professor of Public Policy and Educational Management in the Faculty of Admini-
stration, Autonomous University of Puebla, Mexico. His main research areas are comparative
higher education policy in Latin and North America and organizational change in Mexican
VB
Vlll LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS

Higher Education, but he has also published on disciplinary and organisational change in
social science departments and on transformations in graduate studies in Mexico. Currently he
is co-director of the Alliance for International Higher Education Policy Studies, a collabora-
tive research effort with New York University, focusing on the determinants of policy effec-
tiveness in higher education in the United States and Mexico.
Elaine EI-Khawas is Professor of Education Policy at George Washington University, Wash-
ington D.C., USA. She is also Director of the ERIC Clearinghouse on Higher Education.
Previously, she served as Professor of Higher Education at the University of California, Los
Angeles and as Vice President for policy analysis and research at the American Council on
Education. She is a member of the Board of CHER, a vice president of the Society for Re-
search in Higher Education, and a member of the scientific committee of the Association of
African Universities.
Osmo Kivinen is Professor of Sociology of Education and Director of the Research Unit for
the Sociology of Education (RUSE) at the University of Turku, Finland. His major research
interests are in educational policy and educational systems, higher education, comparative
research and inter-relations between education and work. He has published more than 200
scientific articles, books and reports in English and Finnish.
Maurice Kogan is Professor Emeritus of Political Science, Director of the Centre for the
Evaluation of Public Policy and Practice at BruneI University, UK and a member of the
Council of the (UK) National Conference of University Professors. His major research inter-
ests are: analysis of social policy; the responsiveness of higher education to external influ-
ences; education accountability; the evaluation of public services; postgraduate education;
school governing bodies; and performance indicators. His publications include: Encyclopae-
dia of Government and Politics (Routledge 1992); Advancing Quality in the National Health
Service (Open University Press, 1995) (co-author); Making Use of Clinical Audit (Open Uni-
versity Press, 1995) (co-author); and Reforming Higher Education (Jessica Kingsley Publish-
ers, 2000) (co-author).
Guy Neave is Director of Research at the International Association of Universities in Paris
and Professor and Scientific Director of the Centre for Higher Education Policy Studies
(CHEPS), University of Twente, the Netherlands. He is currently President of the European
Association for Institutional Research (EAIR) and Foreign Associate of the USA National
Academy of Education. The Editor of Higher Education Policy, he is also joint Editor in
Chief (with Burton R Clark, Torsten Husen and Neville Postlethwaite) of Education: The
Complete Encyclopaedia (Pergamon / Elsevier 1998). His most recent book is Educacion
Superior: historia y politica. Estudios sobre la universidad contemporanea (Gedisa, 2(01).
Craig Mcinnis is Professor and Director of the Centre for the Study of Higher Education at
the University of Melbourne, Australia. His recent policy research projects include studies of
trends in the first year undergraduate experience, changing academic work roles, factors con-
tributing to student non-completion, and the career patterns of science graduates. He is cur-
rently working on a study of assessment practices and standards in Australian universities, an
analysis of alternative patterns for the organisation of the academic year, and a study of the
impact of part-time paid work on full-time undergraduate students in Australia.
Lynn Meek is Professor and Director of the Centre for Higher Education Management and
Policy at the University of New England in Australia. His research interests are in the areas of
the sociology/anthropology of higher education; governance, funding, management and diver-
sity of higher education; complex organisation; and social theory and methods.
Jean-Jacques Paul is Professor of Economics of Education at the University of Burgundy in
Dijon, France. He is presently the Director of Iredu (Research Institute on the Economics of
 LIST OF CONTRffiUTORS IX

Education) and Vice-Rector for budgeting and assessment matters of the University of Bur-
gundy. His research work deals with the labour market for graduates, the research links be-
tween academia and companies and the assessment of education systems, including higher
education in developing countries.
Jan Sadlak is Director of UNESCO-CEPES (European Centre for Higher Education) in Bu-
charest, Romania. He is the author of several books and numerous articles on higher educa-
tion and science policy, as well as on processes of reform and transformation in higher educa-
tion and research.
A.H. (Kalie) Strydom is Professor in Higher Education Studies at the University of the Free
State in Bloemfontein, South Africa. He is also the Director of the University's Unit for Re-
search into Higher Education. He is the Acting Director of the Free State Regional Initiative.
Frans van Vught is Rector Magnificus of the University of Twente, the Netherlands. Before
this he was for over ten years Scientific Director of the Centre for Higher Education Policy
Studies (CHEPS) at Twente, and he has held academic positions at universities in both the
USA and the Netherlands. He has been a member since 1996 of the University Grants Com-
mittee, Hong Kong. He has published 30 books and over 250 articles.
Marijk van der Wende is Professor and senior researcher at the Centre for Higher Education
Policy Studies (CHEPS), University of Twente, the Netherlands. She was previously Co-
ordinator of research and training at The Netherlands Organisation for International Co-
operation in Higher Education (Nuffic) and the Academic Co-operation Association (ACA) in
Brussels. Her research, which concerns the impact of globalisation and network technologies
on higher education, has been focused over the last ten years on processes and policies for the
internationalisation of higher education, with particular interests in internationalising the cur-
riculum, the implications for quality assurance and the role of ICT.
Don F. Westerheijden is Senior Research Associate at the Centre for Higher Education Pol-
icy Studies (CHEPS), University of Twente, the Netherlands, where he co-ordinates CHEPS'
research on quality management. He is an executive editor of the journal Oualitv in Higher
Education. On behalf of CHER he co-ordinated the European Higher Education Advanced
Training Course. He has edited and contributed to several books and published a number of
articles on quality assessment in higher education. His current research centres on institutional
and systematic aspects of the emerging institutional arrangements for quality assurance in
Europe.
Keiichi Yoshimoto is Associate Professor in the Faculty of Human-Environment Studies at
Kyushu University, Japan. He was previously a vice-senior researcher at the Japan Institute of
Labour and Associate Professor at the Japanese National Institute of Multi-media Education.
He is a Trustee of the Japanese Society for Educational Sociology. His research and publica-
tions centre on the transition from education (both school and university) to work, and he has
been commissioned by both OECD (1996) and ILO (2001) to prepare reviews on education to
work transitions in Japan.
 PETER MAASSEN

PREFACE

This Festschrift is dedicated to Ulrich Teichler who is celebrating his sixtieth birth-
day in 2002. Ulrich Teichler has been a central actor in the development of the field
of research on higher education in Germany, Europe and beyond. Not only has he
dedicated his professional career to studying a large number of higher education
topics through national and international research projects. He was also in the fore-
front of the efforts to strengthen the structure and profile of higher education re-
search, for example, through his involvement in the establishment of the Consortium
of Higher Education Researchers (CHER). In addition, he has contributed to many
important scholarly works reflecting on the state of the art and the nature of the
field.
The conventional wisdom is that working in a university or college makes you an
expert on higher education. Consequently, while academics like to do research on
every possible topic, they are in general reluctant to examine their own social insti-
tution. Within the European context Ulrich Teichler is one of the main exceptions to
this rule. Already in his student days he has recognised the unique characteristics of
higher education institutions and systems, and he understood that special efforts are
needed to improve our knowledge on higher education. His professional career in
higher education research got an impressive kick-off with his appointment in 1978
as director of the new research centre on higher education and professor on higher
education at the Universitiit Kassel. Ever since then Teichler's recognition of the
need to invest in the development of the field of higher education research stood at
the basis of many scholarly initiatives all aimed at enlarging our knowledge on
higher education. As such Teichler has left many important marks on the field of
higher education research, and in doing so both professionally and personally he
established many contacts and friendships all over the world. Several of his col-
leagues contribute to this volume, many more could have been invited given the
large number of scholars Teichler has cooperated with throughout the years. The
contributions to this volume represent the issues and topics Teichler has focused on
in his scholarly work, for example, the international and global dimensions of higher
education, the transition from higher education to an occupational career, the aca-
demic staff of higher education institutions, and changes in the structure of higher
education. These issues and topics reflect the broad interests and impact of Teichler
and his work, as well as the dynamic character of higher education as it is going
through an important transition period globally.
In this transition period there are many implicit and explicit assumptions in the
practice of higher education about a range of concepts that are argued to affect
higher education in an unprecedented way. Whether it concerns the continuing mas-
sijication of higher education, the impact of globalisation and trade liberalisation

xi
xii PREFACE

on higher education, the marketisation and economisation of higher education, the

privatisation of higher education, or the virtualisation and digitalisation of higher
education. One of Teichler' s most striking professional characteristics is that he does
not take any of these assumptions for granted, nor misuses his professional expertise
to support specific political interests. Ulrich Teichler does not behave like a flag that
blows in the direction the wind of the moment seems to suggest. He makes it very
clear in any seminar, workshop or other professional meeting, as well as in his many
publications what his position is with respect to the topic in question, what the basis
is for that position, and why that position is valid and legitimate from a scholarly
point of view. As those who have worked with him know, Teichler is always present
in meetings in which he participates and in the publications to which he contributes.
He can be very determined and persistent in his efforts to convince others of the
validity of his arguments. But he is always open to the arguments of others, and
never fails to contribute to the intended outcomes of whatever meeting he partici-
pates in, or publication he contributes to. This is just one of the reasons why he has
been and still is such a central character in the field of higher education research. It
cannot be emphasised enough: without Ulrich Teichler research on higher education
would not have been where it is today. This is especially true for the state of the art
of this field in Europe in general and in Germany in particular. But his efforts have
not been limited to his home country and continent. As is shown also by the contri-
butions to this volume, Teichler has inspired higher education researchers all over
the world, from Japan to Mexico, from South Africa to the USA, and from Canada
to Australia.
In addition to all the scholarly benefits deriving from it, it is also fun and never
boring to work with Teichler. Everyone who knows him and has worked with him,
has his or her own memories, experiences, anecdotes, and stories to tell. Maybe one
day someone will collect these and publish them. I am sure that book will be read
widely, as I hope this volume will be.
As the editor of the series "Higher Education Dynamics" I want to express my
gratitude to the editors of this tribute to Ulrich Teichler and the scholars who have
contributed to this volume. The series was set up to create a publication outlet for
high-quality, research-based works on higher education. Teichler's publications and
the contributions of his colleagues to this volume fit this characterisation. The au-
thors included in this volume reflect in their contributions the richness, breadth, and
innovativeness of Teichler's work and the way in which his work inspired them and
others. Through their contributions they pay tribute to Ulrich Teichler and in doing
so they represent everyone in his extensive higher education network. It is a pleasure
and an honour to dedicate this book to Ulrich Teichler on behalf of the editors and
contributors to this volume and all others who have had the privilege to work with
him and benefit from his enthusiasm, broad knowledge, professional drive, and most
of all from his friendship. We all look forward to enjoying the pleasure of his pro-
fessional and personal company for many years to come.

Enschede and Oslo Peter Maassen

June 2002
 JURGEN ENDERS & OLNER FULTON

FOREWORD

This book is a FestschriJt compiled in honour of the 60th birthday of Ulrich Teichler.
The tradition of the Festschrift is that a group of distinguished scholars, both the
contemporaries of the scholar so honoured and those from younger and older age
groups, come together in print at an appropriate temporal landmark to celebrate the
achievements - up to the present time - of his or her life and work. They do so by
offering an example of their own scholarship. As such, the Festschrift can partly be
defined by what it is not. Although of great symbolic significance, it is not a cere-
monial formality: rather, it aims to constitute an important contribution to scholar-
ship in its own right. And although it acknowledges great achievement, it is no
farewell: rather, it recognises and celebrates the ongoing work of an active and
committed scholar.
As editors, we are proud to offer this volume of essays by a group of scholars of
international reputation in higher education research, drawn from five continents,
who constitute in various ways the fellow-researchers, colleagues, collaborators and
friends of Ulrich Teichler. We believe that these essays will constitute an indispen-
sable resource, not only for that far wider group of scholars who have been inspired
by Teichler's work, but for all those with an interest in the themes which underlie it.
In our invitation to the contributors we offered two possibilities. The first was
that they should address directly the theme indicated by the main title of this vol-
ume: the internationalisation of higher education, which has long been a major area
of Ulrich Teichler's work. Alternatively, we invited them to address any other topic
which would reflect or respond to the international activities and contributions
which have been a striking feature of Teichler's career to date - as indicated by our
subtitle 'International Trends and Mutual Observations'. In the first chapter we in-
troduce the chapters submitted by our contributors, and build on them with our own
analysis of some of the key issues.
In the meantime, we simply point out that 'Internationalisation' and 'Globalisa-
tion' are new buzzwords in higher education research and practice. These two terms
draw attention to the undeniable fact that the boundaries of what were once rela-
tively closed national systems, and the features of once distinctive national institu-
tions of higher education, are increasingly being challenged by common inter-
national trends. These trends include a rapid growth in trans-national activities of all
kinds, an increasing tendency towards common policy approaches based on mutual
observation and 'policy borrowing', and the first steps towards supra-national inte-
gration in higher education. On the other hand, while these are undoubtedly new, or
newly challenging, trends in its environment, we need to acknowledge at the same
time that higher education as an institution has long been relatively open to certain
forms of international influence. It might be more accurate to say that the changing
xiii
xiv FOREWORD

balance between national and international, or universal, interests and involvement

constitutes a central tension for the contemporary university.
These developments not only provide new material for comparative research on
higher education, but also pose new challenges to our underlying rationale for such
research. It has been no surprise to those who know his inspiring and restless spirit
of inquiry that Ulrich Teichler was one of the first scholars to emphasise the grow-
ing importance of the international dimension in higher education, and to reflect on
its theoretical, methodological and practical implications for research. As we have
indicated, the essays collected here constitute an attempt to reflect the breadth and
the scope of Teichler' s international activities, of his comparative scholarship and of
their unifying themes. However, in drawing these contributions together as editors
we have been irresistibly reminded of the fable of the hare and the tortoise. Wher-
ever we look for new frontiers in higher education research, we find Teichler already
ahead of us. Even a sketchy list of Teichler' s research activities includes: studies of
the recruitment and careers of graduates in Germany; national and comparative stud-
ies of changing relationships between higher education and the employment system;
research on curricula in higher education and higher education qualifications; struc-
tural patterns and structural reforms of higher education in comparative perspective;
research and evaluation on study abroad programs and on the international mobility
of students and academics; the academic profession in comparative perspective;
studies on education and status distribution in Japan; admission to higher education
in the U.S.A.; the relationship between higher education research, policy and prac-
tice.
Ulrich Teichler is an outstanding representative of a group of social scientists
who have taken higher education seriously as a key social institution, and who have
seen research into higher education as a significant field of enquiry for social sci-
ence. Their work was strongly influenced by their analysis of the changing educa-
tional needs of society, the massification and restructuring of higher education, and
the rise of comparative studies on these phenomena. He is one of the small group of
scholars world-wide who have led the way in establishing and institutionalising re-
search on higher education as a field of study, and he has brought to the field both
spectacular energy and balletic skill and grace.
Teichler was born in 1942, attended the altsprachliche Gymnasium in Minden,
and subsequently studied sociology in Berlin, where he worked after graduation as a
research fellow of the Max Planck Institute for Educational Research. Right from
the beginning of his scholarly career, his special orientation to methodological issues
and his astonishing sensibility for conceptualisation were apparent. His doctoral
thesis was outside the mainstream of social science studies. It dealt with the history
and structure of the higher education system, and its relationship to status distribu-
tion, in Japan; a country that in those days was not very much on the agenda of
European or other external researchers. This changed, however, very quickly during
the coming years, and Teichler's early work laid the theoretical and empirical
ground for his lasting interest in the study of the relationship between higher educa-
tion and the world of work - both in comparative perspective in general and with a
special interest in the Japanese case in particular. Further studies followed on higher
education and the needs of society, and it was in 1978 that Teichler accepted a call
 JORGEN ENDERS & OLIVER fuLTON xv

as Professor at the University of Kassel, where he became the Founding Director of

the Centre for Research on Higher Education and Work.
The Kassel Centre was founded at a time when concern was growing about
graduate employment problems in the wake of the rapid expansion of higher educa-
tion and declining economic growth - and when the need was felt to reconsider cur-
ricula in the context of students' and graduates' changing talents, motives and career
prospects. He subsequently developed this institute to become one of the major Cen-
tres of higher education research world-wide, and he broadened its mission and its
outreach while at the same time keeping the original focus as one of its prime areas
of research. At the University in Kassel, Teichler served for a number of years as
Dean of the Department of Applied Social Sciences and Law, and as the Vice-
President of the university. He has held numerous fellowships and guest professor-
ships: at the College of Europe in Brugge, Northwestern University, Nagoya Uni-
versity, the National Institute of Educational Research in Tokyo, the Netherlands
Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities and Social Sciences in Wassenaar,
the University of Educational Sciences in Klagenfurt, City University of New York,
and the University of California, Berkeley.
At the same time, he was one of the major driving forces in efforts to overcome
obstacles to international communication and co-operation in higher education re-
search. The Consortium of Higher Education Researchers (CHER), the most suc-
cessful international network of higher education researchers, was founded in 1988
at a meeting which was orchestrated and hosted by Teichler in Kassel, and Teichler
served for many years as Director of the Board of CHER. He served also as a Mem-
ber of the Board of the European Institute of Education and Social Policy in Paris, as
Chairman of the Association of Social Science-Oriented Japanese Studies, and most
recently as President of the European Association for Institutional Research (EAIR).
He is a member of the Research Council of the German Association for Asian Stud-
ies, Vice-President of the Society for Research into Higher Education, member of
the Board of the International Academy of Education, and member of the Academia
Europaea. He has served as an OECD reviewer of educational policy in the Nether-
lands and Sweden, and as a member of numerous national and international com-
missions on higher education and adult education.
Teichler's expertise as a scholar is equally underlined by his membership of nu-
merous editorial boards of journals such as the American journal of Education,
Higher Education Policy, Educational Policy, Studies in Higher Education, Asien,
Das Hochschulwesen, European Journal of Education, South African Journal of
Higher Education, Journal of Studies in International Education. In 1997 he was
awarded the Research Prize of the Council on International Educational Exchange
and in 1998 the Comenius Prize of UNESCO.
Ulrich Teichler's research and writing have been shaped and guided throughout
his career by his depth of scholarship in higher education research. He has cast his
role widely: communicating with the wide range of discipline-based researchers in
this field of study; searching for ways to support and to build on the work of applied
researchers; and concerned to ensure the relevance of research for practitioners. His
contribution to this trans-disciplinary, field-based and problem-oriented field of re-
search is well documented in his astonishing scholarly productivity (see appendix).
xvi FOREWORD

At the same time his writings and reflections on higher education as a field of
study are characterised by a modest and realistic approach to its strengths and weak-
nesses, whether viewed in theoretical, methodological or practical terms. He is so
much the more active in promoting different ways to overcome obstacles in higher
education research, and in its relationship to policy and practice: engaging in meta-
research and continuous reflection on the conditions of higher education research;
embarking more systematically on a critique of research; challenging the national
idiosyncrasies of public debates and research traditions through collaborative pro-
jects with researchers from other countries; anticipating changing issues in higher
education; and making the key actors aware of developments they are likely to face
in the near future.
This Festschrift has been compiled in honour of Ulrich Teichler's 60th birthday.
Its publication could never have been accomplished without the enthusiastic support
of all the contributors who took up our invitation to join in this scholarly celebration.
We offer them our warmest thanks for their stimulating essays and their lasting
commitment to this publication. Further acknowledgements are due to the Consor-
tium of Higher Education Researchers and to the Centre for Research on Higher
Education and Work. From its beginning, the Consortium of Higher Education Re-
searchers has served as a platform for the improvement of higher education research
across national and language boundaries, disciplines and thematic areas. We are very
grateful that we were able to rely on this well developed network to sponsor our
editorial work. We also want to express our gratitude to the Centre for Research on
Higher Education and Work at the University of Kassel, with its excellent infrastruc-
ture, for all its support in various stages of the editorial work in the production of
this book. In particular, Christiane Bradatsch and Andre Schelewsky from the Cen-
tre in Kassel greatly improved the appearance of the book through their assistance in
the production of the finished version. The final stages of the work of the two editors
were also supported by the Centre for Higher Education Policy Studies at the Uni-
versity of Twente.
We are well aware that the book raises more questions than it resolves. We could
not have expected otherwise, given the complexity of its subject matter, and its re-
cent appearance in the muddy waters of current history. Such open-endedness may
appal those who aim to reach firm conclusions and clear guidelines; perhaps it will
better please those who constantly aim for the challenges of new frontiers. For better
or worse, the book is a tribute to a scholar who encompasses both aims. And wher-
ever our work may lead us, one thing can be taken for granted: he will already be
ahead of us.

Enschede and Lancaster Jtirgen Enders

June 2002 Oliver Fulton
 JURGEN ENDERS & OLNER FULTON

BLURRING BOUNDARIES AND BLISTERING

INSTITUTIONS:
AN INTRODUCTION

Intemationalisation of higher education can be viewed as a trend: unresistable, as those

who resist fall behind. Or it can be viewed as a challenge, which might or might not be
taken up, and which might be taken up differently. (Teichler 1999: 21)

"Internationalisation" and "globalisation" became key themes in the 1990s, both

in higher education policy debates and in research on higher education. Higher edu-
cation policy is still predominantly shaped at a national level; and as such, it still
tends not only to reflect but to underscore the specific traditions and circumstances
of individual countries. However, a number of different trends, many of which can
be grouped together under the general heading of "internationalisation", have begun
to challenge the predominance of the nation state as the main determinant of the
character of universities and colleges, and of the experiences of their students, their
graduates and those who work in them. Internationalisation is contributing to, if not
leading, a process of rethinking the social, cultural and economic roles of higher
education and their configuration in national systems of higher education.
Ulrich Teichler was one of the first researchers to take seriously the topic of in-
ternationalisation as an area of theoretical, empirical and policy interest. During his
research career to date, this interest has led him to embark on projects of research
and scholarship across a broad front. He has undertaken and promoted comparative
research, aimed at understanding the nature and the underpinnings of national differ-
ences in many aspects of higher education (such as education-work relationships and
the experience of academic staff), as well as the growth of common trends across
different national contexts. He has also analysed the more direct processes of inter-
nationalisation, which he defines as increasingly deliberate, systematic and inte-
grated attempts by national governments, supra-national agencies (not all of them
governmental) and higher education institutions themselves to engage in a range of
international activities; and he has conducted large-scale research projects on the
impact of several such attempts.
Teichler's approaches have shaped the present volume. Our contributors do not
necessarily share in full his own analysis of internationalisation. But as his col-
leagues, collaborators or members of a set of overlapping "invisible colleges" (each
one international in its range), they have all written their chapters in response to the
agenda which Teichler has played a leading role in constructing.
Our task in this Introduction is to clarify this agenda. We begin by outlining the
range of processes which have been identified under the broad label of "internation-
alisation", and by suggesting some of the paradoxes and contradictions which it
helps to highlight. Next, we introduce and discuss the more complex, and ideologi-
cally more suspect, concept of "globalisation", and its implications for the nation
1
1. Enders and O. Fulton (eds.), Higher Education in a Globalising World, 1-14.
© 2002 Kluwer Academic Publishers.
2 JDRGEN ENDERS & OLIVER FULTON

state. We then draw more extensively on Teichler's own work to analyse the dynam-
ics of various aspects of internationalisation, and to make some suggestions about
the origins and persistence of national differences in the face of apparently common
international trends. Finally, we offer a brief overview of the chapters which follow.
There is little doubt that the university as we know it - the modern university as
a project of the nation state and its cultural identity - finds itself in a complicated
and indeed delicate situation at the moment (K wiek 2000). Universities are institu-
tions that, in all societies, have performed basic functions which result from the par-
ticular combination of cultural and ideological, social and economic, educational
and scientific roles that have been assigned to them. They are multi-purpose or
multi-product institutions which contribute to the generation and transmission of
ideology, the selection and formation of elites, the social development and educa-
tional upgrading of societies, the production and application of knowledge and the
training of the highly skilled labour force. This range of functions constitutes the key
tasks of higher education systems, albeit with different emphases depending on the
national context, the historical period, the specific sector and indeed the institution
concerned. But what is clear is that nowadays, universities are heavily involved in
literally every kind of social and economic activity in our increasingly dynamic so-
cieties - and this is one of the factors that make higher education such an interesting
social institution to study.
Moreover, there is no prospect of achieving any kind of stability in university-
society relationships, let alone one which will satisfy all parties, for there is no
longer a single society to which a university can now be expected to respond. There
are only governments, academics and students, labour markets and industries, pro-
fessions and occupations, status groups and reference groups, communities and lo-
calities, and the dis-localities of the "global". In this light we see it as of great ana-
lytic interest to study the emerging new modes of co-ordination in the higher educa-
tion sector, their underlying rationales and in particular the effects of international i-
sation and globalisation - we will come back to the debate on terminology later -
and also how these are being translated into institutional frameworks and responses.
Equally, from a normative point of view it also seems essential to stimulate a policy
search for institutions which will be solid and dynamic enough to withstand the cur-
rent tensions and dilemmas: dilemmas that are already triggering demands for the
simultaneous performance of contradictory functions (Castells 2000) in a polycen-
tric and internationalising environment. In other words, what can be done to support
higher education's capacity to continue to function as an institution, now that the
mission that it is expected to fulfil can only be described as impossible?
As a number of the contributors to this volume suggest, a review of the complex
and dynamic processes of internationalisation at different levels in higher education
reveals that these processes are prompting increasingly rapid change in two rather
different respects (Teichler 1999). First, there is now a wide range of border-
crossing activities, many of them resulting from institutional rather than governmen-
tal initiatives, and these are certainly still on the rise. But we can also see more sub-
stantial changes towards systematic national or supra-national policies, combined
with a growing awareness of issues of international co-operation and competition in
a globalising higher education market. Under the first heading there is a growth of
 BLURRING BOUNDARIES AND BLISTERING INSTITUTIONS 3

specific, clearly visible international co-operation, including activities such as stu-

dent and staff mobility schemes, co-operative research activities and foreign lan-
guage teaching to support them; under the second, we can see trends towards inter-
nationalisation, regionalisation or globalisation of the actual substance and structures
of higher education - for example, proposals for convergence in institutional pat-
terns, study programmes or curricula.
Perhaps at no time since the establishment of the uni versities in the medieval period has
higher education been so international in scope. Internationalism is a key part of the fu-
ture, and higher education is a central element in the knowledge-based global economy.
(Altbach & Teichler 2001: 24)

Those (including ourselves) who claim to have identified a strong trend towards
internationalisation, are self-evidently also describing the past: asserting that higher
education in the past was less international than today, and even less so in compari-
son with the anticipated future. A closer look, however, shows that higher education
in the past can be described in a seemingly controversial and even contradictory
way.
The university in its medieval Western tradition has always been perceived as a
highly international institution compared to other major institutions of society.
Grand notions of students moving freely from Bologna to Paris to Oxford suggest
that from its earliest times the university transcended national or, to be more precise,
territorial frontiers. These medieval folk-memories are reinforced by images of the
Renaissance, of Europe in the Age of Enlightenment, and nowadays of academics as
the archetypal global players in contemporary societies. Certainly there has always
been an appreciation of cosmopolitan values in universities, pride was frequently
based on international recognition and reputation, international co-operation and
mobility were not unusual, and a universal conception of knowledge dominated
many disciplines and was seen as legitimate in others. Thus one could fairly argue
that the university always was and still is an international institution, and that it has
been a major force not only in the secularisation of modern societies but also in their
internationalisation.
But these memories and images may actually serve as a kind of mystification if
they are taken as proof that the university always has been, and therefore always will
be, an international institution. The other side of the coin is the prominent historical
role of universities in the process of nation-building, and their dependence on the
nation state. In his essay on the modern university, Wittrock wrote that
... universities form part and parcel of the very same process which manifests itself in
the emergence of an industrial economic order and the nation-state as the most typical
and most important form of political organisation. (Wittrock 1993: 305)

This is what the "nationalisation" of higher education is about (Neave 2000). The
contemporary university was born of the nation state, not of medieval civilisation,
and it was only in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, following the establish-
ment of clear national economic interests, that universities acquired their identifica-
tion with science and technology. Three quarters of all universities, even in Europe,
were established in the last century, half of them since 1945. Their regulatory and
funding context was, and still is, national; their contribution to national cultures was,
4 JURGEN ENDERS & OLIVER FULTON

and still is, significant; students tended to be, and still are, trained to become na-
tional functionaries; and universities played, and still play, a considerable role in
what some have called the military-industrial complex of nation states. In this per-
spective, they are very much national institutions. It is appropriate, therefore, to see
current trends as part of a process by which national systems of higher education are
being challenged by new forces of internationalisation. Perhaps paradoxically, be-
fore they could become fully international institutions in the current sense, universi-
ties had first to become national institutions - just as the current politics of interna-
tionalisation presupposes the existence of nation states.
Having said this, the notion of internationalisation reminds us at the same time of
its clear links to international power and domination. There are neo-colonial ele-
ments in the debate: nationalism may well be provoked into growth at times of in-
ternationalisation; competition and exclusion are at stake when terms such as "glob-
alisation" are on the agenda. The narrative of globalisation that entered the English-
speaking world in the 1960s, and was then taken up surprisingly quickly all over the
world, is not just a narrative but an ideology with multiple meanings and linkages. In
this context it is often constructed as an impersonal and inevitable force - in order to
justify certain policies.
At any event it should make us suspicious that the most powerful actors, and the most
likely winners, praise intemationalisation of higher education almost unconditionally,
and push aside the anxieties of the less powerful actors. (Teichler 1996: 9)

The challenges of internationalisation or globalisation are confronting develop-

ing countries at a time of major national transformation and restructuration (Moja &
Cloete 2001). These countries' burden is in many cases threefold: to support the
further expansion and "nationalisation" of their higher education system, to redefine
its role and situation in the regional context, and to struggle with the impact of
global forces confronting it, like the WTO treatment of higher education in the
framework of the GATS agreements (Strydom, this volume). Meanwhile, in many
industrialised countries "internationalisation" and "globalisation" are nowadays per-
forming a kind of "icebreaker" function (Enders 2002) for national reform agendas.
In many cases, neither the diagnoses of the perceived problems of the system nor the
corresponding prescriptions for reform are in any way new. But the international
argument lends fresh wind to national debates on higher education reform which can
now sail under the flag of "internationalisation" by claiming to strengthen national
capacities in the face of global competition.
Thus an additional factor to be considered is competition among systems and in-
stitutions of higher education. At the institutional level, universities have not gener-
ally been perceived in the past as highly competitive: over the last half-century, the
huge state-funded growth of higher education has damped down any need for com-
petition. In any case, most institutions' capacity to compete was limited in practical
terms, even if they might have wished to extend their territory (Dill & Sporn 1995).
The scenery is now being changed, first by the recent stagnation or even decrease in
levels of financial support, which is sharpening institutions' need for new sources of
funding, and second by the blurring of boundaries of space and time through the
availability of new technologies which are making possible new modalities, both of
 BLURRING BOUNDARIES AND BLISTERING INSTITUTIONS 5

learning and of research. So, as globalisation theorists would have it, the past is no
longer a reliable guide to the future. Despite earlier low levels of competition, the
increasing rivalry among higher education institutions, along with the other competi-
tive challenges just mentioned, is leading universities that wish to compete, or to
find new niches in the emerging international market, to develop more adaptable and
flexible means of organising and managing academic work.
These adaptations can take a variety of forms. In some universities we see newer
and income-earning (and hence potentially competitive) activities such as continuing
education, technology transfer and research exploitation taking place at, or even just
beyond, the boundary: new units are created to manage these activities which leave
the traditional core of academic work relatively untouched. In others, new structures
are emerging which increase internal differentiation, and bring these activities more
into the centre of the university while preserving or even sharpening the distinction
between old and new roles. Others again are aiming at various forms of integration,
so that a new and more competitive culture begins to suffuse even the most tradi-
tional and stable areas of academic work (Sporn 1999; Clark 1998). In other words,
we might say that universities' reactions to internationalisation, and their hunger for
new resources, begin as a series of blisters on their skins. It is an interesting question
whether they can continue to treat these as localised eruptions to be plastered over or
otherwise contained at the periphery, or whether they will be forced to adopt a more
holistic approach.
At the national level, however, we can see two contradictory factors. On one
hand, as suggested above, politicians are paying growing attention to international
competition. On the other hand, there seems to be a growing concern with mutual
observation and comparison between systems and institutions, which suggests a kind
of revival of interest in international co-operation. For policy analysts working in
comparative higher education it is, of course, particularly interesting to see how a
previously widespread and entrenched scepticism about the possibility of learning
anything useful from foreign experiences is being overtaken by an equally insouci-
ant optimism as to the transferability of specific elements of other higher education
systems. The outcomes of this development, however intriguing, are far from clear.
But we can probably look forward to some startling, though hopefully sometimes
fruitful, misunderstandings of the structures and dynamics of higher education sys-
tems abroad, not to mention some interesting attempts to apply their lessons at
home.
The advent of globalisation as a fashionable topic has led to considerable contro-
versy over whether it is a genuine social process or a new element of political dis-
course - or, most plausibly, a composite mixture of both (Guillen 2001). Globalisa-
tion sometimes seems a catch-all phrase or a non-concept, a catalogue of more or
less everything that seems different since the 1970s: advances in information tech-
nology, greater capital flow across borders, international mobility of labour or of
students, new public management and the weakening power of nation states, credit
transfer in higher education and international recognition of degrees. Moreover,
"globalisation", "internationalisation", "regionalisation" and "de-nationalisation" are
frequently used interchangeably to highlight the international activities and widen-
6 JORGEN ENDERS & OLIVER FULTON

ing outreach of higher education. Still, there are important differences and Scott
(1998) has proposed a clearer distinction between the different terminologies.
Following Scott's interpretation, we believe that the concept of internationalisa-
tion should refer mainly to processes of greater co-operation between states, and
consequently to activities which take place across state borders. It reflects a world
order in which nation states still playa central role. Given this political reality, the
emphasis is on the building of strategic international relationships, based on mutual
co-operation and also on mutual observation. In this formulation, the conceptual
boundaries between the state, the market and the university seem fairly clear, albeit
regularly contested in practice.
In contrast, globalisation refers primarily to the processes of increasing interde-
pendence, and ultimately convergence, of economies, and to the liberalisation of
trade and markets. (In addition and as an observable consequence, globalisation has
a strong cultural component, which tends to encourage the establishment of a (usu-
ally Western) global-brand culture, although in principle it can also support the dif-
fusion of more indigenous traditions.) The process of globalisation is associated with
a restructuring of the nation state: through the deregulation of legal and financial
controls, the opening of markets or quasi-markets (including in higher education),
and the increasing primacy of notions of competition, efficiency and managerialism.
In a globalised environment, the power of nation states is fundamentally challenged:
states find that they have very limited control over policies that regulate higher edu-
cation "systems".
This basic distinction between internationalisation and globalisation can be sup-
plemented, if also complicated, by the concept of "regionalisation". Taking Europe
as an example, and regarding "Europeanisation" as a form of regionalisation, we can
see two somewhat contradictory trends. On the one hand, regionalisation, at least in
higher education, could be described as a process of growing regional co-operation
or even integration on equal terms, involving mutual co-operation and "horizontal"
interaction at all levels: between national and sub-national governments, between
sectors and institutions of higher education across the region, and even region-wide
collaboration among corresponding units within universities and colleges: in other
words, a benign regional version of the internationalisation processes we have just
described. On the other hand, one can also make a persuasive case that regionalisa-
tion in higher education is part and parcel of the globalisation process, establishing
co-operation among neighbours in order to counteract the pressure from other parts
of the world.
Some such attempt to reduce the bewildering variety of phenomena labelled
"globalisation" to a more systematic definition must be an essential preliminary to
any serious account of current devclopments. But if we are to move beyond defini-
tions, there are a number of options.
One option is to disentangle and systematise the various components and dimen-
sions already addressed (cf. Guillen 2001). Can we actually observe the phenome-
non of "globalisation"? Where and how is it really happening? Is it producing con-
vergence within higher education, and at what levels? Is it undermining the authority
of nation states over higher education, and if so, where is all the power going? Is a
global higher education system - and culture - genuinely in the making? It ought to
 BLURRING BOUNDARIES AND BLISTERING INSTITUTIONS 7

be obvious that our answers to these key questions in the giobalisation debate may
not necessarily all lead in the same direction. Recent developments seem, for exam-
ple, to be leading to a society that is multidimensional, polycentric and contingent -
but one, however, in which the national and the trans-national still coexist. As vari-
ous studies (e.g. Sassen 1996) have reminded us, the role of the state has changed,
but it has not been eliminated. It is not simply the case that the national state is los-
ing significance, because the state itself has been a key agent in the implementation
of global processes, and it has emerged quite altered by this participation.
In this light, the controversy between "the state" and "the market" as imperfect
alternatives (Wolf 1988) may well not be as sharp as it seems at first sight. While
recent reforms have been prompted by a loss of trust in the regulatory power of the
state and the widespread pe.rception of so-called government failures, we now find a
growing awareness of the imperfections of the market, including so-called market
failures (Meek, this volume). It still remains to be seen what will happen in the
longer run, now that in so many countries the state has decided to set up markets or
quasi-markets in service sectors like higher education, which seem to operate as
dynamic systems of contradictory functions. Our understanding of globalisation is
still in its infancy. Given the complexity of the phenomena involved, we may need
to keep an open mind as researchers, and try to construct a more differentiated pic-
ture of the causes, implications and effects of the emerging secular trends at stake
and the multiplying actors and stakeholders involved (Maassen 2001).
However, a further, closely related, option would be to make the first cautious
steps towards a developmental theory of internationalisation, focusing particularly
on the inner dynamic of higher education systems. Teichler (1999) has noted three
substantial changes - virtual quantum leaps - in the international activities of higher
education in Europe, and indeed in industrial societies more widely:
first, from a predominantly "vertical" pattern of cooperation and mobility to the
dominance of international relationships on equal terms (for example, in the area
of student mobility, from a predominant pattern of movement from developing
and newly emerging countries into industrialised countries, to a predominant
pattern of student exchange between the industrialised countries);
second, from casual or opportunist actions to systematic policies of internation-
alisation (the latter comprising a complex amalgam of international programmes
and agencies in higher education, systematic national policies to foster strategic
internationalisation, and institutional policies to implement management, infra-
structure and services for international activities); and
third, from a disconnected range of specific international activities, sometimes
accompanied or followed by the internationalisation of some core activities, to
an integrated internationalisation of higher education.
Both the challenges and the trends described above are beginning to influence
the development of higher education policy at the national level. They are leading to
initiatives that go beyond traditional internationalisation policies, which could be
characterised as marginal, add-on activities mainly focused on the international mo-
bility of students and teachers. We are now seeing more structural measures which
will influence the higher education system more profoundly (van der Wende 2002).
8 JORGEN ENDERS & OLIVER FULTON

Mutual awareness and self-reflexivity among the actors involved (Beck 1996) are
certainly growing in the international landscape of higher education.
Nevertheless, we should bear in mind that the context for internationalisation
varies substantially from country to country. As we all know, context matters, and
the point we started from always leaves its stamp on wherever we may arrive
(Stinchcombe 1965). It is obvious that the economic and political power of a coun-
try, its size and geographic location, its dominant culture, the quality and typical
features of its higher education system, the role its language plays internationally,
and previous internationalisation policies have all to be taken into consideration. Not
so many years ago, many countries had sharply differing views on the merits or even
the possibility of internationalisation, and the same can still be said today - even if
to a somewhat lesser extent. A number of studies recently undertaken by Ulrich
Teichler and his colleagues can offer us some revealing illustrations.
In analysing the results of an international study on the academic profession, for
example, Enders and Teichler (1995) identified four types of national approach to
internationalisation which reflect the different contexts just described:
"Would-be" internationalisation: in these countries, academics and institutions
of higher education are in favour of international partnerships, but they are dis-
couraged because they find it hard to win acceptance on equal terms from play-
ers in more powerful countries;
"Life-or-death" internationalisation: in these countries, international communi-
cation, co-operation, and indeed recognition are considered indispensable. Apart
from a few fields of study, academics cannot command respect at home unless
they are internationally visible;
"Two-arena" countries: in these countries, academics in many fields can choose
between striving for national or international visibility. The academic market of
the home country is big and important enough to stand on its own, but at the
same time international activities are a further possible option;
"One-way" internationalisation: in these countries (generally English-speaking),
for many years internationalisation mainly meant hosting foreign students and
academics, and considering international research only if it was published in
English.
Another example of differing national approaches can be found in a study of stu-
dent costs and financing (Daniel, Schwarz & Teichler 1999). This showed that the
level and shape of public financial support for students in the past was not so much
based on the wish to steer students' behaviour (as is often recommended), but rather
was an expression of the basic understanding of the social role of the student in the
country concerned. Such understandings of the prototypical student include:
the learner and young citizen (where substantial grants are provided regardless
of parental financial resources);
the child in a family social system (where there is little public support for cover-
ing direct student expenditures);
the child in a family system with strong welfare components (where financial aid
is provided to a considerable proportion of students but contingent on parental
resources);
 BLURRING BOUNDARIES AND BLISTERING INSTITUTIONS 9

the investor in hislher future (where loans are a major component in student aid
systems).
A further example could be drawn from the work of Teichler and his colleagues
on the ambiguous role of the European dimension in higher education. On the basis
of various evaluation studies (Teichler 1998; BarbIan et al. 2000), Teichler has con-
cluded that European educational support programmes like ERASMUS and
SOCRATES have constituted a breakthrough in internationalisation. Despite the fact
that less than 10 per cent of the student population have taken part as individuals,
these programmes have succeeded in making learning and teaching on a trans-
national basis into a normal element of study at most institutions of higher educa-
tion. Nevertheless, the main thrust of European universities in transcending their
traditional national horizons turns out to have been international or even global
rather than European. Moreover, on the whole neither the institutions' wider poli-
cies, nor the specific changes they have made to their infrastructure in the cause of
internationalisation, make clear conceptual or practical distinctions between Euro-
pean and wider goals.
Studies like these should make us aware of the usefulness of comparative re-
search in higher education. Comparative perspectives
... are indispensable for understanding a reality shaped by common international trends,
reforms based on comparative observation, growing trans-national activities and partial
supra-national integration in higher education. (Teichler 1996: 431)

But the underlying rationale of traditional forms of comparative higher education

research is a presumption that we can reasonably analyse and compare national sys-
tems which are defined as relatively closed; and this too is being challenged by re-
cent trends.
On the one hand, comparative research might lose its topic, if the 'world', the 'global
society' etc. turns out to be an appropriate concept. On the other hand, the trans-national
activities in higher education, for example staff and student mobility, graduate mobility,
international knowledge transfer, curricular co-ordination through international net-
works, matters of recognition etc., might spread so much that they overshadow the re-
maining national system characteristics. (Teichler 1996: 450)

Yet we live in a world order where the national and the trans-national (still) co-
exist (Sassen 1996). What is clear is that comparative approaches to higher educa-
tion can no longer treat trans-national phenomena as being beyond their domain.
The complexity of the internationalisation and globalisation of higher education
certainly invites further research. For this, we will need to use multiple methods of
applying our theoretical and empirical tools to a variety of research settings defined
at various levels of analysis. The differences and similarities which we discover
across these levels and settings ought to provide us with some starting points for
what may well turn out to be our biggest question: how different are the causes and
effects of internationalisation and globalisation between one context and another?
This book approaches the internationalisation of higher education in two ways.
On the one hand, it attempts to look inwards, in order to clarify in more detail what
are the various components and dimensions of the international character of higher
education, and how these inter-relate. This should help us to understand the implica-
10 JURGEN ENDERS & OLIVER FULTON

tions of internationalisation and globalisation for teaching and learning, research and
services and decision-making and administration. On the other hand, we also look
outwards to changes that are taking place in societies at large and how these are
linked to the functions, the inner processes and indeed the legitimacy of higher edu-
cation. This perspective should make us more aware of the links between the rise
and decline of the nation state and the international phenomena of higher education,
as well as exploring the path-dependencies of national approaches towards globa-
lisation, and revealing the inherent normative approaches and value judgements in-
tertwined with global economic and technological competition.
Within the book we have organised the papers into three broad categories. The
first section is focused on higher education policy and society in a globalising world.
Guy Neave discusses from a historical point of view the rise of the stakeholder
perspective in higher education. Key to this is the changing status of the national
authorities (or their counterparts) responsible for higher education co-ordination,
which we can see shifting from their historic function as a state agency of control
and oversight to becoming prime amongst a number of stakeholders. His analysis
shows, however, how the stakeholder concept has taken very different forms and
rested upon very different assumptions about the nature of the relationship between
higher education and the community in mainland Western Europe, in contrast to
Britain and the United States.
Maurice Kogan is also concerned with issues related to variability and conver-
gence in his study of the impact of national and social characteristics on higher edu-
cation policy. He analyses certain constellations of path-dependency in higher edu-
cation policy and their relationship to social, cultural, geographical and other na-
tional characteristics. He reminds us, however, to be modest, and acknowledge our
limited explanatory power in the search for a satisfying unitary set of "independent"
variables which might relate these policy choices to national characteristics and
idiosyncrasies.
Lynn Meek reviews changing patterns and structures in modes of co-ordination
in higher education: as planning and resource allocation mechanisms, as overall
regulatory frameworks and as a set of rules and ideas. He highlights the weaknesses
and the unintended consequences of strengthened market co-ordination of higher
education, and the beginning of a renewed interest in state regulation. His conclud-
ing plea, to replace the idea of the natural ascendancy of the market over state con-
trol with a dialectical relationship between the two, is certainly of further analytical
and political interest.
John Brennan analyses the dual social role of higher education, in contributing to
the reproduction as well as to the transformation of societies in developed and de-
veloping countries alike. He considers global challenges as well as national changes,
in analysing the delicate balance and the unstable priorities that may be given to
these competing functions of higher education under particular historical and na-
tional conditions.
Finally, Jan Sadlak and Klaus HUfner analyse the role of international organisa-
tions in higher education, and their relationship to higher education research. They
point out that these organisations have played an important role in the generation of
knowledge from research on higher education and in its incorporation into policy-
 BLURRING BOUNDARIES AND BLISTERING INSTITUTIONS 11

making. However, different international organisations play different roles, and their
activities are vulnerable not only to outright political intervention but to their own
self-imposed sensitivity, in order to avoid offending their constituent members and
jeopardising their own future.
In the second part of the book the focus is on global challenges and varied re-
gional and national responses.
The central concern of Frans van Vught, Marijk van der Wende and Don
Westerheijden is whether the Bologna process will be an adequate European re-
sponse to the wider challenges of globalisation. They highlight the increasing impor-
tance of economic and competitive rationales as the paradigms of internationalisa-
tion in higher education, and show how that requires an extended role for quality
assurance. They argue that the co-operative and "public good" approach of the Bo-
logna process has not yet generated an adequate response to the challenges of glob-
alisation in the field of higher education.
Ladislav Cerych is also concerned with progress towards the so-called "Euro-
pean Higher Education Area", and in this context he looks more closely at the con-
stellation of major actors at the national and supra-national level. He too is sceptical
about the follow-up proposals of the so-called Bologna process, owing to the con-
tinuation of a rather confused situation in which the responsibilities of the different
actors are not clearly defined, and especially, where the role of the European Com-
mission has not been clarified.
With the chapter from Akira Arimoto, the book moves on to a number of country
case studies on globalisation and national higher education systems in parts of our
world beyond Europe. Arimoto's point of departure is the changing societal condi-
tions surrounding the university, in which he includes the shifts to a knowledge-
based society, to post-mass higher education, internationalisation, globalisation and
market economies. From this analysis he derives a number of issues which confront
efforts to reform higher education in Japan, with a major emphasis on teaching,
learning and curricula.
Rollin Kent identifies internationalisation as a general frame of reference in
which to identify and analyse issues in Mexican higher education. He shows how
Mexican universities in both the public and private sectors have refashioned their
self-image away from a localist perspective toward a more cosmopolitan and out-
ward-looking mode. He notes a rising interest in observations of, and comparisons
with, the situation in other countries, in order to justify policies aimed at emulating
the levels of funding and quality found abroad. At the same time, internationalisa-
tion in higher education clearly must also take into account the challenge of expand-
ing the role of universities in strengthening local identities and indigenous lan-
guages.
Kalie Strydom's analysis of the South African case provides another interesting
example of a country that is struggling at the same time with the national transfor-
mation of its higher education system, its role in the regional (African) context and
the challenges of globalisation. He concludes that sustainable socio-economic de-
velopment can only be realised if it is based on indigenous foundations, and that the
developing system of higher education in South Africa needs not only time, but also
12 JURGEN ENDERS & OLIVER fuLTON

protective measures to guard against unfair practices disguised as healthy competi-

tion.
In the third and final part of the book the focus is on students, labour markets,
and academic staff.
Craig McInnis analyses the changing work and study patterns of undergraduate
students in the light of recent studies in Australia, some European countries and the
U.S.A. He provides evidence of a declining level of student commitment to univer-
sity study, which he ascribes to part-time work, the availability of information tech-
nology and changes in the values, lifestyles and aspirations of students. He con-
cludes that policy is still being developed in the belief that student career pathways
can be developed and managed by government, but that new practices are needed to
meet the demands of students who wish to negotiate the terms of their own engage-
ment.
Osmo Kivinen is also concerned with the teaching and learning function of
higher education in our age of uncertainty. His view is guided by a pragmatist con-
cept of teaching and learning and the growing importance of tacit knowledge in our
societies. On this basis he attempts to defend the role of the university, by tying re-
search and study together, and by ensuring that teaching supports study - study un-
derstood as equivalent to inquiry, if not to learning how to do research.
The main purpose of the contribution from Jean Jacques Paul is to assess to what
extent universities are ready to face the challenges imposed by knowledge-based
economies. He presents and compares some major results of a twelve country study
- initiated and led by Ulrich Teichler - with respect to the labour market prospects
for their graduates, the quality of the study provision, the competencies acquired by
graduates compared with those that they require, and the appropriateness of higher
education. On this empirical basis he argues for a stronger emphasis on project and
problem-based learning, independent learning and a practical emphasis in teaching
and learning, all of which can enable the development of behavioural competencies.
Keiichi Yoshimoto also analyses empirical findings from the same international
study, and compares patterns of higher education and transition to work between
Europe and Japan. His multi-level analysis of graduates' experiences, organisational
frameworks and cultural impacts on transition to work suggests that a quite different
logic is at play in the life course of Japanese graduates, in their typical status passage
from higher education to work. Reflecting on Japanese graduates' apparently low
levels of utilisation of knowledge in their early careers, he argues that any evaluative
judgement should be conditioned by a full appreciation of the implications of this
logic.
Finally, Elaine EI-Khawas' focus of exploration is on the mechanisms by which
academics include an international dimension in their work, and on the opportunities
and constraints which new academics face in building careers for themselves that
will include international components. Her review of the literature, and her summary
of the results of an international survey of academics, underline the significance of
discipline and country in conditioning the extent and the reach of international ac-
tivities. However, she finds evidence that despite a number of obstacles, many new
academics have a strong sense of the opportunities for, and the desirability of, inter-
national research.
 BLURRING BOUNDARIES AND BLISTERING INSTITUTIONS 13

At this point, a conscientious - but foolhardy - editor might be expected to draw

together the threads of all of these chapters, and propose a synthesis which would
not only summarise their conclusions but build new theoretical and policy insights
on the outcome. We have no such intention. We are conscious, fIrst of all, that to do
justice to the range of perspectives and insights which we have just sketched out
would require another substantial volume - if it were not to result in a few banal
over-simplifIcations. But secondly, and crucially, we are strongly reminded of that
famous metaphor which Robert Merton used as the title of one of his books on the
sociology of science, borrowing it from Isaac Newton who himself acquired it from
St Bernard of Chartres. In Newton's words, "if I have seen further it is by standing
on the shoulders of giants" (Newton, 1676). In our case, this book is a testimonial to
Teichler as the giant, and we leave it to others, and not least to the giant himself, to
have the last word.

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Clark, B. R. (1998) Creating Entrepreneurial Universities: Organizational Pathways of Transformation.
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Neave, G. (2000). "Introduction. Universities' Responsibility to Society: An Historical Exploration of an

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 PART 1

HIGHER EDUCATION POLICY AND SOCIETY

IN A GLOBALISING WORLD
 GUYNEAVE

THE STAKEHOLDER PERSPECTIVE HISTORICALLY

EXPLORED

1. INTRODUCTION

One of the more interesting by-products which accompanies the spread of English as
a lingua franca is the launching onto the dark waters of misunderstanding of terms
that possess meaning and precision in one historic or political context but which,
taken over into another setting, suddenly lose both. There is, of course, another and
even less enviable fate possible, and this is for a term to become so utterly divorced
from its original meaning that it mutates into what amounts to little more than a new
version of "the Black Box". There are many examples of this process - "account-
ability" figures amongst the foremost with "governance" following swiftly on its
heels (Harman, 1992; Neave, 1998, 2000a).
The acid test of the ability of such words to carry their essential meaning over
into other contexts is, of course, the test of translation into other tongues. To French
speakers, there is no exact equivalent to "accountability" and their desperate search
for approximations leads to even further confusion. "Responsabilite" - best ren-
dered into English as "answerability" - has some correspondence but it is a poor
one. "Imputabilite" - the action of assigning to some person, legal or physical, the
duty of implementation - is another tattered thing. What accountability most cer-
tainly is not, though many Francophones have been led to believe it is, is about uni-
versity accounting systems and the ways of getting money into learning (compta-
bilite). Likewise "governance" - despite generating intense activity for the best part
of the past decade and a half - is subject to similar distortions. To the French, it may
be rendered as "la gestion interne de I 'universite ", or as "Bestuursorganisatie" or
"Universitatsverwaltung" for Dutch and German speakers (Hirsch & Weber, 2001).
I have several points in mind in summoning up these particular examples. First is
the presumption that because we both subscribe to the same nominal expression, we
are essentially talking about the same set of phenomena, procedures and, no less
important, that we entertain similar ways of looking at the world. This is often not
the case. The second point is that terms coined in one linguistic context and taken
over into another tend also to entail a shift in meaning from an essential to a nominal
form. In other words, behind our use of apparently common terms, we can only en-
gage in meaningful exchange because the second party imparts his - or her - mean-
ing and interpretation to what we are saying. We are speaking, outwardly, about the
same thing - say accountability. Yet what our interlocutor understands often lies in
his or her meaning, not in ours.

17
1. Enders and O. Fulton (eds.), Higher Education in a Globalising World, 17-37.
© 2002 Kluwer Academic Publishers.
18 GUyNEAVE

There is a third point, and it is of the utmost importance. The use of a lingua
franca strengthens the notion of convergence. After all, if we were not moving to a
similar condition, we would not be able to use common terms. Again, let me suggest
this is a false assumption. It is no less of a false assumption to believe that, because
the meaning implicit in the term as originally used is taken up elsewhere, other sys-
tems - or countries - ipso facto endorse the implicit model or ways of dealing with
things that we, the original possessors of the lingua now become franca, have laid
upon it. Finally, and it is another way of reiterating what has just been said, but from
a slightly different angle, language is normative. But if others use our terms of de-
bate, that does not mean to say that they either recognise or, for that matter, accept
our norms or our assumptions.
I mention this because there is a tendency in comparative higher education, and
more particularly in that sub-set which is concerned with policy, implicitly to be-
lieve that beneath the triumph of the Anglo-Saxon language as a vehicle of ex-
change, there is also a convergence towards the norms and practices which that
tongue carries with it. The best - or, depending on your ability to sustain a literally
"multi-cultural perspective", perhaps the worst - examples of this process are to be
found in that burgeoning field of analysis of "internationalisation" or "globalisa-
tion". Here convergence is explicit in the theory, and amazing efforts are made to
prove its existence as an objective phenomenon. But convergence is also explicit in
the application of the terms employed; the language itself rests on an implicit but
unwarranted assumption that the models and practices contained in it are the norma-
tive points for that convergence.

2. PURPOSE
In this chapter I want to explore the particular dynamic behind the rise of the
"Stakeholder Society" as it applies to higher education, and more particularly as it is
emerging in the various systems of higher education in western Europe. There are
several good reasons for doing this, quite apart from the very obvious pleasure of
being able to take up one of the many themes which, over the years, Ulrich Teichler
has made his own, and to drag it, kicking and screaming, into a setting that he might
find alien. I refer, of course, to his multi-faceted work on students and the labour
market, a field which he bestrides like the Colossus at Rhodes.
It is a banality of the highest order to see students as "stakeholders". Essentially,
that is what they have always been, though questions such as on what terms and on
what conditions tend historically to be somewhat of a tangled web. Before we can
get to the heart of the matter, there is much undergrowth to be hacked aside.
First, let me say that I recognise fully that the term "stakeholder" is precisely one
of those concepts which derives from an Anglo-Saxon perspective on the institution
of higher education and its relationship with society. Like "accountability", "stake-
holder" is a sore puzzlement to the French: "ayant droits" is one rendition I have
seen, "actionariat" another. I have no doubt that it provides similar bemusement to
our German or Dutch colleagues. But even if, for the sake of argument, we assume
the validity of the convergence thesis, there is still much value in exploring the dif-
 THE STAKEHOLDER PERSPECTIVE 19

ferent approach-paths taken, as well as the reasons that underlie those differences.
Even if we are all marching towards the Holy Grail of market-driven higher educa-
tion, we do not necessarily take the same road, even though there are suggestions
that our commitment to the ultimate goal requires that we should do so (Henry, Lin-
gard, Rivzi & Taylor, 2001).
Yet the stakeholder perspective does have certain advantages. It allows us to
bring together as a part of an overall perspective certain elements which, hitherto,
have largely been separated out and researched in isolation from one another. I am
thinking here of government-higher education relationships, changes in governance
and in internal management systems and the various attendant sub-topics such as
leadership, etc.

3. LITERATURE AND HISTORIOGRAPHY

In defining the concept of stakeholder, there are basically two perspectives relevant
to higher education. The perspective which predominates today hails from business
literature and very particularly from the intersection between the sociology of or-
ganisations and the internal functioning of the firm. To this there are two clear
strands.
The first has to do with enlarging the responsibilities of the firm beyond those
classically associated with shareholders. The second strand takes a rather different
focus, and it is particularly significant when placed in parallel to recent develop-
ments in higher education. This second perspective was largely developed by the
economist Edith Pemose in the late 1950s (Pitelis & Wahl, 1998). It has to do with
the re-interpretation of the firm as a "knowledge" system, whose capacities for in-
novation or stagnation are largely a function, not simply of management capacity,
but also of the organisational memory within which management capacity develops.
The introduction of the concept of "stakeholder" had two major consequences for
the relationship of the firm with its environment. As I will make clear later, these
consequences have a remarkable parallel some forty years later in our own domain.
It introduced a broader range of "constituencies" which the firm should take into
account (Wheeler & Silanapaa, 1998) in addition to straightforward shareholders.
These included investors, customers and employees, but more to the point, it was
also argued that attention should be paid to the "values and beliefs" of stakeholders.
In other words, attention to a broader constituency went hand in hand with what was
conceived as a broader definition of "social responsibility" on the part of the firm.

4. ECLECTIC DEFINITIONS
That said, some of the definitions of "stakeholders" which one finds in the business
literature are broad indeed. If some have traced the term back to Adam Smith, and
more particularly to his 1759 publication The Theory of Moral Sentiments, the con-
cept received one definition from Freeman (1984) as "any group of individuals who
can affect or is affected by the achievement of the firm's objectives." Other writers
(Mitchcll, Agle & Wood, 1997) distinguish bctween different types of stakeholders
20 GUyNEAVE

- between claimants on the one hand and influencers on the other. Whilst the former
have a claim or a presumed claim, whether legal or moral, on the firm, the latter
possess an ability to influence the firm's behaviour, direction, process or outcomes.
This is a useful distinction and we will return to it later. Suffice it to note here that
these two categories are not necessarily discrete. Indeed, they can be seen as not
merely forming part of a continuum; they may also illustrate a dynamic process in
stakeholder behaviour. Indeed, what may start out as a group seeking to bring moral
pressure on the institution - be it a firm or a university - has as its ultimate objective
precisely to influence behaviour, process and most especially outcome. A not dis-
similar distinction was drawn by Kogan & Packwood in their exploration of educa-
tional pressure groups active in the British school system during the 1970s. In place
of Mitchell's claimants and influencers, Kogan & Packwood came up with the no-
tion of "illegitimate" and "legitimate" groups. Illegitimate groups were operational-
ised as those which government was not obliged either to consult or, for that matter,
to take their suggestions into account. Conversely, an obligation formally to consult
and to take their recommendations into consideration most definitely attached to
those endowed with legitimacy (Kogan & Packwood 1974).

4.1. Definitions and the Drawbacks thereof

Both Mitchell and his colleagues and Kogan & Packwood take the explicit view that
the attribution of status, whether as claimants or influencers or as legitimate or ille-
gitimate interest groups, is a classification applied by the firm, or in the case of Brit-
ish secondary school policy by government, local or national. In short, stakeholders
are defined by the institution. This is certainly one angle on the problem. In effect, it
confers upon the stakeholder world an "institution-centric" perspective. It is the
stakeholder world as viewed from the institution looking out. It is not the only per-
spective. If one shifts the analytical perspective to the stakeholder world, seen on its
own terms, the definition of stakeholders assumes a very different light indeed.
A more recent definition places the classificatory role outside the individual in-
stitution. Burrows (1999) suggested that stakeholders are "those individuals or
groups who believe that a college is accountable to them and behave as if it were".
This is a very different perspective indeed. And whilst it opens the way to a more
sensitive and complex classification of stakeholders, it has one great disadvantage. It
fragments the institution and, more to the point, fragments stakeholder groups them-
selves, almost to a point where it loses any analytic purchase (see Morrow, 1998).

4.2. Playing Definitional Ducks and Drakes

In the higher education field, it is safe to say that those dealing with this topic tend
to play fast and loose with the term, which is as likely to cover internal interest coa-
litions within the individual establishment of higher education as it is external con-
stituencies. Some attempts have been made to develop typologies, usually within the
setting ofthe United States.
 THE STAKEHOLDER PERSPECTIVE 21

Burrows (1999) for instance attempted to draw up a classification along four di-
mensions:
location, that is, whether internal or external to the institution;
involvement status;
potential for co-operation or threat;
finally, their stake in, and influence upon, the individual establishment of higher
education.
Burrows, however, was not concerned with the historic development of stake-
holders in higher education, still less with the rise of this phenomenon in systems
other than the American. Nor does this particular taxonomy seek to place the rise of
the "stakeholder society" as an element in the historical evolution of the term
"stakeholder" .
Yet, in western Europe, it is precisely this dynamic that requires closer attention,
and precisely on account of its apparent modernity. It also requires attention because
the basic frame factors - relationships with government, the patterns of governance,
the changing dimensions of institutional responsibility - have undergone modifica-
tion of such a radical nature over the past decade and a half in the higher education
systems of western Europe that they need to be integrated into the stakeholder per-
spective. In short, though we might be moving towards a situation in which such
typologies, developed in other circumstances, are useful and even relevant, we begin
from a very different setting.
In this chapter then, I set out to re-interpret the dynamic behind western Euro-
pean reforms with the purpose of tracing the path that takes us towards the stake-
holder society. I shall also take account of some of the elements contained within the
typologies just cited. But these will be adapted to be more sensitive to the particular
circumstances that pertain with us and, at the same time, to be more accommodating
to historical differences.

5. PERSPECTIVES FROM THE DISTANT PAST

If we take a deliberately anachronistic approach to the stakeholder perspective, it is

very easily argued that internal stakeholder relationships have, from the earliest of
days, determined the internal distribution of power and authority within Europe's
universities. What distinguished the 12th century Bologna model from what was
later to be the normal pattern - the so called Paris model - lay precisely in the rela-
tionship between the academic estate and the student estate. Under the Bologna
model, the student estate wielded considerable power. That power rested on the
power of the purse and the power of what today would be regarded as an explicit
contractual base. Students, in effect, both paid and engaged their teachers to dis-
pense knowledge. The Bologna model was superseded in the course of the 14th cen-
tury by the Paris model (De Ridder Symoens, 1992). The Paris model reversed the
relationship between the two estates, and set power, authority and control over the
student estate firmly in the hands of the academic estate. The student estate hence-
forth remained one of little privilege and great dependence - that is, its position was
conditioned and determined by the Masters. The student estate was, in the old Latin
22 GUyNEAVE

phase, in statu pupillari. Or, to use one of the dimensions which Freeman (1984)
identified as the type of stake and influence wielded, ownership of the university
was transferred from the student estate to the academic guild and, conversely, the
student estate found itself in a situation of social, if not always economic, depend-
ence.
I shall pirouette over the ensuing half millennium in the history of the European
university. Not surprisingly, there are, here and there, obvious and perhaps delight-
ful exceptions. For instance, George Davie in his account of higher learning in the
19th century Scottish universities, suggests that the power of the student purse was
not to be trifled with. Indeed, if part of the Professorial income came directly from
the fees paid by those attending the Professorial course, "donnish dominion" would
appear to have been somewhat tempered by the cash nexus (Davie, 1964)! Still, this
vignette in no way invalidates the point I want to make, namely that, whilst modern
in its terminology, the concept of the stakeholder society has a firm historical re-
spectability. Second, it can be argued that what is happening nowadays may be seen
as a renewal of an equally respectable notion. Stakeholder society, in effect, brings
the pattern of ownership and authority back full circle.

6. ANOTHER HISTORICAL WATERSHED

There is, however, another historical watershed. We have to take account of it, if
only for the fact that it set what one might term the Anglo-Saxon universities apart
from their counterparts in Continental Europe. Because it did so, it also provides us
with some insight into the current variations in the paths along which higher educa-
tion in continental Europe was to proceed, as it moved towards the stakeholder soci-
ety. The key to this development has to do with ownership and, more particularly,
with the limitations placed upon the academic estate as a self-governing and inde-
pendent body in the political fabric. It has also to do with the assimilation of the
academic estate as one of the orders of national administration. The key develop-
ments in this area can be traced to what historians see as part and parcel of the rise
of the modern university in western Europe, those reforms in France and Prussia,
identified with the founding of Berlin University and the role of Wilhelm von Hum-
boldt on the one hand and, on the other, the creation by Napoleon in France of that
proto-"network" system of education which was known as the Imperial University.!
These two models lay at the base, in the case of Prussia, of the rise of the re-
search university (Clark, 1994), and in the case of France, of a pattern of state con-
trol which was to serve as template for later developments in Spain, Italy and Latin
America (Neave & Van Vught, 1991). They mark the parting of the ways between
continental Europe and the Anglo-American world, both in the matter of co-
ordination and in the patterns of ownership and internal authority. They also mark
the parting of the ways in the fundamental assumptions about the place of higher
education in the community and, no less significant, about the nature of that com-
munity itself. In effect, if we look at these events within the conceptual terminology
of corporate social responsibilities which Clarkson (1991) outlines, we find higher
education confronted with a radical change in status of prime partners. And from
 THE STAKEHOLDER PERSPECTIVE 23

this it follows that the basic assumptions which underlie the European notion of
stakeholders in higher education also underwent profound modification 2.

6.1. Stakeholder Society as a Force of Erosion

Again, using anachronism as an analytical device, the rise of the nation-state in
western Europe set in place the basic relationship between higher education and
government which, by and large, was to hold until the late 1960s. The rise of stake-
holder society reflects, in effect, the rapid erosion of the unitary state as the prime
force of co-ordination and authority in higher education. Seen from this angle, the
rise of the stakeholder society brought to an end a long historical trend which began
with the founding of the Imperial University in France, built out from the Humbold-
tian reforms in Prussia and which was driven forward and consolidated throughout
the course of the 19th century. The essential feature of what might be termed the
"19th century concordat" between state and university in continental Europe rested
on a dual monopoly. This monopoly flowed on the one hand from the state, in that it
conferred the exclusive right upon the university to award those qualifications that
lead to employment in public service - what is known in certain countries as the
effectus civilis. In return, the university was brought firmly under the legal owner-
ship of the nation.

6.2. A Second Transfer of Ownership

Nowadays, we may see this long evolution on the one hand as the "etatisation" of
higher education or, as an alternative view of the same phenomenon, as a redefini-
tion of the community to which academia owed ultimate responsibility. This com-
munity was not conceived in local and proximate terms, as has tended to be the case
in the United States or until 1919 in Britain, in terms of local instances and interests.
Rather, it was conceived as coterminous with the nation as a whole. This transfer of
ownership from the academic estate to the nation-state in continental Europe did not
take place in the United States. On the contrary, ownership, as defined by the Dart-
mouth judgement of 1819, was firmly vested in trustees, not in the state. Nor did the
transfer of ownership take the same form in Britain, where it tended to remain, for
far longer than in continental Europe, in the hands of the academic estate itself (Eus-
tace, 1987, 1992). In Europe, the transfer of ownership was not the only significant
development. Etatisation also went hand in hand with the transfer of a number of
other functions and conditions. The central purpose behind this transfer from the
institution to national oversight was to ensure that the responsibility of the academic
estate was inseparably bound up with the national interest.
This protracted process of incorporation also accounts for the very different pro-
file of power and authority which these systems displayed, when set against both
Britain and the United States in Clark's famous - or infamous - triangle of co-
ordination (Clark, 1983). Prime amongst those functions transferred in the course of
the 19th century from the academic estate to the nation were the validation and ac-
creditation of courses and programmes, and most particularly those which were as-
24 GUyNEAVE

sociated with public employment, as well as the liberal professions of medicine, law
and engineering - those fields that had to do with ensuring public order and health.
Just as etatisation involved the creation of what we would see today as "national
standards" - and what in other settings has sometimes been alluded to as the "prin-
ciple of legal homogeneity" (Neave & Van Vught, 1991), so the same process in-
volved the setting down of standardised conditions of entry to, and employment in,
the academic estate itself.

7. ETATISATION: A RADICAL FORCE FOR CHANGE

It is, however, an error to see the nationalisation of the academic estate simply as
further evidence of the tentacular spread of bureaucracy into realms where it had no
right to be, fashionable though it is to take this view today. Making academia part of
the civil service had, then, a very different purpose, one that we tend today to pass
over rather too rapidly. Behind this move, which set another identifying feature be-
tween continental Europe and the Anglo-Saxon world, lay the determination to en-
sure that the academic estate not only remained conscious of the national interest but
was directly answerable to those agencies which exercised oversight on its behalf. It
was also intended to ensure that the academic estate remained alert precisely to the
national interest as opposed to various sectional or particular interests that might
seek to exercise sway.
Although not all systems of higher education in Europe illustrate this fundamen-
tal principle with the clarity that one sees, for instance, in France, nevertheless the
notion that the state should act as the guardian of academic freedom on the one
hand, and the prime defining agency of the national interest on the other, was widely
shared - and broadly shaped the relationship between university and society. In ef-
fect, the close nexus between state and what Burton Clark has termed "academic
oligarchy" was very far from being an example of what French political commenta-
tors once sardonically described as characterising the relationship between politi-
cians and civil servants - "copinage et conquinage" - that is, complicity and mutual
corruption. It was, on the contrary, the equivalent of an oversight and control which
also incorporated aspects of accountability as well. Such accountability, however,
took the form of a "closed cycle", a direct and detailed dimension within the legal
ties that bound the university to the state. Accountability was not conceived as an
obligation incumbent upon the institution and separate from the other responsibili-
ties that the close ties of universities to the state required. It was, on the contrary, an
integral part of that overall regulatory system.

7.1. Implications for Models of Stakeholding

What some writers view as the classic dimensions of "state control" over higher
education in western Europe have direct implications for the type of relationship that
higher education could entertain with stakeholders, external and internal. Though
none went so far as the French legislation which, formally speaking, placed a ban on
those engaged in public service serving any interest outside ie, the type of relation-
 THE STAKEHOLDER PERSPECTIVE 25

ship that did exist with external stakeholders was by and large, mediated through the
central ministry. Its terms were set down formally in the regulations that governed
the ties between university and nation, just as the relationship between internal
stakeholders - between the three "estates" of academia, administration and students
- was explicitly laid down in the same regulatory order. Not only was this regulatory
order intended to be uniform with respect to the particular constituencies across the
national territory, thereby assigning them degrees oflegitimacy. By the same token,
it also assigned them degrees of both power and influence - or, in the case of the
student estate - degrees of impotence.
Now the very notion of "assigning" power and formally defining legitimacy
through legal regulation reveals very clearly that the basic assumptions about the
"proper relationship" between university and community rested on very different
premises in continental Europe and the Anglo-Saxon world. And whilst one may
interpret the former as a species of stakeholder relationship, it is certainly safer to try
and draw some distinction between them. We can do so once we bear in mind that
the purpose which underlay the construction of higher education in the nation-states
of Europe was essentially political, that is the creation of a modern state in which
efficiency resided in consolidating the rule of law and the provision of formal equal-
ity in the terms of access to, and operation of, the institution of higher education in
the nation. It is not overly exaggerated to see this classic European arrangement as
the polar opposite of the notion of the "stakeholder society" as it is presently con-
ceived and which, essentially, rests on the basis of direct and dynamic relationships
between different interests. The European equivalent within the realms of higher
education incorporated a number of contrary assumptions that placed higher educa-
tion not within an economic nexus so much as on a political or constitutional
grounding. This difference is best symbolised by setting different terms around vari-
ous stakeholder categories, which in the Anglo-Saxon literature tend to be differen-
tiated only in respect to whether they are internal or external to the individual estab-
lishment of higher education.
Effectively, the regulated order of higher education which took shape in Europe
over the century and a half prior to the 1960s distinguished between three spheres of
negotiation. These were:
1. The State: Parliament, Ministry of Education, Ministry of Finance (for this see
De Groof, Neave & Svec, 1998)
2. The Estates of Higher Learning
The Academic Estate
The Administrative Estate
The Student Estate
3. External Constituencies.

7.2. Two Theories of Stakeholding

The most striking feature of these categories is, of course, their collective nature;
and second, that they do not distinguish between different degrees of ownership so
much as between their functions vis a vis government. The absence of degrees of
26 GUyNEAVE

ownership can be explained by the fact that since public universities were them-
selves "owned" by the nation, there was little point in distinguishing between the
nuances in that characteristic amongst these categories. More important by far were
the very different premises which underpinned the relationship between higher edu-
cation and what used to be termed "external interests". These differences are essen-
tial to our understanding of the different interpretations which the 19th century con-
cordat placed upon stakeholder society in the higher education systems of continen-
tal Europe and their counterparts in Britain and the United States. Agreed, both
turned around the definition of the general interest (Morrow, 1998). But they dif-
fered very radically in the stance they took in respect of those external interests that
lay beyond the "regulated order" of the three estates in higher education.

7.3. Continental Europe

Both the Humboldtian interpretation of the relationship between learning and society
and its Napoleonic counterpart sought to provide what is best described as a "pro-
tected space" around the university with the precise purpose of setting a barrier be-
tween learning and the pressures that outside interests could bring to bear (Berchem,
1985; Neave, 1988). The Humboldtian dicta of the freedom of teaching and learning
(Lehrfreiheit and Lemfreiheit) were not simply expressions of basic principle which
set out the conditions of academic work. They also incorporated a very express
statement about the "proper relationship" between learning and external society. Yet
they also stood as an expression of what were then considered to be the limitations
between the university and the realm of external stakeholders. Put succinctly, what
may, from our present day perspective, be seen as an illegitimate extension of the
powers of the state may also be seen as an arrangement by which the state, as the
supreme expression of the general interest, sought to prevent the unbalancing of that
interest by placing the "regulated orders" of the academic estate, the IIdministrative
estate and the student estate exclusively within its own purview. It was, then, an
arrangement firmly grounded on the belief that individual interests, or - to use a
Gallicism - sectional interests, if allowed to bear down directly upon the university,
posed a very real threat to the university's ability wholly and exclusively to devote
itself to the tasks of advancing learning and scholarship.
The rationale that lay behind the Napoleonic settlement obeyed a somewhat dif-
ferent reasoning. For instance, it placed greater weight upon national cohesion
through legal uniformity. But both constructs shared the fundamental premise of the
incompatibility between the idea of the university as a service provided by the state
and a direct relationship between university and outside interests. They also shared
the equally fundamental condition that the relationship between the university and
the world of commerce and industry should be mediated - or, if a different analogy
is preferred, filtered - through national administration, itself acting as the guardian
of the general interest. In other words, the relationship between university and soci-
ety accorded very little legitimacy indeed to external stakeholders seeking to act
beyond these bounds.
 THE STAKEHOLDER PERSPECTIVE 27

This "theory of the regulated order" stands in marked contrast to the situation as
it developed in both the United States and Britain. In the first place, and we have
commented upon it earlier, the transfer of the "ownership" of universities to the "na-
tional" community did not take place in the former and emerged later and in a very
attenuated and indirect form in Britain. In the second place, both societies shared a
very particular interpretation of the place and role of property-owning as a means of
securing the social order. Such a construct is, of course, interesting on its own ac-
count. More to the point, however, it also lies at the heart of the stakeholder society,
and for this reason it is central to our understanding of the basic values which inform
the two "models of stakeholding".

7.4. The Anglo-Saxon World

From the perspective of the historian or political theorist, the origins of "stakehold-
ing" as a political concept in the Anglo-Saxon world may be traced back to the late
17th century and more specifically to the rise of possessive individualism (MacPher-
son, 1962). Economic historians, however, tend to have their own interpretation, and
lay the origins of stakeholder theory at the feet of Adam Srnith4. Possessive indi-
vidualism is perhaps best represented in the writings of the English philosopher,
John Locke (1632-1704). The central part of this philosophy argues that the accumu-
lation of wealth and possessions is not merely a demonstration of success in this
world and thus a sign of divine blessing upon the fortunate. It is also held to confer a
sense of responsibility by giving the individual - literally - a share in the common
wealth. It gives the individual a share - or a stake - in upholding the existing order.
The larger the share, the greater the individual's interest in maintaining stability or
institutional continuity. Ownership was then not perceived primarily as collective,
even though, arguably, the responsibilities attendant upon ownership were collec-
tive. From this perspective, the contribution of Adam Smith lay in removing from
celestial spheres, and secularising, that mechanism by which fortune was conferred
upon the individual. He placed it in the "invisible hand of the market" - a transfor-
mation, however, which remained solidly anchored in the metaphysical! Thus,
stakeholding - sometimes defined as having something to lose - binds the individual
to the collectivity through his or her share in that symbolic entity which is not so
much the nation state, that is a shared historical, linguistic or cultural community,
but a community defined in terms of ownership and possession - in short, the Com-
mon Wealth, or the community construed in economic terms.
What were the consequences that this construct had for society's ties with the
university? Since ownership was conceived in individual terms, one of the foremost
considerations in guaranteeing social stability and advancement lay precisely in en-
suring that different interests had the means of securing a stake in those institutions
that served the community, schools being one, universities another. In contrast to the
theory of a "protected space" which the state erected around the universities serving
the nation state, the Anglo-Saxon concept of "common wealth" posited a direct rela-
tionship between individual institution and external stakeholder interests. And, no
less significant, decisions as to the status of external stakeholders - whether legiti-
28 GUyNEAVE

mate or not - rested fIrmly in the hands of the individual establishment, its owners
or trustees, rather than on indirect national legislation. No less important, since it
served to differentiate British universities from their American counterparts, was the
issue in whom ownership was vested, in academia as a property-owning corporation
- found in the two ancient universities of Oxford and Cambridge (Eustace, 1987) or
in trustees or regents who represented the external community in the United States.
The traditional English universities and their counterparts in the United States
both subscribed to the principle of ownership of individual institutions rather than to
the incorporation of universities into the nation or the national community. Even so,
they upheld very different concepts of authority within the institution and thus, im-
plicitly, two different constructions upon the place of stakeholders, both internal and
external. The pattern of ownership in the former instance may be interpreted as a
species of "hold over" from the medieval guild, supported by charitable and individ-
ual endowments and accumulated resources. Its prime stakeholders were in effect
internal. Internal stakeholders, the fellows, were largely self-governing. This was not
the case in American universities. There, a pattern of shared governing coalesced
around the turn of the 20th century. Shared governance conferred prime stake-holder
status on the local community and its representatives in the board of regents or trus-
tees. The latter fulfIlled the overall responsibilities of ownership whilst delegating
internal responsibility for administration, employment and the conditions of aca-
demic work upon the president who in turn delegated to deans. Thus the protective
space which underpinned academic work and freedom occupied a locus different
from either the British or the continental European. In effect, it existed in the aca-
demic senate - that is, within the individual institution rather than enveloping it.
Clearly, the assumptions and administrative constructs which underpin the no-
tion of "stakeholding" in continental Europe and the Anglo-Saxon world were
rooted in two very different visions of "community" and ownership. These two vi-
sions, I have argued, cast a very different light on how the "stakeholder society" was
perceived and accommodated. The first revolved around what I have termed the
"theory of regulated order", the second around direct and active participation in the
individual institution of the proximate or ethical community which founded or
owned it. Whilst the former obeyed a largely political rationale, the latter derived
from a social theory grounded in possessive individualism. Different historical and
political contexts then shape the particular construct and emphasis which society
places upon "stakeholder bodies" and in which this concept evolves. In short, na-
tional settings modify the stakeholder perspective.
Against this background, the question we have now to tackle is "How do we ex-
plain the present day rise of stakeholder society in western Europe?" Another way of
presenting the same issue would be to ask "How do we account for the demise of a
regulated order which held good for roughly a century and a half?" What changes
have taken place? How do we account for them? What modifIcations have they
brought about? Thus, we leave the realm of history for the muddy waters of contem-
porary events.
 THE STAKEHOLDER PERSPECTIVE 29

8. MASS HIGHER EDUCATION: THE PRIME DYNAMIC OF THE

STAKEHOLDER SOCIETY
Briefly stated, the rise of stakeholder society in western Europe is inextricably tied
into the drive towards, and the tensions arising from, that amazing transformation
which, in the space of some thirty years or less, has propelled Europe's universities
towards mass higher education and beyond. This is perhaps an obvious truth. If one
takes an individual interpretation of stakeholders rather than the collective one, it is
self-evident that mass higher education will bring about a furious multiplying of
stakeholders qua students. But massification in western Europe had equally pro-
found consequences in redefining both the purpose of higher education and also the
place, the relative weight and thus legitimacy of the various collective groups that
we have termed "estates". Because massification involved redefining the purpose of
higher education in society, not only did it bring about a shift in paradigm - that is in
the way of viewing and interpreting that institution. It also recast what I have termed
"the regulated order" and placed higher education in western Europe firmly within a
stakeholder nexus that bore a certain generic similarity to the pattern of development
pioneered in the United States. The question is, of course, how did it do this?
Earlier in this chapter, I touched briefly on that variant of stakeholder literature
which developed within the field of business studies, or the organisation of the firm.
One of the factors which gave rise to "stakeholder theory" in that setting was a
broader definition of the type of social responsibility that the firm was held to dis-
charge. In the world of commerce and industry, the rediscovery of stakeholder soci-
ety was intimately associated with the extension of responsibility beyond the habit-
ual bounds of stockholders and shareholders. If we apply this analogy to higher edu-
cation, and most especially to the process of massification, we see a broadly similar
phenomenon at work.

8.1. Change in Purpose and Purpose in Change

In the first place, massification entailed a major redefinition of the social and politi-
cal purpose of higher education. Under the setting of the regulated order, higher
education's purpose was, on behalf of the nation, to identify talent and to place it
largely in the public domain - in the services of the state, in central and local ad-
ministration, in the administration of law, public health and the transmission of pub-
lic values through the teaching body in schools. The purpose of higher education in
the "regulated order" was to ensure continuity, stability and cohesion by ensuring
the renewal of the political and administrative elites within the nation. Massification
- and more to the point, the decision of governments to make provision for it -
placed a very particular premium on change, on adaptation by higher education to
the pressures of demand and access on the one hand and to the exigencies of the
national labour market on the other. Higher education was construed henceforth as
an instrument for social and economic mobilisation - a radical change indeed, and
one not easily compatible with the earlier vision of higher education as a vehicle for
political stability (Neave, 2000b). Nor should we forget that other prime task which
30 GUyNEAVE

states in western Europe placed upon higher education, namely to act as an instru-
ment of social and redistributive justice.
Viewed from this angle, one cannot deny that the drive to mass higher education
brought about a quite massive extension in the social and economic obligations that
the state placed upon higher education. Such a mission, set out in the course of the
1960s in France, the Netherlands, Sweden, Germany and Britain, had direct reper-
cussions upon both the academic and the student estates. In the case of the former,
its rapid expansion brought about an internal fragmentation with a high degree of
tension between the professoriate - the traditional wielders of internal authority -
and the burgeoning numbers of untenured assistants. In effect, the protracted and
bitter conflict between these two constituent orders within the academic estate was
not finally settled until the early 1980s. It did much to undermine public confidence
in the academic estate (Neave & Rhoades, 1987).

8.2. The Student Estate: Two Concepts of Status

As for the student estate, massification produced quite the opposite effect. It created
a new form of rhetoric and in doing so, forged a new basis - and a broader one - for
the legitimacy that surrounded the student body. Under the system of "regulated
order", students enjoyed what might be termed an "anticipated status" - that is, their
status in the world of higher education derived from the occupations and social
groups to which they were destined and for which they were being prepared. Whilst
this status did not vanish overnight, nevertheless, massification joined another one to
it. And, far more to the point, the basis of this second status became a key item on
which the university was increasingly judged, and its capacity to accommodate to
social change was weighed in the balance. Students became representatives of the
social group or class from which they stemmed. By the same token, the composition
of the student body, whether defined in terms of social class of origin, gender or
ethnicity, became a powerful pointer to the ability of the university effectively to
mobilise the reserves of talent and to fulfil its newly assigned obligation as an in-
strument of social justice. Indeed, seen from the context of macro-policy, the
strengthening of the student interest has been a constant feature across the past 30
years of higher education policy in western Europe, despite the further change in
rhetoric which the advent of "market-driven", as opposed to social demand-driven,
higher education ushered in from the mid-1980s onward.

9. FROM "REGULATED ORDER" TO STAKEHOLDER SOCIETY

Let us follow this track a little further, since changes in the ways that governments
viewed the student estate provide us with a highly sensitive bellwether to that meta-
morphosis which restored the stakeholder society to the higher education systems of
western Europe. Taken at a high level of generalisation, the shift of the student es-
tate, from being part of the "regulated order" to becoming a prime stakeholder,
passed through two clear stages.
 THE STAKEHOLDER PERSPECTIVE 31

The fIrst of these is intimately associated with the "Time of Troubles". It beset
Europe from May 1968 and lasted until the various commissions of inquiry, reports
and legislation from Sweden through to Italy came up with remedies of varying
sorts. This they did in the course of the Seventies in the shape of the Universitiitsor-
ganisationsgesetz of 1975 in Austria, the Hochschulrahmengesetz a year later in the
then Federal Republic of Germany, and the Swedish higher education reforms the
year after that. There are, of course, many interpretations which may be laid upon
the push for "participant democracy" inside the university. And likewise, this epi-
sode has been analysed from many different disciplinary perspectives - sociology,
politics, public administration (De Boer, Denters & Goedegebuure, 1998; Hirsch &
Weber, 2000; Trow, 1998). From the stakeholder perspective, however, and more
particularly from within our notion of the "regulated order", the events of May 1968
and their aftermath across western Europe can be seen as the contestation of "as-
signed power" - or in the case of students, "assigned impotence" - which the "regu-
lated order" upheld.

10. THE IMPACT OF PARTICIPANT DEMOCRACY

The general burden of the reforms which the uproar precipitated redefIned the
bounds of participation in internal decision-making for students, assistants and pro-
fessors. In short, reform conceded to the fIrst two a formal stake. By the same token,
it proportionately set down the professorial mighty from their seat. The stake took
the form of two provisions: shared governance between the three stakeholders
grounded on the basis of tripartite parity (Drittelparitiit in German) and the replace-
ment of the so-called university of the professors (Ordenarienuniversitiit) by the
concept of the university of representative groups (Gruppenuniversitiit). Since Drit-
telparitiit was enshrined as a principle in formal legislation, it marked a signifIcant
watershed indeed. It placed the student estate on a footing of equality with the aca-
demic estate and, more to the point, conferred upon it formal power (De Groof,
Neave & Svec, 1998), though not necessarily great influence. Similarly, the concept
of the "group university" - which could just as well be rendered as the "university of
stakeholders" - marks a turning point which some may care to see as a primordial
challenge, and an exceedingly long-term corrective as well, to the "university of the
masters", founded six centuries previously.
The fIrst stage in the move towards the stakeholder society thus turned around
reform of the internal systems of governance. In essence, it involved governments
setting up a new balance between, and thus giving formal recognition to, the major
internal stakeholders. The second stage, however, was far more complex. Even if it
involved a fundamental reappraisal and redefInition of the status of students, its
main task lay well beyond that particular item. We will return later to analysing the
broader thrust of reform from the 1980s.
32 GUyNEAVE

10.1. The "De-Regulation" a/the Student Estate

From the standpoint of student status, however, the second stage in the implantation
of the "stakeholder relationship" in higher education was both actually and symboli-
cally achieved by equating students to "consumers". Though this terminology de-
rives from the tenets of present-day economic liberalism, as a new definition of the
student qua stakeholder it merits our closest attention. At the onset of massification
in western Europe, students represented the nation's investment in its own future, a
policy which largely explains the absence of any change in student finance and sup-
port, which tended to preserve the same patterns they had displayed during the elite
phase of university development. Certainly, students now possessed a decisional
stake within the institutions of higher education. Yet, viewed by the canons of eco-
nomic liberalism, what they did not possess was independence from the public
purse. Public subsidies, in effect, maintained students as dependants. Though no-
where was it expressed in such bald and brutal terms, by redefining the student as a
consumer governments sought to pass the burden they had assumed for an earlier
generation back to that generation's children. They also sought to restore to students
and their parents that power of the purse which, if never entirely absent, was, per-
haps for the first time since the demise of the Bologna model of university, to serve
once again as a prime lever to bend institutional adaptability and sensitivity to indi-
vidual demand. As consumers, students were not simply agents of demand. That
they had been during the first stage. Nor were they solely representatives of their
group of origin, though this rhetoric was not entirely abandoned. Rather, students
were looked upon by governments as the prime channel for transmitting directly into
higher education the press for change. Their power as an interest group was all the
greater for having at their disposal the means for ensuring that change came about.
In other words, the student stake which, earlier, had been participatory and deci-
sional, was amplified, if not completed, by the power of the cash nexus. In effect, in
the drive towards a stakeholder society, the student estate was the first to be "de-
regulated", a development often couched in terms of maximising individual choice.
If we look behind the details of such policies as "cost recovery" or full cost
charging, a number of assumptions stand revealed, assumptions which bear a re-
markable parallel to the theory of possessive individualism. And possessive indi-
vidualism, as I suggested earlier, stands at the ideological heart of the stakeholder
society. However, whilst the original notion of possessive individualism was con-
ceived as upholding stability in the social order by giving the individual a stake to
defend, its contemporary edition reversed this purpose. Having a stake, investing in
oneself and assuming the burdens and obligations this entailed, was seen by gov-
ernments and their advisers as a way of forcing the pace of change.
Consuming, one might say, is the counterpart in a "market driven" society to par-
ticipation in one where the political order holds primacy. It is, in point of fact, an act
of sharing in the common wealth, for if there were no wealth to acquire, consump-
tion could not be construed as a right. Consumption would, on the contrary, be seen
as a privilege. Redefining students, as "consumers" of knowledge and training, ef-
fectively altered the basis of their legitimacy. It set them as a projection into higher
education, a sub-set of a broader category of economic actors whose behaviour de-
 THE STAKEHOLDER PERSPECTIVE 33

termined the nation's fate. This revision in the image of the student from being a
member of a protected estate - an elite - to being the spearhead of externally in-
duced change, whilst quintessential of the advent of stakeholder society in the sys-
tems of learning in western Europe, was but one element in a broader ranging proc-
ess. This process involved the very rapid erosion of what we have termed the "pro-
tected area" around higher education. This "protected area" had served to uphold
higher education as a direct emanation of the general interest through the multiple
functions and dimensions involved in state control.
Indeed, the policies of the past fifteen years, sometimes summarised as the "off-
loading state", which involved giving back to institutions of higher education such
functions as internal budgetary allocation, greater initiatives to seek sources of reve-
nue and to contract services to bodies other than those in the public sector, together
with the right to make senior staff appointment without clearance from national ad-
ministration, show very clearly that the notion of a "protected area" was a construct
whose time had gone. In the place of ties with the national community, the rise of
stakeholder society set particular store by ties directly negotiated with external inter-
ests, with employers, industry, service partners, sometimes proximate, sometime
distant.

11. MULTIPLICATION OF ADMINISTRATIVE STAKEHOLDERS

Precisely because the stakeholder perspective requires higher education to serve a

proximate community, it follows that the proximate community should have some
stake in higher education. And from this it also follows that central national admini-
stration, whilst it remains a prime stakeholder, is no longer the exclusive interlocu-
tor. It is rather in a position of primus inter pares - the first amongst equals. This
redefinition of the role of national administration in the world of higher education
has been presented in various ways - from the standpoint of changes in the span of
control; as a move towards what has been termed "remote steering" (Van Vught,
1989); as an example of "new public management" (Pollitt, 1990; Van Heffen,
2000); as illustrating changes in structures of co-ordination (Premfors, 1986); or as
one example of policies of decentralisation and devolution towards the sub-national
regional level (Huisman, Maassen & Neave, 2001). It is, of course, all of these. Yet
the emergence of "regional partners" is a significant development and one which has
been gathering momentum from 1977 onwards when the Swedish government intro-
duced, briefly and disastrously (Lane, 1983), a layer of regional boards responsible
for funding and validating short course programmes of direct importance to the local
economy. The multiplication of administrative "stakeholders" at an intermediary
level between institution and central national administration has been a widespread
development in the course of the past two decades. It formed the basis of the French
Higher Education Guideline Law (Loi d'Orientation) of 1984, was foreseen in the
Spanish Organic Law of 1983 (Coombes & Perkins, 1989) and was created by the
federalisation of Belgium in 1989 (Van Heffen, 1999). Last but not least, it emerged
with the deconstruction of higher education in the once United Kingdom through
34 GUyNEAVE

establishing separate Funding Councils and regional Parliaments in Scotland, Wales

and Northern Ireland (Osborne, 20(0).
Since most of these agencies also wield the power of the purse - and indeed,
some of them (the Spanish Autonomous Communities are a case in point) have in-
herited powers of validation in addition (Garcia Garrido, 1992) - clearly they sit
well to the fore in the influence they may exert over individual establishments. How
the latter perceive this, and indeed how they have accommodated to this additional
layer of stakeholders, is a matter that will require further study; as will the strategies
developed by individual establishments to deal with prime stakeholders - old and
new - which have a regular oversight and responsibility for funding.

12. CONTRACTUALISAnON

There remains one final dimension in the rise of Stakeholder Society in western
Europe. This is the principle best described by having recourse to a Gallicism -
namely "contractualisation", sometimes also analysed under the heading of "condi-
tionality". It too may be seen as one of the key operational instruments that under-
pins the stakeholder perspective. Just as a stakeholder has a part in a venture, so he
or she also has the right to protect that interest. This they may do either by threaten-
ing to withdraw it or, if the worst should come to the worst, by withdrawing their
interest entirely. In other words, the fundamental relationship between consumers -
whether they be government, regions, students, employers or other forms of con-
tracted services - and higher education, as the provider, is conditional upon the latter
providing what the former want. One may, of course, argue that even the regime of
"regulated order" entailed an implicit contractual relationship between state and uni-
versity. In return for educating political and administrative elites, the state granted
the university both protection and a monopoly over academic degrees and titles.
Stakeholder society, however, makes contracts and their enforcement explicit, time
limited, and a central feature of that emerging instrumentality of strategic planning
and systems for assessing institutional performance which influence, if they do not
always determine, the resources an establishment may expect. The other major dif-
ference between "the regulated order" and stakeholder society is not, as some have
suggested (Glenny, 1978) the abandoning of historic incrementalism as a budgeting
method - that is, the previous year's allocation plus some correction for inflation or
the cost-of-living index. It lies rather in the ability of stakeholders to make addi-
tional rewards or to impose additional penalties for services that have been rendered
or which have failed to mature. Whilst this option has always been present for do-
nors, foundations and private sector firms, the recasting of government, whether
local, provincial or central, as stakeholders in higher education has extended this
principle to the public domain.

13. CONCLUSION
In this chapter, I have set out to achieve two things. My first task has been to de-
velop the stakeholder perspective by applying it to long-term historical develop-
 THE STAKEHOLDER PERSPECTIVE 35

ments in higher education. My second task was to use this historical analysis to
show how the concept has taken very different forms, and rested upon very different
assumptions about the nature of the relationship between higher education and the
community, in western Europe by contrast to Britain and the United States. Natu-
rally, I am well aware that not all higher education systems in western Europe nor,
for that matter, their scholars and practitioners will necessarily agree upon the ter-
minology, still less recognise themselves as part of the burgeoning stakeholder soci-
ety. That is natural. After all, when Caliban looked into the mirror, it took him a
long time to recognise his own image. He was not greatly pleased when finally he
did.
One of the tasks of the historian is, of course, to seek out the origins of ideas and
to examine the way these ideas are taken up and used to shape institutions - in this
case, higher education. Much of "stakeholder theory" has its roots in studying how
change in the "external environment" re-shapes the way we think about business
enterprises. It is a recent domain. "Stakeholder theory" is little better than four dec-
ades old. Once we take a temporal and comparative perspective and ally it with
some of the routine categories used by the more thoughtful commentators on busi-
ness organisations - ownership, power, legitimacy for example - we open up vistas
wider, broader and certainly more venerable than they ever imagined. We have
gone, to use the obvious Scottish pun, "beyond their ken". In doing so, we open up
new vistas and new ways of assessing a particular dynamic within our own field.
And a most pleasing symmetry emerges from this examination. Early on, I pointed
out how the earliest recognised university in Western Europe - Bologna - rested on
a contractual relationship between students and tutors. Against a broader backdrop
and an infinitely more complex array of institutional forms, tasks and purposes,
payment by formally negotiated contract is essentially the coping stone of stake-
holder society.
I am conscious that the broad sweep of history has involved one sacrifice. It is an
important one - namely, the impact which stakeholder society is having upon the
individual institution. Tracing the historical antecedents and organisational forms
that are enshrined in the notion of stakeholding is less an analysis of systems and
institutions so much as an examination of the evolution, pervasiveness and variation
of ideas and beliefs that are rooted in, and consequently shape, those systems and
institutions. In this respect, comparative higher education resembles the oarsman
who judges his progress by looking back as he moves forward. Even in an age of
economic integration and globalisation it is some times useful to do this. Such a look
at the past may reinforce our determination to press on with what we are doing now.
And, though we rarely learn from history, it is sometimes useful to know whether
convergent structures are grounded in convergent ideas, beliefs or ways of looking
at the world. As I hope I have made plain, nominal similarity often hides essential
and fundamental differences.
36 GUyNEAVE

NOTES
For other perspectives on these two 'referential models' see Neave, 1988; Huisman, Maassen &
Neave, 2001.
For a rather more historical treatment focusing specifically on this tuming point, which is directly
and indelibly linked with the rise of the nation-state in western Europe, see Huisman, Maassen &
Neave (2001).
Only in 1981 were individual academics allowed to undertake outside consultations with private
sector firms without having to resign their post or to get clearance from the Ministry of Higher Edu-
cation.
4
Smith's Theory of Moral Sentiments can, arguably, be seen as a further elaboration of the theory of
possessive individualism. To each his own chronology and his own patron saint.

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 MAURICE KOGAN

NATIONAL CHARACTERISTICS AND POLICY

IDIOSYNCRASIES 1

I. INTRODUCTION
Few scholars have tackled and illuminated the field of comparative studies in higher
education with such flair and depth of scholarship as Ulrich Teichler. Whether it is
his enormous contribution to studies of higher education and employment, in too
many publications to list here, his formative work on the nature of higher education
systems (Teichler, 1988) or his work on research in higher education (Teichler &
Sadlak, 2000; Schwarz & Teichler, 2000), all subjects of wide application, or his
minute scholarship of the historical development of the Finnish amattikorkeakoulu
(as in the OECD Review, Finland 1995), he has shown the way and increased the
pace. At the same time he has been the prince of colleagues - creating a living col-
legium from across many countries, capacious in the friendships he has nourished
and exercising a degree of selfless regard for the collective good.
It seems to me appropriate to use the opportunity of this collation of offerings to
Ulrich Teichler to raise a subject which is immanent in many of his academic inter-
ests: the extent to which higher education policy and practice reflect national politi-
cal and social characteristics. In doing so, I must confess to concern about the way
in which our field of study has largely limited itself to empirical explorations, to the
point that few attempt to link it with broader questions as explored in political sci-
ence, sociology and anthropology. The reasons for this deficit are legitimate: most
researchers have to perform to contracts; there is a plethora of "real" problems that
should be tackled; linking empirical reality to theory is often difficult and unreward-
ing. Indeed this paper exemplifies how much more easy it is to ask fundamental
questions than to begin to tackle them. I am tempted to echo Samuel Johnson who,
on being told that the piece a lady violinist was playing was difficult, remarked:
"Sir, I wish it was impossible."
The broad question posed here is the extent to which higher education policy and
practice reflect national political and social characteristics. This leads to such spe-
cific questions as: can we typify national social, political and cultural characteris-
tics? Can policy idiosyncrasies in higher education be associated with these
characteristics? Can we explain differences?
In looking for underlying characteristics, we must avoid the assumption that eve-
rything is due to or can be explained by them. It is outside the immediate scope of
this paper to take up equally important and neighbouring themes, such as national
differences in the conceptions or constructions of the university and of individual

39
J. Enders and O. Fulton (eds.), Higher Education in a Globalising World, 39-52.
© 2002 Kluwer Academic Publishers.
40 MAURICE KOGAN

academic identities. But we acknowledge that a more complete analysis would need
to elaborate on the ways in which national characteristics are reflected in theories of
institutions, as well as on the ways in which the state conceives of the mandate al-
lowed to the academic profession, and thus affects patterns of work at the individual
level. And higher education systems bear the impress of all manner of secular
trends, the grand ideas of heroic politicians and the ebb and flow of economies.
Within higher education studies themselves, there is substantial comparative
work which enables us to track securely the policy idiosyncrasies of different coun-
tries. There are Clark's and Teichler's works on higher education systems (Clark,
1983; Teichler, 1988), the national and comparative studies undertaken in the An-
glo-Norwegian Swedish project (Kogan et aI., 2000), Maassen's recent study of the
Dutch and Westphalian systems (Maassen, 1996), containing as it does a masterly
critique of relevant theories of culture, Musselin's work comparing France and
Germany (Musselin, 1999) and many of Neave's essays (e.g. Neave, 1988). Goede-
gebuure and Van Vught have been prominent in their attempts to establish compara-
tive frames; state control and state supervising models have become part of the
commonplaces of our subject (Goedegebuure & Van Vught, 1994; Goedegebuure et
al. 1994).
These studies enable us to make comparisons between different higher education
systems - lateral comparisons - but, other than Maassen, they do no more than al-
lude to the vertical connections between higher education and different countries'
political systems, let alone their more fundamental social and cultural characteris-
tics. In our own three-country study (Kogan et al. 2000) we noted that, ideally, we
should start out with a set of concepts which might lead to meaningful interpreta-
tions by identifying similarities and differences between our country cases. But for
the most part, we kept the argument to the second level and examined policy struc-
tures that were relevant to higher education. Like other studies, ours remained short
of a fuller multi-dimensionality which would connect higher education to the larger
scene.
Some of the relevant literature on national characteristics shows that there has
been some general reflection on two main lines, the spatial and the temporal.

2. GENERAL PERSPECTIVES

The spatial factor has been well expressed, by perhaps the ablest of urbanists, as
being:
... that elusive something. that Taine called by that misleading word 'race': a long ac-
cumulation of psychological and social traits, a kind of cultural reproduction over gen-
erations, among people living together in a country or a region or a city ... As Taine
stressed, there is something beyond the economy and inherited cultural dispositions;
there is an element of serendipidity that will refuse to be explained in any systematic
way. People meet, people talk, people listen to each other's music and each other's
words, dance each other's dances, take in each other's thoughts. And so by accidents of
geography, sparks may be struck and something new come out of the encounter.
(Hall, 1998: 20-21).
 NATIONAL CHARACTERISTICS AND POLICY 41

That cultural reproduction might extend to assumptions about government -

though the potential rapidity of change in that zone of human activity implies that it
might well be less capable than other zones of embodying ingrained characteristics.
The second, or temporal, dimension accounts for development and change, and
in a sense runs counter to the notion of national idiosyncrasies, inasmuch as it might
well assume in a quite deterministic fashion that there are all but inevitable and uni-
versal stages of development. For example, the progression of higher education from
elite systems to mass or universal systems seems virtually unstoppable. Or, another
example, divided systems tend to converge, so that it is all but a sure bet that binary
systems will fIrst of all implode into unitary systems and then, mainly spontane-
ously, develop more fInely gradated hierarchies of institutions. Similarly, it is possi-
ble to hitch key developments such as the universal obsession with quality assurance
to secular movements such as massifIcation, and changes in the economic costs and
expectations of higher education.
In dealing with temporal factors, Pierson (2000) depicts macro-social processes
in the study of comparative politics as "Big, Slow-Moving and ... Invisible." In do-
ing so, he characterises the time horizons of different causal accounts as "tornado",
"meteorite", "earthquake" and "global warming" - going from a short time horizon
both of cause and of outcome to a similarly long time horizon. In a less elaborate but
more empirical attempt, Bleiklie (in Kogan et aI., 2000) constructed a time series
over which changes in three countries could be compared.
A simpler but essential element of the temporal dimension is that thoughts or
policies are never entirely new. The historical inheritances of institutions - build-
ings, endowed wealth, tenured staffing, to say nothing of cherished sagas - act as
part-determinant of what changes might happen. Whilst policy changes have been
substantial and have had considerable impacts, some originated from factors which
were present well before the large changes of the 1980s. Trevor-Roper noted that the
civil revolution of the 1640s in England was led by those who had been pondering
on the need for change for a whole previous generation. A principal force for conti-
nuity was the presence of particular groups in particular roles. " ... History has its
continuities as well as its breaches: continuities contained within the experience of
generations" (Trevor-Roper, 1992: xii-xiv). In our more limited zone, over several
generations the ablest have secured admission to elite universities. This builds up
enduring academic cadres sharing similar approaches to academic values, work and
status. UK academics deriving from the more elite centres have occupied the key
academic, institutional and system leadership jobs, even if they no longer have a
monopoly of them (Halsey, 1992). In Norway, there remain traditional links of fam-
ily and social set between senior bureaucrats and the academic elites (Bleiklie et aI.,
2000). Traditional academic ideals persist in both research aspirations and teaching
practices (Henkel, 2000). At the same time, one can detect in the more diverse tex-
tures of recently massifIed systems the beliefs and practices of leading fIgures hith-
erto locked into leadership roles of the less prestigious non-university sectors.
Current systems are multi-modal and do indeed rest on a base of complex archae-
ologies. Yet even the most enduring characteristics must have a beginning, and
therefore a point in time when they were not present, and an ending, when the world
moves on and they cease to operate.
42 MAURICE KOGAN

Temporal tracking seems a good possibility for this enquiry, because it can rest
on assumptions of roughly similar stages of organic development, against which to
describe systems. Yet this deterministic assumption does not plausibly apply to the
nature of government. Even as more, or all, institutions have become part of the
"noble" system, national authorities have exhibited no singular pattern of govern-
ment - for example, over the whole range of European and Australasian countries
there have been simultaneous examples of both increased and reduced centralisation.
Policies, practices and their reforms may, therefore, reflect both national tradi-
tions and values and the actions of individual actors that offer strategies that break
up traditions.
One of the more systematic attempts to come to terms with the general issue of
the basic characteristics that affect policy-making propensities is that of Heiden-
heimer, Heclo and Adams (1983). They ask:
how .. can we analyse the impact of time periods, national settings, and policy sector
characteristics on the content of policies?" They identify discrete differences among na-
tions' handling of various challenges and ask "how far can these habits and experiences
be subsumed under consistent national models of policy making? (Heidenheimer et aI.,
1983: 315).

They quote Gustafsson and Richardson (1980) who noted national styles: the
British with a tendency to extensive consultation, an avoidance of radical policy
change, and a disposition to support well-entrenched interests; the French with a
greater willingness to enforce radical policy change against resistance; the Swedes
with a capacity for radical innovation, but with wider consultation and a greater will-
ingness to wear down and convert opposing interests. Premfors (1980) attempted
something similar, and specifically for higher education policy making, in the same
three countries. These attempts, however, unwittingly illustrate the opposite of what
they might have hoped to prove. They were written when the "reform" movement in
most countries was just starting up - and they unwittingly reaffirm the point that
countries might seek to overturn what had sedimented into apparently enduring
characteristics. Thus, shortly afterwards, the British virtually ceased to consult (Ko-
gan & Hanney, 2000) and went headlong for radical change, although the French
and the Swedes have largely kept to form.
Heidenheimer and colleagues analyse differences across a range of policy
modes. They compare the relative influence of national political systems and of pol-
icy sector characteristics on policy making - and conclude that national politics
rather than sectoral features seem to have won. The countries evinced differences in
rule making and enforcement procedures; in citizen support for government initia-
tives; and in citizen satisfaction, strongly differentiated by social class. These are all
attempts to assess whether there are national and other characteristics that playa part
in determining policy preferences and outcomes. However, they do not attempt the
task of relating these characteristics to the other factors at work.

3. SOME UNTIDY EXAMPLES

We return now to evidence from our own field of higher education and education
policy. We could begin the quest in several ways. We could inspect statements of
 NATIONAL CHARACTERISTICS AND POLICY 43

national systems and policies, and read back to see what they tell us of broader na-
tional characteristics. Or we could start with available assumptions about broader
characteristics, and see how far they explain the shape of higher education struc-
tures, policies and practices. Or perhaps we should try to do both.
To take the last possibility first, there are tantalising but fleeting references in
some official and academic documentation to the broader social and political back-
ground of higher education policies. An obvious first stopping place for these would
be the OECD country examination reports, some of which (though at best a sizeable
minority) give clues that could lead back to a more general and fundamental axiol-
ogy. The OECD reports do not comment systematically on underlying characteris-
tics, and they lay more emphasis on some characteristics than others. We therefore
select two particular dimensions, geographical conditions and cultural features, to
illustrate our point about the lack of systematic correspondences between character-
istics and policy systems. But we should also note how many of the OECD state-
ments, some which go back to the 1960s and 1970s, weaken any possible
assumptions about enduring characteristics, because to some extent they describe
states of being that no longer exist.

3.1. Physical and Geographical Conditions

One example of the impact of geography, but not one discussed in the only OECD
report on the UK (1975), might be the obstinacies of British policies and practices,
and their immunity to foreign example which can be ascribed to an island psychol-
ogy and the sense of protection that it has conferred. The OECD report on Italy
(1969), however, does refer to the diversity of physical and geographical conditions
that _rganization the Italian population. This was not substantially overcome by It-
aly's unification, which was formally achieved in 1860 but which is in many senses
not fully complete. Problems
.. , are complicated by disparities stemming from the accumulated layers of diehard tra-
ditions and the lingering traces of culture in various regions of the country. [ ... J All this
means that the ... system must be given an individual and original fonn ... (It) must de-
velop along lines that are suitably conceived, tailored to circumstances and extremely
flexible. (OECD, 1969: 25-6).

For Canada on the other hand, " ... the geographical distances and the topog-
raphical and climatic conditions remain a factor with strong political and cultural
implications that should not be forgotten." There is a preference for decentralised
solutions: " ... it was ... the locality out of which have arisen responsible and self-
governing democratic community forms." (OECD, 1976a: 16-17).
The internationalism which is so strong a theme underlying all Scandinavian
higher education and science policies evidently arises from the Nordic countries'
perception of their geographical position on the northern edge of Europe. In addi-
tion, the national report of the OECD examination of higher education in Finland
(OECD, 1995) links the emphasis on care for the outdoor environment with the geo-
graphical circumstances in which Finns live. (But similar circumstances might ob-
tain elsewhere, e.g. in many parts of Russia, without generating similar concerns.) In
44 MAURICE KOGAN

one of the earlier reports, on Norway (OECD, 1976b), Ingrid Eide, an under-
secretary from the Ministry of Education, explained how, in planning, the Norwe-
gian authorities had to take account of
the small number of people, the dispersed settlements, the peculiarities of ... geography
and climate. The population is dispersed and '" there is political consensus that the
country must continue to have a population living a dispersed pattern, and we must pay
for it and construct for it. [ ... J In order to make one cohesive nation out of a population
as dispersed as ours, a centrally organised school system became an important mecha-
nism. (p. 67)

But that dichotomy too might have changed. The oil boom brought many Nor-
wegians into the Oslo region from the formerly dispersed pattern. But ambivalence
about the dominance of local values and about the need for central welfarism re-
mains strong in Norwegian policies at large (see Bleiklie et al., 2000) and in higher
education policies.
So it might seem obvious that polities and policy outcomes are shaped in part by
the physical and geographical conditions which they inhabit. But this does not al-
ways seem to work. Norway and Sweden are similar in virtually all geographical
characteristics, but their style of government has been quite different. In spite of its
geographical dispersion, Sweden has provided a classic example of centralised wel-
farism (Aasen, 1993), whilst Norway has rejoiced in its determined localism, yet at
the same time advancing welfarism (Eide, 1995). Germany and France, Belgium and
the Netherlands are pairs of countries also quite dissimilar in their governmental
structures, but the differences are not easily ascribable to geographical determinants.
Even some low level generalisations do not seem to work. Australia and the
USA are federal systems, perhaps because they cover a land mass that would have
made a unitary system difficult to operate. But the Soviet Union had a vast land
mass, yet for 70 years was a federal system only in name.
Moreover, even as we concede the power of geography we need to note shifts
since the 1970s which, if not adding up to globalisation, have made the pull of natu-
ral circumstance less assertive as political leaders seek to imitate and implement
policies that are designed to ensure comparability with other countries.

3.2. Cultural Differences

Cultural differences between countries have proved difficult to define and capture -
see Maassen's excellent work (1996) on this. He raises the key issue by asking what
the notion of "national factors" as a cultural force might mean.
Does it refer to a 'national culture' ", Or does every higher education system exist as
specific combinations of national values, for example, social justice, competence, lib-
erty, and loyalty, as suggested in Clark's normative theory? (Maassen, 1996: 56),

Maassen notes Hofstede's (1980) dimensions representing societal values that

countries are supposed to develop in dealing with the basic issues facing them:
power distance: a country's response to inequality in power among its members.
 NATIONAL CHARACTERISTICS AND POLICY 45

uncertainty avoidance: the degree to which the majority of people in a country

prefer formal rules and explicitly structured activities to deal with unclear or un-
foreseen circumstances.
individualism (and collectivism): the extent to which people identify themselves
as part of the group or organization to which they belong.
masculinity: the degree to which countries differ as regards clearly differenti-
ated roles and expectations for men and women.
Hofstede's study is based on work with country clusters, empirically derived
from responses to questionnaire items, after which the resulting dimensions were
related to variables such as GNP, political system, and geographical location. As
Maassen notes,
one possible route would be, like Hofstede's, to classify as many as possible of higher
education's 'system beliefs' in order, amongst other things, to try to see how systems
are managed ... The four basic values of Clark [i.e. Clark (1983») (at system level) of
higher education - social justice, competence, liberty, and loyalty - could, for instance,
be used for designing such dimensions. The use of these dimensions would make it pos-
sible to list higher education systems and to compare average national 'values and be-
liefs' scores, but it would not lead to a clear understanding of the underlying causal
relationships or the identification of the variables that could explain why the scores are
as they are. (Maassen, 1996: 60).

In fact, however, Hofstede's attempt, and similar ones, do not always satisfy
what one instinctively knows about the working of different societies, polities and
higher education systems. In any event, Kogan in reviewing the OECD's national
review system notes that:
... generalised values may be held in common among country authorities ... but then
splinter as they are converted into goals and begin to be worked out in detail. [ ... )
Variation is a function not only of idiosyncrasy, of powerful individuals or of ephemeral
ideology, but also of strong and well sustained political ideologies. [ ... ) Some of the
variations are ... of ethic and ideology .... there is a widely differing approach towards
the work ethic in different countries. There is a span of attitudes towards equality and
selection. There are different perceptions of value to be placed on economic growth.
There are differences in attitudes towards problem-solving at the policy level between
the logical and the pragmatic. (Kogan, 1979: 8)

I might have added that these add up to a kaleidoscope rather than a series of
contingent factors.
Of the OECD Reports, the Norwegian (OECD, 1976a) and the French (OECD,
1971) are the most explicit about generic cultural characteristics. Of France, the ex-
aminers noted that:
In its emphasis on literary values, in its taste for abstract ideas, traditional French educa-
tion has been simply a strongly accented version of European education. To these, how-
ever, must be added certain other characteristics which, if not unique to France, are
particularly conspicuous there. (OECD. 1971: 22-23)

These are "the revolutionary principle of equality", "the concern with equality
conceived as uniformity", "a high degree of competitiveness", "centralised direction
and impersonal administration" and "the penchant for dualisms".
But it should be noted that many of these traits derived from the French Revolu-
tion and its Napoleonic aftermath. How far back must a style and tradition go before
46 MAURICE KOGAN

we can count it as a fundamental national characteristic? Would Richelieu or Colbert

have signed up for them?
At a more obvious level, Canada's linguistic and cultural variety is a direct result
of its particular post colonial history. So, too, the zealous bilingualism of Finland
(perpetuated at great cost for the Swedish speaking 6% of its population) derives
directly from its earlier history.
An important sub-set of cultural factors affecting government and politics might,
on the face of it, be religious affiliations. They determine government patterns in the
largely denominational multi-plurality of Dutch school arrangements. The essence
of these differentiations, which also apply in part in Belgium, is not, however, the
doctrines or epistemologies espoused by different confessions, but a tribal insistence
on remaining free to pursue them in terms of institutional and power structures. Dif-
ferentiation by belief system again does not hold when we consider the differences
between Sweden and Norway - both Lutheran. If one deems Catholicism as likely to
tend towards authoritarian centralism, the case of Spain presents almost the extreme
opposite of delegation and separatism.

4. STRONG HISTORICAL EXPERIENCES

It is perhaps tautological to say that structural and policy characteristics bear the
impress of strong historical experiences. In Britain the massive breach with the tra-
dition of Burke and Mill which was brought about by Thatcherite policies is an ex-
ample of events where equilibria are "punctuated" (Baumgartner and Jones, 1993).
Some systems were created in countries which had quite recently suffered severe
travails. But the effects of these experiences may not endure, and may lead them to
embrace quite different patterns from those previously endorsed. The national report
for the OECD examination of higher education in Finland (OECD, 1995) refers to
the Finnish struggles for independence and national identity, although it is difficult
to see what impact these had on higher education policies and practices. The Ger-
man report (OECD, 1972) notes the enormous influence of legalistically minded
bureaucracies, especially at the land level.
Gennan universities and higher technical schools have mirrored only too well the hier-
archical and authoritarian society they served (OECD, 1972: 22).

The examiners noted that reform had a hard struggle because the reaction to the
foul policies and practices of the Nazi era was not to look forward to yet more
change, but to look back to pre-Nazi forms. But if we look for an example to refute
the notion of enduring national characteristics, we can note that the German system
and its institutions moved on, and are now quite different in access policies and as-
sociated assumptions from anything else that went before.
These episodic influences must be contrasted with historical influences related to
social structures. Norway (OECD, 1976b), again according to Ingrid Eide, has never
had a large leisured class, "... neither ... did we ever want a segregation between
doing a practical job, and using one's head." "The collective aspect ... is seriously
considered." And this egalitarianism was reinforced by a strong legal tradition. "The
Vikings stated a thousand years ago that it was with the law the country should be
 NATIONAL CHARACTERISTICS AND POLICY 47

built and not ruined by non-law" (OECD, 1976b: 67-68). One has to ask, however,
whether this collectivism has been affected by the recent oil boom and the associ-
ated flourishing of the entrepreneurial spirit.
Etzkowitz notes:
Until recently, French universities were largely an extension of the Ministry of Educa-
tion. In the US universities operate largely as autonomous entities within a loose
framework of governmental and self-regulation. [ ... J Perhaps the most significant dif-
ference between universities in Europe and America is that US universities have played
a leading role in determining the law, institutional formats and basic framework of their
relationship to the federal government whereas in Europe and Japan university systems
and regions, are typically a creature of their national governments, with resources and
direction flowing from the top down .... the German universities are still sponsored by
their lander. (1999: 8\).

Again, however, such analyses of histories describe but do not explain differ-
ences.

5. FROM BASIC NATIONAL QUALITIES TO HIGHER EDUCATION POLICY

CHARACTERISTICS
If, then, it is not possible to think in terms of enduring national characteristics which
might lead to particular policy forms, we might tackle the same issue from a differ-
ent angle by asking whether such basic national characteristics are visible in higher
education modes. Our own Anglo-Norwegian-Swedish project produced compari-
sons made between the three countries, as given below in Table 1 (Kogan et aI.,
2000: 206-207). How far do they relate to broader national characteristics of politi-
cal systems?

Table 1. Change over time in different dimensions of higher education:

Norway, Sweden and the United Kingdom, early 1970s to late 1990s.

Government level
Between the facilitatory and the interventionist
Between the providing and the regulative
Between the welfare, deficiency funding and
the market driven
Between the decentralised and the centralised
Between the professionally and the manageri-
ally led system
Between control by the political and adminis-
trati ve laity and by the academic professionals
Between sponsoring free enquiry and instru-
mental knowledge
Between individual development and economic
and social policy values
Differed considerably between countries. UK
more interventionist
Scandinavian countries less regulative; UK more
regulative
All in direction of market
Norway and Sweden less, UK more centralised
Moves towards managerial power
More political and lay control. But academic
control over content still strong in all countries
Free enquiry strong, but more deference to in-
strumental purposes in some areas
Economic and social policy values more strongly
embedded in missions
48 MAURICE KOGAN

Table 1. continued

All stronger evaluation, but UK, though incorpo-

Between peer and self-evaluation and system-
rating peer judgement, more external, linked to
atic quality assurance
allocations
Institutional level
Between collegium and strong rectorate Rectorates strengthened in all countries
Between faculty organisation and central con-
Central mechanisms strengthened
trol and development mechanisms
Between traditional academic and innovative
New models in all national rhetorics. Institutional
styles and modes (e.g. entrepreneurial, adaptive
adoption variable
and learning institutional models)
Between weak. and strong accountability
All stronger
mechanisms
More policy dependency, but more institutional
Between independent and dependent institution
earning of resources
Between free grants and market acquired re-
More dependency on markets
sources
Individual academics
Individuality strong, but more team and sponsored
Between individual and team and sponsored
organisation of research and curriculum develop-
knowledge
ment
Curiosity driven research still most esteemed, but
Between individualistic, curiosity driven and
more responsive, in some areas, to 'relevance'.
instrumental, 'relevant' knowledge
Similar tendencies in some education
Between individualistic and systemic and pol- Policy-driven values more salient, but individual-
icy-driven values istic values remain strong
Between scientific, progressi ve and humanistic,
Scientific model more widely imposed
recursive models of knowledge production
Between knowledge-led and bureaucratic or Knowledge-led models still dominant, but some
market models of quality impacts of bureaucratic and market models
Collective identities more important, but not at the
Between individual and collective identities
expense of individual identities

It would be tedious, and an appropriate exercise only for a far more extended at-
tempt at scholarship, to examine each of these generalisations in detail. What is evi-
dent, however, is that these comparisons of where higher education systems stand
now do not comfortably match the ascriptions made in the more general statements
of national characteristics. The extreme case is notoriously that of the UK, where the
largely publicly funded universities were the freest in the world. In this, they
matched the only slightly less centralised local government, schools and health sys-
tems. This tradition of central abnegation of power had deep roots derived from the
latter nineteenth century, and had ample philosophical backing in the writings of
Burke and J S Mill. But now all bow to Caesar, with virtually no protest at central
dominance. Has our backbone melted? It is a commonplace, however, that the Scan-
dinavian countries, like many other Western European regimes, have moved the
other way, from centralisation to more institutional autonomy. Were these move-
ments truly shifts in the national psyche?
 NATIONAL CHARACTERISTICS AND POLICY 49

We can look at other examples in the recent literature which differentiate be-
tween the higher education policies of different countries. Braun attempts
to disentangle the complex configurations of factors which have influenced the reform
capacity of governments with regard to the governance of universities. (Braun, 1999:
239-261).

He follows the particular theme of the new managerialism, on four dimensions,

namely: the extent to which governments have switched to a philosophy of man-
agement by objectives, the extent to which governments have permitted universities
to deal autonomously with the management of institutional affairs, the attempts of
government to make universities more responsive to social, political and economic
demands, and the extent to which the internal authority of universities has been re-
formed.
His overview demonstrates the remarkable similarity of reform attempts, but
demonstrates also that we find different managerialist models emerging. England
started from the collegium model; those starting from the oligarchic-bureaucratic
model were Germany (West), France, Italy, Switzerland and the Netherlands. The
U.S.A. started from the market model. All of these can be loosely associated with
general characteristics of traditional political and administrative cultures, but the
shift to managerialist convergence cannot be explained by enduring traits. Perhaps
the ways in which managerialism is played out will eventually display differences
that can be thus attributed; the evidence is not yet there.
Musselin (1999) gives an account of differences between the French and German
systems, in which she shows that there is a specific national type of relation between
the state bodies and the universities in each country and that it differs greatly; but
that:
state-universities interactions have national bases that must not be seen in terms of cul-
ture, but rather as societal ... constructions of relationships (Musselin, 1999: 42).

The differences lay first in structures, between the weak governing ability of
French universities and the formal structure of the French Ministry which splits the
universities into different problem areas, whilst the German universities are fairly
integrated institutions with a stronger institutional position; and second, in the inter-
play between the state and the academic profession. In France, disciplinary experts
advise on policies, although they have no representative status, whilst in Germany,
the profession has no direct channels of influence independent of the institution. In
France decisions are synoptical, and are organised within national procedures that
allow for comparisons between similar situations. "In Germany ... case-by-case
decision taking prevails" (Musselin, 1999: 49). The Hochschulreferent ("university
correspondent" - a civil servant with responsibility for a specific university) plays a
key role and there is an absence of experts. France uses national incentive policies
for steering, within frames, whilst in Germany individual presences in the ministry
make case-by-case action possible. More recently, changes developed in France be-
cause of the emergence of funding by negotiation.
Musselin's differentiations may eschew a cultural explanation, but might all the
same be associated with some of the deep characteristics noted by the 1976 GEeD
50 MAURICE KOGAN

examiners. The French penchant for abstraction might make it natural to subordinate
local cases to the power of national synopsis. This might also be associated with
deep republican rhetoric of the belief in geographical equality (whilst promoting
individual elitism). What is perhaps surprising, and not easily reconciled with the
demotic view of German behaviour in our policy field, is the emphasis on personal
connection and on pragmatic case-by-case deliberation between the universities and
the Lander.
Differences between Sweden and England, as depicted by Bauer and Henkel
(1997), rest in part in the size of the systems. But this does not account for the dif-
ferences attributed .to the status of reform. Externally-run quality assurance is much
more significant, and government-led, in the UK. The Swedes moved away from
classic centralised statism towards a much more pluralistic approach. At the same
time, this tendency chimes in with what one has always felt about Swedish adminis-
trative and political culture - its openness and transparency, its tradition of remiss in
which many stake-holders have their say. The power of the state has to some extent
always been in fugue with, and partly suppressing, these tendencies.

6. GENERAL DISCUSSION

Thus we do see significant differences in higher education policy-making mecha-

nisms, and in their outcomes in terms of policies, but we may conclude that it is nei-
ther useful nor possible to identify any coherent set of underlying causes of
difference, nor yet to link them with underlying national characteristics. Everything
points to specificity of mixes, in which long-term "geological" factors (geography,
religion, culture and stage of development) interact with immediate factors (oil cri-
ses and September 11), and we may come to the conclusion that we have to reinstate
the individual actor, or group of actors, to the centre of the stage. They are to some
extent the unconscious heirs to the society and place that they occupy, but their free
will determines a policy outcome at anyone particular time. Thus there was no long
term reason why Margaret Thatcher should have decided to reduce higher education
expenditure to the point where it eventually led to a revolution in state-university
relationships, or Keith Joseph to question the intellectual autonomy of academics.
Yet the individual actors must contend with the strongly inertial qualities of many
existing social arrangements. Long-term accumulation leads actors to adjust their
policy preferences to accommodate a new environment.
We thus begin to reach some eclectic conclusions in the search for a satisfying
unitary set of explanations. As Musselin has written to the author, "we can not
search for a cause, but for the specific mix of causes that characterise a country and
may explain the reactions to reforms" (personal communication, 2001). Countries
may have enduring characteristics, but some characteristics that are deemed to be
enduring may produce reactions that dislodge them, or reduce them to a second or-
der role.
 NATIONAL CHARACTERISTICS AND POLICY 51

NOTES
I acknowledge substantial critique and help given me in writing this paper by Ivar Bleiklie, Mary
Henkel, Jiirgen Enders, Oliver Fulton and Christine Musselin.

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 V.LYNNMEEK

CHANGING PATTERNS IN MODES OF

CO-ORDINATION OF HIGHER EDUCATION

1. INTRODUCTION
This chapter reviews changing patterns and structures in modes of co-ordination in
higher education. It examines modes of co-ordination from three basic perspectives:
as a planning and resource allocation mechanism; as an overall regulatory frame-
work or set of rules; and as ideas - that is, more than merely a set of legally defined
structures and processes.
The chapter begins with a brief analysis of the concept of modes of co-
ordination, followed by an overview of changes in "classical" models of co-
ordination (buffer/intermediary bodies, the continental model, etc.). The discussion
then turns to a summary of the international reform agenda in higher education,
leading to a more in-depth examination of how past models of co-ordination have
been replaced by market relationships, concentrating on the international/global di-
mension.
The market is treated as both a set of concrete exchange relationships that shape
the goals and structure of higher education and as normative or idealised presump-
tions concerning how higher education should be governed. I argue that in some
respects the market as a mode of co-ordination does not achieve all that is expected
of it. Formalised regulatory frameworks may be necessary for the achievement of
certain objectives (though regulation and market are not necessarily antagonistic
concepts). With the development of the knowledge based global economy, and
higher education institutions themselves transcending national boundaries through
forming international consortia of various types, questions concerning effective
modes of co-ordination become increasingly complex and difficult. Clearly, the de-
cisions and policies of such global bodies as the World Trade Organisation have the
potential to significantly affect the way in which higher education is structured and
offered around the world. The penultimate section of the chapter looks at the unin-
tended consequences and weaknesses of market co-ordination of higher education,
and the beginning of a renewed interest in state regulation. In conclusion, I suggest a
new approach to research on higher education; one that replaces the notion of the
natural ascendancy of the market over state control with that of a dialectical relation-
ship between the two.

53
J. Enders and O. Fulton (eds.). Higher Education in a Globalising World. 53~71.
© 2002 Kluwer Academic Publishers.
54 V.LYNNMEEK

2. CO-ORDINATION CONCEPTUALISED

The term "modes of co-ordination" with respect to higher education has a number of
meanings. In the narrow sense of the words, "modes of co-ordination" refers to spe-
cific governmental, quasi-governmental or inter-institutional arrangements for man-
aging specific trans-institutional activities. Martin and Talpaert (1992: 1) define
higher education co-ordination as "the formal system of planning, monitoring, allo-
cation of resources, and control whereby governments and bureaucracies regulate
higher education". Van Vught (1989: 21) defines the related term of regulation in
much the same way. Regulation is "the efforts of government to steer the decisions
and actions of specific societal actors according to the objectives the government has
set and by using instruments the government has at its disposal". However, this
chapter adopts a more eclectic approach to co-ordination, examining not only the
different machinery used to control higher education institutions and systems, but
also the ideological foundations upon which such machinery is based, and the rela-
tionship between external authority structures and internal forms of governance and
management.
Modes of co-ordination can be thought of as planning and resource allocation
mechanisms; as overall regulatory frameworks; or as a set of ideas. Much of the
literature on co-ordination in higher education focuses on planning and resource
allocation functions and their pursuit through specific governmental, quasi-
governmental or inter-institutional arrangements. A separate co-ordinating authority
(an intermediary or so-called "buffer" body, such as the former University Grants
Committee in the United Kingdom) may be established to perform these tasks, or
they may fall to the responsibility of one or more government ministries. If, how-
ever, we see co-ordination as an overall regulatory framework or set of rules, this
emphasises the basic structural requisites of a higher education system and the de-
gree of formal differentiation which they express, for example in the distinction be-
tween unitary and binary systems. Analysing co-ordination as ideas - that is, as
more than merely a set of legally defined structures and processes - allows for the
examination of the normative and ideological assumptions underlying specific con-
trol mechanisms, and hence also the assumptions underlying shifts in the way in
which higher education systems and institutions are governed. For example, in many
countries, bureaucratic control and the rational-legal ideal on which it is based have
given way to the principles of new public management, economic rationalism and
the concepts of "the market" and competition as the best way to regulate higher edu-
cation institutions and systems.
The argument pursued in this chapter is that the ideas underpinning steering and
regulatory frameworks of higher education are more important than specific struc-
tures and control mechanisms. Over nearly two decades the "idea" of market and
competition has progressively come to dominate considerations of the co-ordination
of higher education. However, with the start of a new millennium, we are witnessing
the beginnings of a renewed interest in state regulation of higher education, as it
appears that some governments have reached the limits to which they can abrogate
their fiscal and policy responsibilities for this sector. Of course, in practice, specific
modes of co-ordination cannot be fully distinguished from the ideological assump-
 CHANGING PA TIERNS OF CO-OROINA TION 55

tions upon which they are based. On occasion, however, there may be a contrariety
between the expectation and what is actually achieved by a particular mode of co-
ordination - and market steering seems to fall into this category.

3. MODELS OF CO-ORDINATION

The structure and regulation of higher education systems cannot be understood

without reference to the history and development of the specific national contexts in
which they exist. The organisation of higher education differs widely between socie-
ties and over time within societies. There are, for example, formally unified systems
recently created in Australia and the United Kingdom where (almost) all higher edu-
cation institutions are called universities; well entrenched formal binary divisions
between university and non-university institutions in Canada, the Netherlands and
Germany; and highly centralised systems in France. Also, there is the USA with its
great variety of institutional types; and systems under reconstruction such as in East-
ern Europe, South Africa and Mozambique.
The mere reference to a "system" of higher education in the absence of a specific
national context can therefore be misleading. Nonetheless, higher education has al-
ways had an international flavour, and to a remarkable degree, diverse and often
divergent national systems of higher education appear to be experiencing common
problems and dilemmas.
So long as it is kept in mind that we are referring to "ideal types", some broad
historical models of governance and co-ordination of higher education can be identi-
fied. Harman (1992: 2) lists four broad models upon which the governance of higher
education is based:
1. The collegial model emphasises non-hierarchical co-operative decision-making,
and a significant degree of self-determination by academic staff.
2. The bureaucratic model emphasises legal-rational authority and formal hierar-
chies.
3. The professional model emphasises the authority of experts and the importance
of horizontally differentiated units linked in loose confederations.
4. The political model conceptualises governance in terms of political conflict
among interest groups with competing views and values.
These models in turn, according to Harman (1992: 2), relate to three types of na-
tional authority systems:
1. The continental mode, in which authority is held by faculty guilds and state bu-
reaucracy, and there is weak autonomous authority at the levels of the university
and its constituent faculties.
2. The United Kingdom mode combines the authority of faculty guilds with a mod-
est amount of influence from institutional trustees and administrators.
3. The United States mode has a similar combination to that in the United King-
dom, but with faculty rule being decidedly weaker and the influence of trustees
and administrators being stronger.
Added to the above must be the market model of higher education co-ordination,
which will receive more attention below.
56 V.LYNNMEEK

While there are a number of substantial differences in the models and modes of
co-ordination outlined by Harman, they do have one element in common. Each one
of them emphasises the concept of relationship or dynamic interaction of bodies and
groups operating at different levels of a higher education system, be it the interaction
between the academic guild and institutional management or between institutional
management and ministerial authority. At the system level, such interactions and
relationships are often characterised as "bottom-up" or "top-down" co-ordination, as
is discussed in more detail below.
Analyses of the ability of higher education institutions to exercise initiative in
the context of system-wide authority structures have often been organised on a con-
tinuum. At one end of the continuum is the "bottom-up" type of system where gov-
ernment policy follows rather than leads a change process initiated at the depart-
mental, faculty or institutional level; at the other end of the continuum is the "top-
down" type of system where institutions merely respond to government-inspired
policy initiatives which are enforced by the power of the state. "Bottom-up" systems
are characterised by high institutional autonomy, and control mechanisms that sup-
posedly rest more on a competitive market than on state legislative authority and
explicit co-ordination mechanisms; "top-down" systems are characterised by the
opposite.
In a top-down, centrally funded, national system of higher education, govern-
ment is a highly significant actor. But no government has absolute power over
higher education, or at least, it cannot exercise it absolutely. Governments are them-
selves part of the higher education system, and their policies are either constrained
or furthered by the norms, values and interests of other significant actors within the
system. The dynamics of such a complex system as higher education are dependent
upon the intersection of interests, strategic behaviour, norms, values, and ideologies
of all concerned. In examining modes of co-ordination, it is the dynamics and com-
plexities of the interrelationship between higher education policy and the structure
of higher education systems which are at issue. The actions and interests (including
ideological ones) of various agencies, interest groups and stakeholders are con-
strained or furthered by the structure of the academic system and their specific loca-
tion within it.
The relationship between structure and modes of co-ordination changes accord-
ing to the overarching policy intentions of governments at different points in time
(Teichler, 1988; 1996). During the 1950s and early 1960s, higher education policy-
makers were preoccupied with questions of expansion of higher education and the
means of achieving it. From the late 1960s to the mid-1970s, attention shifted to "a
search for a modem structure of the higher education system" in a climate of student
criticism of prevailing teaching, research and decision-making patterns. From the
mid-1970s to the mid-1980s, there was
a shift from optimism or euphoria regarding the needs and virtues of educational expan-
sion toward pessimism and renewed scepticism and a collapse of faith in societal plan-
ning, both in terms of understanding sufficiently the complexity of higher education and
its environment and of carrying through plans of reshaping higher education
(Teichler, 1992: 44).
 CHANGING PAITERNS OF CO-ORDINATION 57

The early 1990s were characterised by reductions in public expenditure; in-

creased emphasis on efficiency of resource utilisation and management; and a
strengthening of the policy and planning role of individual institutions. The period
from the mid-1990s to the beginning of the new century has witnessed a shift in the
steering of higher education from state to consumer control, coupled with the uni-
versalisation of post-secondary education and renewed interest in the innovative
capacity of higher education, particularly with respect to research. As Johnstone
(1998: 4) writes,
The refonn agenda of the 90s, and almost certainly extending well into the next century,
is oriented to the market rather than to public ownership or to governmental planning
and regulation.

But, before examining the ascendancy of market co-ordination in more detail, a

few words need to be said about the demise of one of the classic approaches to co-
ordination: that is, the intermediary or "buffer" body.

3.1. The Demise of Intermediary Bodies

Up to the end of the 1980s, the use of intermediary or "buffer" bodies to regulate
higher education was quite popular, particularly in the Commonwealth countries.
The University Grants Committee (UGC) in the United Kingdom and the Com-
monwealth Tertiary Education Committee (CTEC) in Australia served as linking
agencies between government and higher education institutions, influencing institu-
tional policy on the one hand and acting as quasi-pressure groups with respect to
government on the other. Such bodies were designed to understand the institutions,
to be sympathetic to institutional needs and to represent institutional interests to
government, and were largely governed by academic notables (Clark, 1983).
But the government reform agenda in places like Australia, New Zealand and the
United Kingdom left no space for such intermediary bodies (though they continue to
exist in such locations as India and Hong Kong). In Australia, for example, follow-
ing the 1987 election and in order to exercise more direct stewardship of the econ-
omy, the then Labor government substantially reduced the number of statutory
authorities in the belief that
for many purposes government departments have the decided advantage of making the
relevant Minister directly responsible for the effectiveness and efficiency of administra-
tion and of saving costs through the use of long established administrative machinery ...
(Williams, 1988: 2).

As part of an ideology of "let the managers manage", the Public Service Board
was abolished and personnel responsibilities were devolved to departmental heads.
According to Williams (1988: 7), the analysis in the government's policy discussion
paper, Statutory Authorities and Government Business Enterprises (1986),
on the relations between Minister and statutory business enterprises does not leave room
for a statutory body ... to stand between the Minister and the business enterprises.

Or, as McInnes (1990: 115) puts it,

58 V.LYNNMEEK

by defining the role of public authorities and enterprises within a business rather than a
service framework, the government has clearly argued that there is no place in the pub-
lic sector for independent agencies that do not have the potential to raise revenue.

One such agency that was quickly "axed" following the 1987 elections was
CTEC.
Though the details are different, intermediary bodies in the United Kingdom,
New Zealand and elsewhere met their demise for much the same reasons as those
that prevailed in Australia. In particular, governments became reluctant to support a
mode of co-ordination that existed as much to protect the interests of the higher edu-
cation institutions as those of government.

4. THE REFORM AGENDA

Governments nearly everywhere have been rethinking the way in which they co-
ordinate their higher education systems. While the detail differs substantially from
country to country (and the devil is often in the detail), governments have been re-
sponding to a number of more or less universal pressures. First and foremost has
been the transition from elite to mass higher education. About 60 per cent of the
world's universities founded since the twelfth century have been established since
the Second World War. It is during this period that higher education has achieved
most of its growth and transformed itself from a small collection of relatively mono-
purpose elite institutions into very large mass systems of higher education. Part and
parcel of the massification of higher education has been the rise of the knowledge
economy and its globalisation, a phenomenon that would not have been possible
without a steady and substantial increase of highly educated and skilled labour. Ac-
cording to the World Bank (2000), in every global region higher education enrol-
ments have more than doubled and, as can be gleaned from the OECD's publication
Education at a Glance (2000 edition), the rise in higher education participation in
OECD countries has been impressive indeed.
Today, four out of ten school leavers in OECD countries are likely during the
course of their lives to attend tertiary programs which lead to the equivalent of a
bachelor's degree or higher.
A significant proportion of persons will also start tertiary education aiming for
occupational skills.
Between 1990 and 1997 the number of students enrolled in tertiary programs
grew by more than 20 per cent in all except five OECD countries, and in eight
countries by more than 50%.
On average across OECD countries, a 17 -year-old can now expect to receive 2.3
years of tertiary education, of which 2.0 years will be full-time.
Other broad socio-economic imperatives influencing the steering of higher edu-
cation include:
the substantial costs associated with mass higher education, which have led to a
concern by government to realise more value per dollar committed in this sector;
the clear expectation of government that the higher education sector should be
more closely tied to the national economy, both in meeting national labour mar-
 CHANGING PATTERNS OF CO-ORDINATION 59

ket needs and also through the commercialisation of its research and teaching ac-
tivities;
the demand from an increasing proportion of the population for participation in
higher education, thus inevitably making higher education more of a political is-
sue;
the dramatic rise of the social service burden on the national treasury due to an
ageing population, coupled with pressures to cut government expenditure and to
demand greater efficiencies from public sector institutions; and
the replacement of traditional manufacturing industries by the so-called "knowl-
edge processing sector", of which higher education is an integral component.
To these imperatives, many governments have made similar responses, such as:
reductions in public expenditure per head of student population;
increased emphasis on efficiency of resource utilisation;
increased emphasis on performance measurement, particularly in terms of out-
comes;
increased emphasis on demonstrable contribution to the economy of the nation;
and
the strengthening of institutional management and of the policy and planning
role of individual institutions.
The continuing pressures for rapid expansion in student enrolments and for
higher education institutions to serve a greater range of functions increase the need
for higher education systems to improve their capacity for effective planning and for
efficient management of resources, both financial and human. As mentioned above,
concern with higher education reform has become a part of a broader government
agenda of micro-economic reform of the public sector and, similarly, the changes
proposed are framed in the language of "efficiency" and "productivity". This is re-
flected, in many OECD and developing countries alike, in a shift from what have
been termed state control to state supervision models of higher education steering
and co-ordination (Neave & Van Vught, 1994).
One of the major policy challenges for governments in managing their higher
education systems has been how best to obtain the appropriate balance between the
needs of centralised funding, planning, co-ordination and accountability on the one
hand, and the need for institutional autonomy and appropriate discretion in goal set-
ting and management on the other. Since the 1970s two broad policy strategies are
evident in relation to higher education. The first can be characterised as strong gov-
ernment planning and control through the application of "stringent regulations" and
tightened budget allocations. The second policy strategy can be seen more as a
"stepping back" by governments from detailed centralised control through encourag-
ing higher education institutions to be more autonomous, self-regulating and market
oriented in their operations - albeit within an overall framework of government pri-
orities. Self-regulatory higher education systems are considered to be more innova-
tive than those subject to detailed centralised control (Van Vught, 1989).
Throughout the 1990s, not only governments, but higher education policy re-
searchers as well, have been obsessed with the idea of self-regulating - "steering at a
distance" - higher education systems. But it is now becoming apparent that many
60 V.LYNNMEEK

researchers have mistakenly tended to see state control and state steering models as
mutually exclusive. Neave (2001: 13) makes the point that, particularly in Western
Europe, there has been the assumption that "responsibilities relinquished by the state
would straightway be reflected in their assignment to, and their relocation within,
the individual university". Research has tended to assume a polar model of either
state control or institutional self-determination, missing out on all the nuances -
which are often critical - in between. As Neave suggests, "within the mental
boundaries which the "state surveillance" model sets down, there could be no place
for the development of intermediary levels of decision-making save as horrendous
examples of the failure of policy to fall in with the predicted workings of that
model".
Rather than viewing state control and state supervisory models of co-ordination
as mutually exclusive polar opposites, it is better to conceptualise state supervision /
state control in terms of a continuum from the state as provider to the state as con-
sumer of higher education (Williams, 1995). As Richardson et al. (1999) note, the
state as provider fully funds higher education with little regard to the market, while
the state as consumer pays for higher education services alongside many other pub-
lic and private customers, including students, in a competitive market. Where par-
ticular higher education systems may be placed on this continuum varies from
country to country and according to the particular historical period within each
country. Moreover, and contrary to much recent analysis concerning the develop-
ment of higher education, over time a particular higher education system can in
principle move in either direction along this continuum. This point will be discussed
in more detail shortly.
Coupled with a general shift at the national system level, from state control to
state supervisory models of higher education, has been the strengthening of corpo-
rate management models at the institutional level. The two phenomena are directly
interrelated. Under the state supervisory model, a large degree of responsibility and
authority is transferred to institutional management, which is expected to provide
strong and decisive leadership. In some systems, there have been strong expectations
by government that such institutional management should serve the interests of gov-
ernment, particularly with respect to producing higher quality educational output at
lower unit cost. This new control function of management increases the tension be-
tween management on one hand, and rank and file academic staff on the other: in
higher education institutions, traditional academic norms and values concerning con-
trol over working conditions are not easily modified.
The collegial model of academic governance has probably always been a well-
perpetuated myth. Nonetheless, higher education institutions do have their own par-
ticular norms and values that must be taken into account in devising effective co-
ordinating structures and practices. Tension between managerial and collegial ap-
proaches to running the university is widespread, and contributes significantly to
staff alienation - which, in turn, may neatly undermine staff commitment to those
corporate planning processes which the managerial approach is intended to accom-
plish.
 CHANGING PATTERNS OF CO-OROINA TION 61

5. MARKET CO-ORDINATION OF HIGHER EDUCATION

One of the central themes in the recent reforms of the co-ordination of higher educa-
tion is the assumption that higher education is made more effective and cost efficient
in an environment of deregulated state control and enhanced institutional entrepre-
neurship where market relations, consumer control, user-pays and institutional com-
petitiveness help to further innovation, quality and relevance. Both the corporate
management push within higher education institutions and the deregulation of state
control at the system level are driven by a more or less universal trend towards pri-
vatisation / marketisation in higher education.
"Privatisation" (taken here to mean the growth of "privateness" within public
higher education) and market-like relations have risen higher on the higher educa-
tion agenda of many countries, regardless of whether their systems are primarily
public or have dual public and private sectors. Indeed, shifts in public / private rela-
tionships have taken place in many spheres, not only within higher education.
Privatisation is being embraced both as an ideology in its own right and as a re-
action to what is perceived as "public failure". Behind many of the changes in the
relationship between governments and higher educational institutions is the philoso-
phy of "economic rationalism"; this reflects a belief that market forces, rather than
state intervention, will make institutions more cost-effective and better managed, as
well as making higher education systems more fluid and responsive to clients' needs
and demands.
So far, we have described the rise of market co-ordination of higher education in
relation to national governments which have stepped back from direct steering of
their higher education systems. We turn now to a relatively new phenomenon: cross-
national co-ordination of higher education in a free market environment.

5.1. Globalisation of Market Co-ordination

In one sense, higher education has always been an international activity. In the thir-
teenth century, scholars from the most distant parts of Europe migrated to the main
centres of higher learning at Paris, Bologna and Salerno. Later, universities them-
selves migrated to every corner of the globe. But a new phenomenon has emerged
over the last couple of decades whereby the formal regulation and co-ordination of
higher education have begun to pass from the hands of individual nation states to
those of international or supranational agencies. Here there is space to mention only
three aspects of this trend: the creation of international consortia of higher education
institutions; the rise of supranational co-ordination of higher education in Western
Europe; and the globalisation of higher education under international trade liberali-
sation agreements.

5.2. International Higher Education Consortia

Networks of higher education institutions have existed for a long time. Yet until
recent years, they have always had a predominantly academic focus, and have been
run by academics. The type that has emerged much more recently is the strategic
62 V.LYNNMEEK

consortium or alliance, initiated by university executives and run by administrators.

Cases in point are "Universitas 21" and the European Consortium of Innovative
Universities. These consortia are becoming increasingly formalised with the ap-
pointment of executive officers and secretariats, and are forming links internation-
ally as well as domestically. One of the primary reasons for their existence is to take
advantage of global market opportunities in selling higher education products.
Universitas 21, for example, initiated by the Vice-Chancellor of the University of
Melbourne, is a company incorporated in the United Kingdom, with a network of 18
leading research universities in ten countries. It uses its high brand value, based on
the reputations of its member institutions, to market its products; and has recently
formed an agreement with Thomson Learning (a giant international news company)
to develop a global e-university.
It is too early to tell how far initiatives like Universitas 21 will have a global im-
pact on higher education provision, but the potential is quite substantial with the
distance learning market outside of North America estimated to be worth US$15
billion. Since such formalised higher education consortia are a relatively new phe-
nomenon, they have not been the object of concentrated research efforts. But they
are quite interesting from a co-ordination point of view, for they transfer mecha-
nisms of control from the public to the private sector and from nation states to a
much more nebulous international arena. The significance of this transfer is greatly
increased by moves to liberalise trade in educational services globally, as will be
discussed shortly.

5.3. Supranational Co-Ordination of Higher Education

International authorities, such as UNESCO and the World Bank, have for some time
played a role in influencing the structure and character of various national systems
of higher education. But, in recent years, cross-border co-ordination of higher educa-
tion, particularly in Western Europe, has been greatly extended and formalised
through various agreements and legislative initiatives sponsored by the European
Union (EU). Some of the main initiatives in this area include:
COMMETT: Community in Education and Training for Technology.
ERASMUS: European Community Action Scheme for Mobility of University
Students.
LINGUA: promoting foreign language competence.
TEMPUS: promoting the development of higher education systems in central
and eastern Europe.
PETRA: promoting vocational education and training for young people.
SOCRATES II: supporting European co-operation from school to higher educa-
tion. The higher education section of SOCRATES II continues and extends
ERASMUS.
But arguably the most significant initiative reshaping the structure if not the
character of higher education in western Europe in recent years has been the 1999
Bologna Agreement, and subsequent amendments. Basically the agreement imposes
 CHANGING PATIERNS OF CO-ORDINATION 63

a two tier Anglo-Saxon structure of higher education on the whole of the European
Community. The main articles contained in the agreement are as follows:
adoption of a system of easily readable and comparable degrees.
adoption of a system essentially based on two main cycles, undergraduate and
graduate. Access to the second cycle requires successful completion of ftrst cy-
cle studies, which should last a minimum of three years.
establishment of a system of credits as a proper means of promoting the most
widespread student mobility.
promotion of mobility by overcoming obstacles to the effective exercise of free
movement.
promotion of European co-operation in quality assurance with a view to devel-
oping comparable criteria and methodologies.
promotion of the necessary European dimensions in higher education, particu-
larly with regard to curricular development, inter-institutional co-operation, mo-
bility schemes and integrated programs of study, training and research.
The ideas behind many of the EU sponsored initiatives and reforms of higher
education have been the liberalisation of educational services and the free movement
of students between countries, supposedly resulting in a better educated and more
mobile workforce auspiciously placed to deal with the demands of the global knowl-
edge economy. The General Agreement on Trade and Services (GATS) of the World
Trade Organisation (WTO) extends the idea of trade liberalisation in higher educa-
tion globally. Some fear - while others hope - that the WTO will become the ulti-
mate global co-ordinator of higher education.

5.4. Globalisation - General Agreement on Trades and Services

GATS is a multilateral, legally enforceable agreement governing international trade
in services, initially formalised by the Uruguay Round of negotiations by the WTO
member states in 1994. New rounds of negotiation are continuing, though the 1999
Seattle meeting of the WTO failed to reach closure on outstanding issues. Four
modes of supply of services are referred to in the GATS agreement, and each has the
potential for signiftcant impact on current patterns of supply and demand:
"Cross-border supply". Here services flow from the territory of one WTO mem-
ber into the territory of another member, being transmitted via telecommunica-
tions or mail: potential impact on distant learning initiatives.
"Consumption abroad". This refers to situations where a service consumer, or
his or her property, moves into another member's territory to obtain a service:
implications for the international flow of students.
"Commercial presence". A service supplier of one member establishes a territo-
rial presence, including through ownership or lease of premises, in another
member's territory to provide a service: affects overseas facilities, branch cam-
puses and partnerships.
"Movement of natural persons". Persons of one WTO member enter the territory
of another member to supply a service (for example, accountants, doctors or
teachers): affects academic mobility.
64 V.LYNNMEEK

Although all forms and levels of education are listed under chapter 5 of the
GATS classification system, it is mainly higher education and adult education that
are being considered as export commodities. It is also interesting to note that nego-
tiations have almost exclusively involved trade specialists, rather than educational
ones, and have only involved national authorities and no general stakeholders
(European University Association 2001: 4).
As stated above, GATS is a legally enforceable agreement. Any member country
can take a dispute to the WTO, which can compel a country to change its practices,
such as accreditation, to ensure that it does not act to restrict trade. A number of
countries, such as Australia and the United States, are arguing that the GATS provi-
sions should be comprehensive, should achieve higher levels of liberalisation in all
service sectors, and should promote the expansion of market access and the removal
of discriminatory barriers. Individual governments' obligations under GATS include
the following constraints.
No restriction can be imposed on the number of service providers, either through
a quota or an economic means test.
No restriction can apply as to the type of legal entity (e.g. governance structure)
under which a provider may operate.
No limit can be imposed upon the percentage of foreign ownership.
Qualification requirements and procedures, technical standards and licensing
requirements "may not be more burdensome than necessary to ensure quality of
service", and in the case of licensing requirements, "may not in themselves be a
restriction on supply".
Arguably, there may be no restriction on intakes in order to avoid an oversupply
problem (for example, limiting the number of students emolled in medicine).
National subsidies previously confined to domestic public providers must be
made equally available to foreign providers. (NTEU, 2001a: 5 ) ,
Some of the barriers to trade in education which GATS is intended to overcome
are: government monopolies and barriers against the commercial presence of foreign
education providers; government subsidisation of domestic institutions; and differ-
ential treatment of foreign students (Cohen, 2000: 11).

6. THE END OF MARKET IDEOLOGY?

With the collapse of the iron curtain and of the former Soviet Union at the end of the
1980s, the victory of the free market was celebrated almost everywhere. With re-
spect to education, Johnstone (1998: 4) writes that "underlying the market orienta-
tion of tertiary education is the ascendancy, almost world-wide, of market capitalism
and the principles of neo-liberal economics". But the end of the 1990s and the be-
ginning of the new millennium are witness to a growing, and sometimes violent,
protest against the further ascendancy and globalisation of the market. These pro-
tests, such as those in Seattle in 1999, and later in Geneva and Melbourne, are di-
rected at the spread of the global market economy in general and at such programs
as GATS in particular. It is not the place here to argue the rights and wrongs of these
protests, but merely to point to them as at least partial evidence that world domina-
 CHANGING PATTERNS OF CO-OR DINA TION 65

tion by market capitalism and the principles of neo-liberal economics may not be as
inevitable as some have assumed.
There is limited evidence that, at least in some places, the tide is turning against
the market as the ideal mechanism for the co-ordination of higher education. On 28
September 2001, for example, a number of leading higher education bodies around
the world issued a Joint Declaration on Higher Education and the General Agree-
ment on Trade and Services. Signatories to the Declaration are the Association of
Universities and Colleges of Canada; the American Council on Education; the Euro-
pean University Association; and the Council for Higher Education Accreditation
(USA). The Declaration (2001) stated that obstacles to international trade in higher
education should be negotiated under conventions other than trade policy regimes
and that the associations' rt<spective countries
should not make commitments in Higher Education Services or in the related categories
... in the context of the GATS. Where such commitments have already been made in
1995. no further ones should be forthcoming.

The following were some of the principles underlying the Declaration.

Higher education exists to serve the public interest and is not a "commodity".
The authority to regulate higher education must remain in the hands of compe-
tent bodies as designated by any given country.
Education exports must complement, not undermine, the efforts of developing
countries.
The internationalisation of higher education is integral to the quality and rele-
vance of the academic endeavour.
Quality is a key objective both for domestic provision and for international edu-
cation exports, irrespective of the mode of delivery.
International co-operation in higher education must operate under a rules-based
regime.
Higher education differs significantly from other service sectors.
Public and private higher education systems are intertwined and interdependent.
Caution must be exercised.
Transparency to affected stakeholders, and open consultation with them, are im-
perative.
In other ways too there has been international and national questioning of
whether the market will achieve for higher education all that is expected of it. The
Universitas 21 initiative, for example, has not been all "smooth sailing", attracting
criticism from both students and academic staff. Academic union leaders in Austra-
lia, Britain, America, Canada and New Zealand (countries containing Universitas 21
member institutions) wrote to the organisation's chairman calling for a moratorium
on plans to develop online courses in conjunction with Thomson Learning, arguing
that "core academic tasks should remain with the faculty, not be given over to the
control of a for-profit education company" (Maslen, 2001: 1). The Universitas 21
Students' Network has also questioned the direction in which the consortium is de-
veloping. noting that "students are without any official representation within the
governance of either the corporate or academic structures of U21" (NTEU, 2001b).
66 V.LYNNMEEK

The University of Toronto has withdrawn from the consortium "to protect the value
of its degrees and to avoid fettering any future online initiatives of its own" (the
Node, 2(01).
The ways in which market relations are being employed in higher education ap-
pear somewhat contradictory. For example, there is research evidence to suggest that
the achievement of certain key policy objectives, such as diversity of higher educa-
tion institutions and programs, cannot be left solely to the market (Meek et aI.,
1996). Market forces and competition may create an environment that is "more
completely homogeneous than state administration (whose control is never as com-
plete) can ever be" (Margins on, 1993: 245). It has also been argued that market
forces may be more of a threat to academic freedom than government policy and co-
ordination ever was (Meek, 2000). The Australian higher education system is a good
example of the harm that can be done when policy and funding are controlled pri-
marily through market competition.
Arguably, higher education reform in Australia has shifted its system further in
the direction of market co-ordination than in many other countries. From a system
totally dominated by government funding only a couple of decades ago, Australia
has now become one of the world's leaders in the proportion of higher education
funding coming from non-government sources: presently, a number of institutions
receive over half their operating revenue from non-government sources, and on av-
erage, about a third of university revenue is from earned income. Australia has be-
come a major world player in terms of the recruitment of full-fee paying overseas
students, and tuition fees for domestic students are amongst the highest in the world
for a public higher education system. Thus financially, Australian higher education
has moved from being a publicly supported to a publicly subsidised system. At the
same time, it is a system experiencing extreme financial hardship, and a deteriora-
tion in teaching and research infrastructure - to the extent that bodies such as the
Australian Vice-Chancellors' Committee (AVCC) are arguing that the sector is
achieving a level of mediocrity from which it may never recover (AVCC, 2001).
A recent Senate inquiry into the capacity of public universities to meet Austra-
lia's higher education needs reported at the end of September 2001. The report, enti-
tled Universities in Crisis (2001: xxiii), argued that:
... many of the problems and pressures that universities are experiencing are symptoms
of the Government's inadequate funding and the parlous state of many universities' fi-
nances. The crude funding cuts to universities, supposedly in an effort to make them
more efficient, have continued to the point where they are causing long-term damage to
the fabric of the higher education sector.

Australia is probably approaching the limit to which government can abrogate its
responsibility for funding public higher education. The Senate inquiry also indicated
that it appears that government steering is reaching the extreme position of "leave it
to the market" even for basic decisions concerning the future direction of the sector.
Moreover, it is an "excessively short-term market orientation, [with] over-concent-
ration on teaching and research programs of private benefit, at the expense of
longer-term national needs" (Universities in Crisis, 2001). The inquiry also stated
that:
 CHANGING PAITERNS OF CO-ORDINATION 67

changes to the funding arrangements for higher education and the development of a
marketised higher education sector have taken place without any assessment of the im-
plications for universities' capacity to meet the nation's higher education needs (2001:
13).

New Zealand's higher education system, too, is often mentioned as a paragon of

market co-ordination. But a newly elected Labour government seems less taken with
the virtues of the market than its predecessors. The new Associate Education Minis-
ter is reported as stating that New Zealand higher education has:
... now had nine years of hands off the steering wheel from the government that's been
in power, and what is wanted is more leadership. Government's role is to now provide
that leadership ... we need to roll out concrete policies which will change the direction
of the tertiary sector ... (Scenario, 2000: 1).

It seems that the new Minister has proclaimed "the market model for tertiary
education 'dead"', and has proposed or enacted the following measures to ensure its
demise:
Formation of a new Tertiary Education Advisory Commission (TEAC) to re-
establish governmental guidance in the sector
Progressive reductions in tuition fees and increases in per-capita government
funding
Review of the per-student funding formula, to ensure consistency in the govern-
ment's education and research policy objectives and the "operational outcomes
of the funding system"
New funding for research based on academic specialisms identified from within
the institutions
Development of funding models based on negotiations between government and
institutions
A limit on the number of new universities
An end to work with private providers
Reduced quality compliance requirements for providers with demonstrated per-
formance (Scenario, 2000: 3)
It is also interesting that New Zealand has re-introduced a "buffer body" in the
form of the TEAC. Whether TEAC will operate in terms of the ideal characteristics
of intermediary bodies as outlined above remains to be seen. Nonetheless, it does
appear that New Zealand is intent upon shifting the balance between state regulation
and the free market back towards the state. In part, this appears to be a rational re-
sponse to a degree of market failure brought about by a steep escalation of student
tuition fees and a corresponding decline in student demand, resulting in increasing
financial hardship for individual institutions. The report of the Senate inquiry in
Australia has also called for the re-introduction of some form of independent body,
standing between the institutions and government, to advise on higher education
policy. But no action has yet been taken on this recommendation.
68 V.LYNNMEEK

7. CONCLUSION

Over the last two or three decades the balance between regulation and competition in
higher education has shifted dramatically in favour of competition. This is despite
the fact that the ideal of totally free markets, unfettered by state intervention, is not
achievable in real life.
The market ideal of entrepreneurship and economic freedom - whereby competi-
tion would maximise economic growth unfettered by state regulation - is a theoreti-
cal construct rather than an approximation to actual patterns of economic activity.
Markets can be neither created nor maintained in the absence of regulatory frame-
works, including legal underpinning for property transactions, finance and credit and
access to the factors of production. State regulation is also necessary for a range of
economic-related undertakings including international movements of commodities,
money and immigrants; the provision of economic and social infrastructure; educa-
tion and vocational training; economic stabilisation through fiscal and monetary
policy; and public health care and welfare services (Head, 1991: 2). Groenewegen
(1991: 15) maintains that:
although the benefits of competition are undoubtedly substantial. they are neither as
universal nor as easily repeated as many economists have supposed, at least in so far as
the 'real world' is concerned.

He goes on to state that:

... given the very explicit connection so often drawn between deregulation and competi-
tion, these limitations of competitive practice should be emphasised. Such warnings are
all the more necessary in the well-nigh universal homage paid to unrestrained market
forces and widespread competition because of the benefits they allegedly can convey ...
First of all, the degree of generality attributable to the links between efficiency and
competition needs very careful scrutiny. Secondly, the ease by which competition can
be generated and the signs by which it is recognisable have been subject to rather ex-
travagant claims ... Finally, it should be more generally realised that competition, in the
special sense in which economists use the word, has often little specific relevance to
certain activities (for that reason often appropriately carried out within the public sector)
to which the microeconomic young Turks wish to apply their much beloved, but often
ill-founded, free market principles. Like the road to hell, the path to competition as a
method of deregulation is often paved with good intentions, but unsubstantiated and
hence wishful thinking.

A distinction should be drawn between the market as a specific, concrete set of

exchange relationships having predictable outcomes, and the market as an ideologi-
cally constructed "black box" that is presumed to produce the desirable outcomes
and effects. Even in the economic literature, there is a good deal of debate about
what is a market (Rosenbaum, 2000) and the primacy of the market versus organisa-
tion as the co-ordinating mechanism of human activity (Simon, 2000). And, in prac-
tice, there is not a one size fits all market, particularly in the public sector:
... a market does not automatically work as it is supposed to. 'Leave it to the market' is
usually bad advice. With an ordinary private-sector market, the rules and procedures
that govern it have evolved over years of trial and error. A public-sector market, by con-
trast, is judged by how well it works from its inception. Its rules and procedures there-
fore must be exhaustively thought through in advance. For a market to deliver on its
public-policy promise, the government must design it skilfully (McMillan, 2001: 2).
 CHANGING PATIERNS OF CO-ORDINATION 69

McMillan also makes the point that markets are limited and
'" can provide only part of the solution to a public problem.... Regulation continues to
be needed; the role of the market is to help the regulators do their job more efficiently
... very reasons why particular activities have been placed in the public sector - natural
monopoly, externalities, common property - make implementing markets for them dif-
ficult.

Moreover, Simon (2000: 753) maintains that research

... shows that, on average, profit-making and governmental organisations that produce
the same products, both operating in markets, attain about the same levels of efficiency
- the profit motive appears to give no visible competitive edge to private business.

It is thus curious indeed that so much emphasis in public higher education is be-
ing placed on markets, competition and entrepreneurship.
In conclusion, therefore, whether higher education should be co-ordinated by
government regulation or by the market is not an "either/or" choice. Clearly, the
overly cumbersome bureaucratic controls of higher education that existed in many
countries in the 1970s and 1980s required reform. Market co-ordination was intro-
duced to help counter failure in public policy. But we now see market failure with
respect to achieving the goals and aims of higher education in many countries, and
this in turn is being countered through government intervention. Hopefully, this is
not merely a pendulum effect, a swing back and forth over time between govern-
ment regulation and the market. Rather, it can be hoped that tension between market
and regulation, with neither achieving a permanent ascendancy, is to the long-term
benefit of the co-ordination of higher education. Whether this is actually the case is,
of course, an empirical question. But it is a question that might form a more produc-
tive research agenda on modes of co-ordination than one that assumes from the out-
set that the market inevitably fills the void created by the progressive and permanent
withdrawal of the state from the control of higher education.
Market competition and centralised bureaucratic control should not be regarded
as mutually exclusive, but as opposite ends of a continuum of higher education co-
ordination. As argued above, where a particular system is placed on this continuum
depends on a variety of social and economic circumstances and may vary with time.
Little else can be said with any certainty about such a complex phenomenon as the
co-ordination of higher education, except to insist upon the rejection of a linear
model of change and historical transformation when assessing the relationship be-
tween higher education and the state.

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 JOHN BRENNAN

TRANSFORMATION OR REPRODUCTION?
Contradictions in the Social Role of the Contemporary University

1. INTRODUCTION

The promise of social and economic benefit, for individuals and crucially for socie-
ties, provides the main justification for increased investment in higher education in
both developed and developing countries. Confidence in human capital theory con-
tinues to underpin the belief in economic benefit from higher education investment.
In addition much recent writing on the rise of "knowledge economies" assigns an
important role to higher education institutions. Higher education is also regarded as
having the potential for contributing to other political and social changes through its
support and underpinning for the institutions of civil society. This latter role is par-
ticularly important in some developing countries. Thus, higher education appears to
playa central role in supporting both advanced forms of capitalism and new forms
of democratic citizenship. From these perspectives, it may reasonably claim to be
about nothing less than the transformation of society.
Yet alongside these two major aspects of the social role of universities is a third
which sees higher education's contribution to social change and development in a
somewhat different light. In many countries, the role that universities play in the
reproduction of social elites is acknowledged, with either embarrassment or celebra-
tion according to the politics of the time. More generally, it is possible to find pow-
erful arguments for a theory of higher education which defines its social role as
reproduction and its individual role as status confirmation. From this kind of theo-
retical position, unequal access is not some unfortunate defect in the higher educa-
tion system but precisely what one would expect to find.
This chapter will argue that both transformation and reproduction are inherent in
higher education's relationship to society. It will discuss how questions of reproduc-
tion and transformation are necessarily present in debates about access, about cur-
riculum and about labour market linkages. It will argue that both aspects of higher
education's role tend to be present in most higher education systems, indeed in most
institutions of higher education.

2. CONTEXTS
Throughout most of their histories, universities have entered into intimate relation-
ships with other social institutions, sometimes supportive, sometimes critical. In the
modern world, calls for universities to adapt and to respond to the changing charac-

73
1. Enders and O. Fulton (eds.). Higher Education in a Globalising World. 73-86.
© 2002 Kluwer Acruipm;r· Puhl;.,hPrs
74 JOHN BRENNAN

ter and needs of other social and economic institutions are frequently heard. Today's
universities are expected to be useful. But useful to whom? Useful to what end?
Much is being written about the transformation of modern society. For example,
Kumar has observed:
Wc are faced. at the end of the twentieth century with a series of pronouncements and
declarations that, taken either singly or together, amount to the claim that the western
world is undergoing one of the most profound transformations of its existence.
(Kumar, 1995: 152).

And if this claim has any validity for the western world, how much more valid
would it appear to be for parts of the world that have fundamentally changed the
natures of their social and political systems, as for example in central and eastern
Europe or in South Africa.
The characteristics of the new kind of modern society are variously described.
For Kumar, "fragmentation", "pluralism" and "individualism" are key features. Oth-
ers have referred to the "information society", to the "knowledge society", to "post-
industrialism", "post-Fordism" and "post-modernity". The importance of "globalisa-
tion", of "ref1exivity", of "new technologies" are stressed. It is not the purpose of
this chapter to explore these claims for the arrival of a new kind of society, nor to
consider rival contentions that we are rather entering a new stage of capitalism, a
stage which sees its defining imperatives of "profit, power and control" ever ex-
tended, both geographically and into new spheres of social life (e.g. Bauman, 1998).
Rather, the general contention that we are living in a period of radical social change
will be taken as a starting point for considering the role of universities in social
change. For our purposes, it is not important whether we are seeing the emergence
of a new kind of society or rather of a new stage of capitalism.
In considering the kinds of claims that have been made for the role of universi-
ties in processes of social change and transformation, I shall suggest a number of
key clements which need to be investigated empirically in order to arrive at an as-
sessment of the validity of these claims. Part of the argument of the chapter will be
that much of the debate about the role of universities, in both policy and theoretical
terms, lacks adequate reference to sound empirical knowledge of what is happening
to universities and to the people who pass through them.
The examination of the role of universities in social transformation can be con-
ducted at various levels. At a global level, the imperatives of the so-called knowl-
edge economy imply a role which is increasingly linked to the needs of economic
institutions, which supports and encourages labour mobility, and which seeks the
maximum equivalence between the knowledge and credentials which are generated
by individual higher education institutions, wherever they are located.
At a national level, higher education can face challenges arising out of social, po-
litical and economic changes taking place within the society. Radical examples of
the latter include post-apartheid South Africa and post-communist central and east-
ern Europe. It should not, however, he assumed that radical national changes will
produce equally radical responses from universities. It is already clear that the initial
response of universities in central and eastern Europe to the social and political
changes occurring within their countries was largely to turn their backs on them (e.g.
 TRANSFORMATION OR REPRODUCTION? 75

Scott, 2000; Dahrendorf, 2000; Darvas, 1999), to protect their newly won autono-
mies and to promote their own interests. In South Africa, however, universities have
been heavily engaged with the social reconstruction agenda. This has required them
to address fundamental questions of access, curriculum and institutional diversity
(Gourley, 1999; NCHE, 1996). This is not of course to say that the national policies
and institutional strategies in these two parts of the world have necessarily achieved
their intended effects. J
At a third level, universities might playa part in social change and transforma-
tion within particular geographical regions, either within a nation state or across
national borders. Within Europe there are several associations of universities which
aim to support the development of regions that cut across national boundaries, e.g.
the Association of Danube Universities. Within a nation state, the potential regional
role of the university in economic and social transformation is symbolically under-
scored by the example in the north east of England of the construction of a new
campus for the University of Sunderland on the disused site of the town's former
shipyard: the knowledge economy literally replacing the industrial economy.
Any number of questions could be asked about the roles which universities, and
other higher education institutions, play in processes of social change and transfor-
mation. What roles do universities play in initiating change, whether economic or
political, social or cultural? What roles do they play in relation to social changes
which are already under way, however initiated? Do universities tend to support the
status quo, preserve existing social hierarchies, protect traditional values? Or do they
provide an arena in which existing values and hierarchies are challenged and
changed? And whatever role is played, who initiates it? The state? The university
leadership? The wider academic community? The students? And does the university
have any choice? To block? To subvert? To ignore?
These are large questions. The modest aim of this chapter is to indicate some of
the mechanisms through which universities contribute, positively or negatively, to
processes of social change and transformation and to provide one example of an area
of empirical work which can provide some illumination of the nature of the roles
played by universities.

3. TRANSFORMATION OR REPRODUCTION?

Social transformation lies at the radical end of conceptions of social change. It im-
plies at the very least some fundamental changes in society'S core institutions, the
polity and the economy, with major implications for relationships between social
groups or classes, and for the means of the creation and distribution of wealth, status
and power.
For Anthony Giddens, an important characteristic of modern society is the posi-
tion of the "expert" and the role of "expert knowledge". Thus,
decisions ... [are] ... enacted on the basis of claims to expert knowledge of one kind or
another. Who takes these decisions, and how. is fundamentally a matter of power (Gid-
dens, 1994: 76).
76 JOHN BRENNAN

The equation of knowledge with power is not of course new. What is important
is what "counts" as knowledge, what is its source and who has access to it. Giddens
writes:
An expert is any individual who can successfully lay claim to either specific skills or
types of knowledge which the layperson does not possess (Giddens, 1994: 84).

But what constitutes a "successful claim"? The answer is increasingly given in

terms of possession of a certificate or a diploma. Claims based on status and social
position are no longer valid. Competence as measured by educational credentials is
the only legitimate basis of expertise, of knowledge and hence of power. Does this
then imply a central role for higher education institutions as dispensers of both
knowledge and credentials? And does this imply a linked role in the distribution of
wealth, status and power in society?
Universities have frequently been regarded as key institutions in processes of so-
cial change and development. The most explicit and commonly expressed role they
have been allocated is the production of highly skilled labour and research output to
meet perceived economic needs. But during periods of social transformation - which
may certainly have at their heart far-reaching changes in the economy - universities
may playa no less important role in helping to build new institutions of civil society,
in encouraging and facilitating new cultural values, and in training and socialising
members of new social elites.
Concerns about extending access and widening participation in higher education
take their force from the above two roles. Extending access is important to achieving
efficiency - providing people with the knowledge and skills needed by "knowledge
economies" - and widening participation is important to achieving fairness - provid-
ing equality of opportunity.
Much has been claimed for universities, in the modernisation and reconstruction
of contemporary societies, by a wide range of national and international reports (e.g.
Task Force on Higher Education and Society, 2000; Association of European Uni-
versities, 1998; OECD, 1999; Currie and Subotzky, 2000; Hopper and O'Rourke,
2000). Most have given primary emphasis to the economic contribution, both
through the formation of human resources and through the generation of new
knowledge, each of them essential to national and enterprise competitiveness in the
global economy. At the same time, a more liberalising and social role has been
claimed by social and educational theorists.
In a recent book, Allman (1999) has argued for the importance of a critical edu-
cational praxis as a precursor of social transformation. But is this what higher educa-
tion really produces, at least to any great extent? Delanty has written:
The university no longer merely reflects the social transformations of modernity, but is
itself now a major site in which different social projects are articulated (Delanty, 2001:
\58).

But which projects and in whose interests? Barnett has argued that the university
can help us all live in an age of "supercomplexity" (Barnett, 2000). But where is the
evidence that it actually does help us in this way?
 TRANSFORMATION OR REPRODUCTION? 77

Proponents of the more liberal view of the university's role, it must be noted,
almost universally speak from within the university community. The economic view
is the one generally emphasised by national governments and international bodies,
and it is also a view that is frequently endorsed by university leaders, fearful for
their budgets.
There is no shortage of heroic claims about the role of universities in modern so-
ciety. Yet analyses of what the university actually delivers are often somewhat more
pessimistic. This is true both of the economically-driven visions, which tend to be
coupled with criticisms of universities for producing the wrong kinds of graduates
with the wrong kinds of skills, and of the more liberal or romantic visions which
tend to see instrumentalism and academic capitalism where liberation and critical
thinking should be (e.g. Slaughter & Leslie, 1998).
There has, of course, been plenty of theorising about higher education which
casts the university in a less than heroic role. From Marxist analyses such as Bowles
and Gintis's work in the 1970s which saw higher education as maintaining the capi-
talist status quo (Bowles & Gintis, 1976) to recent' studies which have analysed
higher education's role in the reproduction of social elites (Bourdieu, 1996; Brown
& Scase, 1994), there has been a continuous thread of analysis which has empha-
sised higher education's contribution to society as primarily one of social reproduc-
tion rather than social transformation. Teichler has emphasised the distinction
between educational and social inequalities, writing in 1980 that "social inequality
has been largely preserved despite reduction in inequality of educational opportu-
nity" (Teichler et aI., 1980: 134). Over twenty years ago, Teichler concluded that
social inequality and its legitimisation through the existence of a "moderate educa-
tional meritocracy" were deeply rooted in industrial society. But that was then and,
as we have already noted, both higher education and society have changed substan-
tially over the last two decades.
One way of resolving these apparent contradictions is to acknowledge that uni-
versities play multiple roles, both reproductive and transformative. Within individ-
ual institutions, even within individual academic departments, the roles played may
be not only mUltiple but contradictory. At system level, differentiation has become a
key characteristic: non-university sectors, distance universities and private universi-
ties exist alongside traditional state universities in many countries, each type playing
distinctive roles. Martin Trow's well known distinction between elite and mass
higher education (Trow, 1974) originally saw these states as sequential. But it is also
possible to see them as parallel and performing different roles - elite and mass
higher education existing side by side in the same society. A recent study has de-
scribed how institutional differentiation in the United Kingdom has enabled elite
functions to be protected within a mass higher education system (Egerton, 200la).
As several writers have noted, obtaining a degree is no longer enough to obtain a
high economic and social position: it must be the right kind of degree from the right
kind of institution, and preferably accompanied by the right kinds of social and cul-
tural capital (e.g. Teichler et aI., 1980; Brown & Scase, 1994).
78 JOHN BRENNAN

4. CONTRADICTORY ROLES

Consideration of the role of universities in social change and transformation raises

questions of who, of what and of where. Who gets higher education (the access
question)? What do they get (the curriculum question)? And where does it lead them
(which is frequently seen as a labour market question but is also a political and
status question - more generally, a placement question)? To these three questions
should be added the question of research and the balance to be struck between in-
trinsic and extrinsic drivers of its development.
The access question is fundamental. If educational credentials represent the key
legitimate route to adult roles and social status in modem society, then the question
of who has access to them is a central one to an understanding of such societies.
Nowhere is access to education equal. Whether advantage is based on membership
of the nomenclatura, an ethnic group or a social class, some social groups are more
likely to participate in higher education than others. Social transformation can come
about if the "disadvantage gap" between social groups is lessened or if the histori-
cally advantaged group is replaced by a new group. Similarly, resistance to trans-
formation might be demonstrated by a university's non-engagement with this
question, and a student profile reflecting historic structures and inequalities.
The curriculum question is related to the question of research. The relationship
between the two is often seen to be central to the inner workings of higher education
institutions. Of central interest, therefore, are questions of what gets taught and re-
searched. The role of universities in labelling particular aspects of knowledge as valu-
able enough to be investigated, passed on to others, and preserved for future ge-
nerations may be at the heart of questions about the impact of universities. Certainly,
it has profound implications for the contribution of universities to social change.
It is tempting to see the curriculum question as a debate between critical thinking
and competency (see Barnett's work - e.g. 1994, 1997 - among others), or as a
choice between liberal education and vocational training. But this is of course a false
dichotomy, as many courses of study have long claimed to achieve both (Silver &
Brennan, 1988; Boys et aI., 1988, among many others). But we do know from a va-
riety of studies that different academic subjects and forms of curriculum organisa-
tion produce different kinds of people (Becher, 1989; Pascarella & Terenzini, 1991).
If academic disciplines are essentially "ways of life" involving distinguishable world
views and values (Maassen, 1996), then curriculum questions become essentially
questions of the kinds of people educational institutions produce - and, it could be
argued, need to produce, in order to meet a variety of cultural, economic, political
and social needs. And the curriculum question is of course related to the access
question. Access to some forms of knowledge and credentials may be very restricted
even in mass participation higher education systems.
The placement question is central to the long-term impact of higher education.
Placement of graduates in "top" labour market and political positions provides the
opportunity for the values and world views of these people (formed out of an inter-
action of social origins and socialisation) to have a powerful effect on the future
direction of the society. Depending on the characteristics of the graduates, the econ-
omy may be more efficient, the state may be more benevolent, the culture more rich
 TRANSFORMATION OR REPRODUCTION? 79

and so on. Or at least that is the claim. Of course, some graduates may not occupy
"top" labour market or political positions. Again, depending on the characteristics of
the graduates, they may be frustrated or content with this situation. Depending on
the circumstances and context of their society, they may form a source of opposition
and dissent.
A final role for universities might be added to the above list. It is the role of the
university in providing "protected space" - intellectual, temporal, physical and po-
litical - to allow people, individually and collectively, to think the unthinkable, to
push the limits of the possible, to reflect and re-assess. Not quite an "ivory tower"
perhaps, but a safe environment set apart from the interests, orthodoxies and pres-
sures of the day.
The above roles are performed by universities in different ways in different
places and at different times - and with different consequences. Understanding
whose interests are served by decisions made by, or imposed on, higher education
institutions with regard to access, curriculum and research is critical to exploring the
roles universities play in social change and transformation. Understanding how deci-
sions are made, who funds what aspect of an institution's work, and who benefits -
and who loses - in these arrangements, are questions that, if explored properly, will
provide some illumination of the role of universities in social transformation.
It is Ij.lso important to distinguish between examples where the role of universi-
ties is largely autonomous and examples where the role is set firmly within state
plans and control mechanisms. It is important to distinguish between examples
where universities playa role in "igniting" change, examples where the role is one
of "accelerating" existing change processes and examples where the role is more
about the "blocking" of change. It is important to distinguish between examples of
planned and intended changes and examples of changes which are the unintended
consequences of university-based activities.
Much of the recent literature on the roles played by universities in processes of
transformation and modernisation has tended to be normative: focusing on what
universities ought to be doing, on what is planned for them to be doing. The hopes
and aspirations of politicians and policy strategies are assumed to be achievable re-
alities; as indeed are the alternative visions of radical educationalists.
Below we attempt to consider how we might address the empirical question of
the role which universities currently play in social reproduction and social transfor-
mation. We do so in respect of a single country and with regard to two of the ques-
tions raised above, namely who gets higher education, and where does it lead them?

5. ACCESS TO WHAT?
A recent study in the UK examined the contribution which universities in the north
east of England were making to the regional economy and to social equity (Belt et
aI., 2001). The north east is an area of relatively high unemployment. Traditional
industries of shipbuilding and coalmining are largely gone, although the cultural
traditions they supported are still important. The region's five universities see them-
selves as playing an important regional role in transforming both the economic pros-
80 JOHN BRENNAN

pects of the area and the opportunities of the people who live there. The study by
Belt et al looked at the social composition of the students attending the universities
of the region and at their employment histories after graduating.
Perhaps it is no surprise to record that the students from more middle-class back-
grounds tended to go on after they had graduated to get better jobs than their work-
ing-class counterparts. But what should also be noted is that the middle class
students tended to come to study in the north east from outside the region and, when
their studies were over, they left the region. The working class students were gener-
ally local and they remained in the north east after their graduation. The jobs they
acquired tended to be of low quality. Thus, in this example higher education appears
to have both confirmed the generally low socio-economic position of the local stu-
dents in the region and contributed relatively little to the regional economy.
In an earlier UK study of higher education and employment, Brown and Scase
(1994) concluded that the role played by higher education was essentially one of
"status confirmation" of middle class social positions. Essentially their study was
about the reproduction of elites. The more recent north east study suggests a wider
applicability of the status confirmation concept, to apply also to lower socio-
economic positions. The north east universities seemed simultaneously to be helping
to confirm both the middle class status of the students from outside the region and
the working class status of the students from within the region.
What further evidence can we find in support of the status confirmation thesis of
the employment advantages of graduates? Taking a national perspective on higher
education in the United Kingdom as a whole, a modified picture emerges.
Support can be found for the thesis at a very general level in the social composi-
tion of higher education students in the UK. Although participation has been ex-
tended substantially during the last decade, children from middle class backgrounds
remain far more likely to find their way into higher education than their working
class counterparts. Recent reports by Connor and Dewson (2001) and Forsyth and
Furlong (200 I) show that while 45% of young people from higher social class
groups (llIn, II and I) enter higher education, the figure for lower social class groups
(I1Im, IV and V) is under 20%. There is thus some support for the view that the edu-
cation system assists the middle classes to reproduce themselves, although it must
also be pointed out that a large number of middle class children do not end up in
higher education, and a substantial number of working class children do.
If we turn to higher education students themselves, going to university means,
for the majority, the eventual acquisition of a good job (Elias et aI., 1999, Brennan et
aI., 200 I). For students from middle class backgrounds, this can reasonably be de-
scribed in terms of social reproduction or status confirmation. But graduates from
working class backgrounds get good jobs as well. As part of a recent European study
of graduate employment led by Ulrich Teichler at the University of Kassel, and in-
volving research groups from 12 countries, over 4000 UK graduates returned de-
tailed questionnaires concerning their labour market experiences during the three to
four years after their graduation. The results of this study indicate that while the
quality of the job obtained after graduating is related to the social background of the
student, it is a very imperfect relationship and is much influenced by factors such as
subject of study, gender and institution attended (see tahle 1).
 TRANSFORMATION OR REPRODUCTION? 81

Table 1. In "graduate job " after three years (percent) (UK graduatesfrom 1995 cohort,
N=4,340).

Male Female
Working class 72.9 64.6
Middle class 75.4 68.7
"Old" university 76.9 69.0
"New" university 74.7 66.7
Colleges 69.4 66.8
Vocational arts/social sciences 75.0 80.6
Vocational sciences 82.4 64.4
Non-vocational arts/social sciences 66.2 58.4
Non-vocational sciences 72.9 77.4

Students from middle class backgrounds do have advantages in the labour mar-
ket. They get paid better, are more likely to be in jobs which require a degree, more
likely to use their degree knowledge in their work and more optimistic about their
future employment prospects. The analysis of UK data from the European study also
shows that such students are more likely to use their social networks to gain em-
ployment. It shows too that use of social networks by middle class graduates is asso-
ciated with getting a better than average job, whereas use of social networks by
graduates from working class backgrounds is associated with getting a worse than
average job. In other words, middle class students possess additional resources
which, when taken in combination with their degree certificates, work to add labour
market value to the credential (Blasko et aI., forthcoming).
Graduates from working class backgrounds fare best in the labour market when
they take more vocational or technical courses. Many of them do indeed take such
courses and several studies have pointed to the greater instrumentality of students
from lower socio-economic groups (Connor & Dewson, 2001). They are also more
likely to take them at "new" universities or colleges. Where the subject studied is
less important in employment while factors such as "personality" and the prestige of
the institution attended matter more, working class students are at a much greater
disadvantage. Thus, the largest effect of social class on graduate employment is
found among graduates from non-vocational arts courses at "new" universities
(Blasko et aI., forthcoming).
What can we conclude from all this? There is certainly evidence from the data
for the social reproduction function of higher education. Students from more advan-
taged social backgrounds maintain those advantages by acquiring educational cre-
dentials which have high value in the labour market, and in society more generally.
But there is also evidence of higher education providing upward mobility for large
numbers of students from lower socio-economic backgrounds. Such students mainly
obtain good jobs and enjoy a clear labour market advantage over non-graduates.
They do so in part by taking more vocational courses, and by entering those parts of
the labour market where educational credentials hold greater sway. Lacking other
forms of social and cultural capital (cf. Bourdieu & Passeron, 1977; Bourdieu,
82 JOHN BRENNAN

1996), they are more dependent on their educational capital for success in the labour
market. However, the assignment of lower status to the institutions through which
this mobility is channelled ensures that the status confirmation function of elite insti-
tutions is preserved. As Egerton has remarked in a recent paper,
"gains in participation by disadvantaged groups lead to strategies .... on the part of the
advantaged which exclude or diminish their achievements" (Egerton, 2001 b: 283).

In other words, special advantage is reserved for graduates from the types of
higher education (institutions and fields of study) which remain dominated by stu-
dents from already socially advantaged groups.
If we return to the larger questions of who gets higher education, and what hap-
pens to them and society as a result, we find evidence that processes of social repro-
duction and transformation are taking place simultaneously. Middle class students
are using higher education to maintain (and perhaps to legitimise) their class posi-
tion. But at the same time, students from lower socio-economic backgrounds are
using higher education to achieve upward social mobility. The social consequences
can be seen in the employment sphere, for example where the nature of jobs changes
to accommodate the enhanced knowledge and skills possessed by graduates entering
traditionally non-graduate fields (e.g. Mason, 2001); they can also be expected to be
seen in cultural, social and political spheres, as many studies have indicated the im-
pact of attending higher education on these dimensions (e.g. Pascarella & Terenzini,
1991).
If we look more closely, we see that different things are going on in different
parts of the higher education system. As we have noted, in the United Kingdom,
students from lower socio-economic backgrounds are more likely to attend the so-
called "new" universities (former polytechnics) and to take more vocational courses.
The life chances of many such students are indeed likely to be "transformed" by
their experiences in higher education but they will still not be as good as those of
students from higher socio-economic backgrounds who attend elite "old" universi-
ties. For the latter, status has been confirmed; social hierarchy has been reproduced.
This UK example appears to show a massively expanded higher education sys-
tem meeting economic requirements for a large graduate labour force, but doing so
in ways which do nothing to threaten the reproduction of social advantage and exist-
ing social hierarchies. It is contributing to wealth creation, but not to its redistribu-
tion; to efficiency, but not to fairness.

6. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION

The United Kingdom is a socially stable society. To the extent that it is undergoing
transformation, it is reflecting the kinds of global changes which we referred to ear-
lier. In part, these have involved the massive expansion of higher education and the
provision of new opportunities for upward social mobility for large numbers in the
society. But such "transformative" processes have probably done little to disturb
more longstanding processes of elite reproduction. Indeed, the same global changes
have made the latter more important. In the knowledge economy, it becomes crucial
for members of advantaged socio-economic groups to ensure that their children re-
 TRANSFORMATION OR REPRODUCTION? 83

ceive an elite education, because reproduction of their advantages will depend on

education to a greater extent than ever before.
Globalisation notwithstanding, national transformations are occurring in many
parts of the world as "old regimes" are replaced, along with the ideologies that sup-
ported them. Ask about some of the above issues in South Africa, for example, and
one finds the higher education community engaged in a radical exercise to widen
access and participation (Gourley, 1999). Historically "white" universities have long
since opened their doors to other races. These were and remain the elite institutions,
and their appropriation of the "best" staff and students from the historically "black"
institutions impoverishes the latter and those who remain in them. And although the
historically black institutions have, in their turn, opened their doors to white stu-
dents, few have walked through them. Thus, while not denying an important role for
higher education in the transformation of South African society, we should also be
alert to the probable existence of a continuing role in the reproduction of advantage,
for both whites and blacks.
Ask about some of the above issues in central and eastern Europe, and the re-
sponse is likely to be largely one of silence. After decades of centrally-regulated
state planning, whereby higher education's goals were set by the party and the state,
the main concern in recent years has been the recovery and protection of autonomy
(Scott et aI., 2000). New laws have been passed which attempt some degree of trans-
fer of authority from national governments to individual higher education institu-
tions. But this transfer has not, for the most part, been accompanied by any clear
articulation of the role to be played by higher education in the social, economic and
political transformations taking place, with varying degrees of urgency, within these
societies. At the same time, the continuing protection afforded to higher education
by state funding lessens the potential effects of market competition and the "global"
aspects of transformation. In some countries, private universities have been created
which attempt to meet the new needs of new times, or at least a limited subset of
them. In other countries, the establishment of private institutions is severely limited
by national legislation (Darvas, 1999, Scott et aI., 2000). Tomusk, however, has re-
cently argued that the apparently neutral role of universities in central and eastern
Europe belies a process whereby segments of the old communist elites have used
higher education to secure and legitimise their positions in the "new" regimes (To-
musk, 2000).
The argument of this paper is that the social role of higher education cannot sim-
ply be read off from political statements of what it is meant to be, even where such
statements exist. Indeed, such statements can be quite misleading about what is go-
ing on in practice. By their very existence, universities and other institutions of
higher education are contributing to the reproduction of their host societies or to
their transformation. As we noted in the UK case, they most likely do a bit of both.
On higher education's role in transformation processes in central and eastern
Europe, Ralph Dahrendorf, quoting Elener Hankiss, has argued that:
... the time of transition has turned out to be one in which there is no space 'for any
creati ve contribution on the part of East Central European intellectuals and universities'.
This is all the more unfortunate since the post-communist countries could do with more
liberal education. Indeed, 'these countries in transition are badly in need of new ideas,
84 JOHN BRENNAN

critical spirit, moral integrity, examples of excellence, knowledge, initiative, and crea-
tivity' (Dahrendorf, 2000: 96).

This sounds rather similar to the "protected space" that we noted earlier. But pro-
tected for whom, and with what consequences? It is impossible to escape the access
issue. Again, quoting Dahrendorf on universities in central and eastern Europe,
Universities themselves have to make it clear that they are not institutions for the per-
petuation of social elites but elite institutions for all who are able and willing. (Dahren-
dorf, 2000: 109)

The new comparative project on the role of universities in the transformation of

societies (see note 1) will provide some evidence of the extent to which universities
in this region are rising to this and other challenges.
Universities are not neutral institutions. They engage with and they impact upon
society at many points and in many ways. Large claims are made for the benevo-
lence of this impact. But the evidence for it is patchy, and limited to specific times
and contexts. Statements of aspiration abound, both from policy communities and
from individual commentators. These statements are often in conflict with each
other - as are larger statements made about the effects of globalisation and the na-
ture of "post-industrial" society.
The evidence often contradicts as well. Higher education's roles are multiple.
This paper has argued that they can be considered under the four broad headings of
access (who gets higher education), of curriculum and research (what do they get),
of placement (where does it lead them - and with what wider social consequence)
and of what we have termed "protected space" (e.g., to think the unthinkable). These
four issues are applicable to higher education institutions and systems in all kinds of
society - stable or transforming. They relate both to questions of economic well-
being, heavily stressed by governments, and to questions of equity, social inclusion
and democracy. No single narrative can be applied to the answers which empirical
research has begun to provide to these questions. Nothing is pre-determined. Uni-
versities can be and do many things but, for good or ill, they make a difference.

NOTES
A comparative study on the "role of universities in the transformation of society" has recently been
initiated by the Centre for Higher Education Research and Information at the Open University, and
the Association of Commonwealth Universities. It will involve comparisons between countries in
sub-Saharan Africa and central and eastern Europe. The author of this paper acknowledges the con-
tributions of several of the participants in the above project to the ideas which are explored here.

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 JAN SADLAK & KLAUS HUFNER

INTERNATIONAL GOVERNMENTAL
ORGANISATIONS AND RESEARCH ON HIGHER
EDUCATION!

1. INTRODUCTION

Like every experienced scholar, Ulrich Teichler has developed an interest in certain
preferred domains. For many years he has demonstrated a keen and steady interest in
what international organisations have been doing in the vast area of higher educa-
tion. This attention has been reciprocated; a remarkable number of these organisa-
tions have sought out his expert knowledge in a variety of contexts - from
participating in meetings to organising and carrying out complex international re-
search projects. In this essay we shall try to show how and why certain international
governmental organisations, while relying on experts such as Teichler, are embark-
ing on this type of activity.
Higher education is a domain that is of direct or indirect interest to a number of
international organisations - both non-governmental and intergovernmental, not to
mention a whole range of international associations and research organisations.
However, only some of the intergovernmental organisations, the category with
which this essay is concerned, find it necessary to seek expert advice on a more or
less regular basis. These organisations draw on advice on higher education, from
relevant research and policy analysis, in order to avoid faulty reasoning when devel-
oping and implementing their own activities of policy advice in this field. An even
smaller number of them initiate, monitor, fund or participate in intellectually rigor-
ous analysis or debate concerning higher education in its international, national, re-
gional and institutional contexts. But it appears that this context is gradually
changing, because our knowledge-based and communication-intensive society now
requires a new set of policies with regard to education and science - and interna-
tional organisations simply cannot afford to plan their activities without an adequate
knowledge base.
It is important to keep in mind the main features which characterise all interna-
tional organisations - their statutory area of competence, their membership, their
principal constituency, their human and financial resources. All of these will deter-
mine how a given organisation relates to research activities concerning higher edu-
cation or any other field. Consequently, international organisations' approaches to,
and demands of, such research differ considerably.
It should also be pointed out that although international organisations usually co-
operate with each other, they also compete as they become more and more exposed

87
1. Enders and O. Fulton (eds.), Higher Education in a Globalising World, 87-100.
© 2002 Kluwer Academic Publishers.
88 JAN SADLAK & KLAUS HUFNER

to new challenges imposed by various processes associated with globalisation and

with the regionalisation of social and economic development. This can be a convinc-
ing argument for the creation and preservation by each organisation of its own ac-
cumulated knowledge base and the cultivation of its own external networks of
experts and advisors. It cannot, therefore, be expected that the work of international
organisations will never overlap. Yet this does not necessarily imply wasteful dupli-
cation, since the specific context of these organisations' mission, needs and activi-
ties can differ considerably. It also explains why international organisations compete
for the services of some particularly prolific experts. Ulrich Teichler has certainly
been one of these.
The inherently national character of educational policies has implications for
higher education research. Policy is mainly developed within national boundaries, or
according to the local context of a particular educational and political system. There-
fore, the research initiatives and activities in which intergovernmental organisations
get involved are mainly related to a limited range of topics: the articulation of a
common methodological basis for the exchange of information, comparative analy-
sis and the study of internationally oriented problems of higher education. It should
be pointed out, however, that, at least in the case of Europe, the research agenda is
extending more and more beyond issues related to the traditional schema of interna-
tional academic co-operation or student and staff mobility. In this regard we can
clearly see the influence of the so-called Bologna Process, whose aim is to create the
"European higher education area" by the year 20 I O.
Higher education and science, with their ingrained international dimension, are
at the forefront of those areas in which international organisations are expected by
their constituencies to become involved. In the majority of cases, the principal func-
tion of international organisations consists of legislative and standard-setting activi-
ties, policy advocacy and policy advising, as well as the launching and
implementation of various operational projects. These activities imply the need for
expertise, both in identifying prevailing new trends, ideas and innovations, and in
transferring them by organising meetings, bringing policy makers and experts to-
gether, publishing the results, drafting policy recommendations and so on. If only
for economic reasons, the international organisations must therefore rely heavily on
existing works and on established expert opinions. And in this respect higher educa-
tion is not very different from other areas. It is especially important to note that,
compared with national research institutions, the international organisations are sel-
dom in a position to critically review the educational policy of their member states
and their institutions. Nor can they defend themselves using the prerogatives of aca-
demic freedom. Their messages arc therefore often wrapped in formulations typical
of "co-operation diplomacy".
But such shortcomings, which arc embodied in the consensus-seeking philoso-
phy of international organisations, do not negate the point that international organi-
sations are especially effective at creating a sound and interculturally sensitive
methodological basis for international comparative analysis. This commitment to
standardisation makes the work of quantitative comparison much easier. The inter-
national organisations can also serve as arenas for scholarly debate and discussion.
They can, if requested, advise national authorities, but only a few of them have ade-
 INTERNATIONAL GOVERNMENTAL ORGANISATIONS 89

quate authority and sufficient financial resources to have a substantial direct impact
on the development of higher education in their member states.
This essay concentrates on international organisations' activities with respect to
higher education in a number of specific areas: their overall role in the development
of higher education, their contribution to policy-making and their role in the study of
higher education in Europe. The present scale of these activities, which are regularly
carried out by such organisations as UNESCO, the World Bank:, the Organisation for
Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the Council of Europe, con-
stitutes an obvious invitation to take a closer look - not to mention that the authors
of this essay have also had the opportunity and privilege of collaborating with Ulrich
Teichler in the context of various projects undertaken by these organisations.

2. UNESCO
UNESCO is one of the specialised agencies of the United Nations system. It is the
only agency that takes responsibility for education in the most comprehensive sense
of the term, embracing formal and non-formal educational structures and functions,
educational policy, planning and educational research. Other UN agencies do deal
with higher education, but only in an operational sense, as in the case of the United
Nations Development Programme (UNDP), or in a narrower context corresponding
directly to their field of competence, for example in health, labour or employment.
UNESCO sees its continuous involvement in the promotion of research on
higher education - particularly research which is relevant for educational policy and
decision making - as one of its main roles in the collective effort to promote change
and development in higher education. Its involvement in higher education also fits
its broader concern with "sustainable human development", in which economic
growth is expected to serve social development and ensure environmental sustain-
ability.
For a number of years UNESCO has supported the functioning of a whole web
of international networks for the dissemination and communication of information
on higher education. It has tried to maintain an environment conducive to research
on higher education, by organising various events involving both institutions and
individual experts (such as Ulrich Teichler), in order to foster informed discussion
on the development of higher education in the service of society. The arguments for
support of this kind which were put forward in 1995 in UNESCO's Policy Paper for
Change and Development in Higher Education still merit attention:
By serving as a kind of clearing house, UNESCO can respond to the prerequisites for
informed decision-making by supplying data and analyses and by monitoring changes
and trends in higher education (UNESCO, 1995: 39).

It is in this context that we should view the modifications which were made in
the new 1997 version of the International Standard Classification of Education
(ISCED). The creation of the UNESCO Institute for Statistics is another example of
UNESCO's attempts at modernisation in the area of internationally comparable in-
formation, in education and other fields of its competence.
90 JAN SADLAK & KLAUS HUFNER

UNESCO convened what was undoubtedly one of the most important interna-
tional events in the field of higher education. The World Conference on Higher Edu-
cation ("Higher Education in the Twenty-First Century: Vision and Action") took
place in Paris in October 1998. The principal documents that were adopted by the
Conference were the World Declaration on Higher Education for the Twenty-First
Century: Vision and Action and the Framework for Priority Action for Change and
Development in Higher Education, which set out a comprehensive vision of the de-
velopment of higher education. These documents also pointed out that research on
higher education should itself be strengthened through such mechanisms as, for ex-
ample, the UNESCO chairs on various issues of higher education. The research to
be undertaken through these mechanisms is needed in order "to ensure continued
progress towards such key national objectives as access, equity, quality, relevance
and diversification" (UNESCO, 1998: 31).
Taking into consideration the specific characteristics of higher education, one of
which is the large number of national and international associations concerned with
it, UNESCO's co-operation and indeed its formal links with international non-
governmental organisations (commonly referred to as NGOs) are also worth point-
ing out in the context of the topic of this essay. Some thirty international NGOs are
currently parties to the UNESCO-NGO Collective Consultation on Higher Educa-
tion, which was established in 1988. The consultation serves as a forum for the ex-
change of views and research findings on major issues and developments in higher
education, such as the role of higher education in society, the management of inter-
national co-operation in higher education and the place of higher education in capac-
ity-building. Both individual scholars and research centres are important
contributors of such findings, and the link between UNESCO and the Centre for
Research on Higher Education and Work at the University of Kassel, of which Ul-
rich Teichler is director, is a good example of such co-operation. The authors of this
essay have benefited from Teichler's profound understanding and knowledge of
higher education at a number of international meetings. One which we keenly re-
member was the Round Table on the Relationship between Research, Policy and
Practice in Higher Education, which was jointly organised in Tokyo by UNESCO
and the Centre for Research and Development of Higher Education of the University
of Tokyo from 3 to 5 September 1997, and which resulted, among other things, in a
jointly edited book (Teichler & Sadlak, 2000).
The activities which we have described so far are mainly of a global character.
There are also activities carried out by UNESCO at the level of the European region,
which covers UNESCO's member states in Europe, North Africa and Israel. These
are being implemented by the European Centre for Higher Education (UNESCO-
CEPES) in Bucharest, which was established in 1972. Since its foundation, the cen-
tre has been an important promoter of activities, and a meeting place for scholars
and governmental representatives from various countries in the region to discuss
higher education issues of mutual interest. The outputs of such meetings are often
presented in CEPES' various publications, which include monographs, studies, pa-
pers and journals, of which the best known is the quarterly review Higher Education
in Europe. The review was founded in 1975 and is published in English, French and
Russian versions. As of the year 2000, the latter two language versions are accessi-
 INTERNATIONAL GOVERNMENTAL ORGANISATIONS 91

ble on line, free of charge, through the UNESCO-CEPES Website. In recent years,
UNESCO-CEPES has also attempted to support the development of research on
higher education by assisting in the creation of the various types of UNESCO
Chairs, especially those dealing with the governance and management of higher
education, policy issues and teaching in tertiary-level institutions in central and east-
ern Europe.
In addition to UNESCO-CEPES, three other UNESCO Institutes - the Interna-
tional Institute for Educational Planning (IIEP) in Paris, the International Bureau of
Education (IBE) in Geneva and the UNESCO Institute for Education (UlE) in Ham-
burg - undertake activities relevant to the European region which require input from
those involved in research on higher education. However, a majority of their work is
addressed to the global audience. Of these three, IIEP makes an important contribu-
tion to both undertaking and disseminating research on higher education. Ulrich
Teichler has been directly involved with the work of IIEP for quite a number of
years, most recently acting as a member of the IIEP Council of Consultant Fellows.
IIEP's research and studies in higher education began in the 1960s with the in-
ternational research project on "Planning the Development of Universities", which
established a set of useful indicators for university management, studied the plan-
ning mechanisms of 85 universities around the world and published a series of suc-
cess stories of university planning, with the objective of assisting higher education
institutions in developing countries during a period of rapid expansion.
In the 1970s, the IIEP launched one of its most comprehensive international re-
search projects on higher education and employment. Based on surveys of students,
graduates and employers in 21 countries, the project attempted to identify the rea-
sons for the mismatch between the supply of graduates from higher education insti-
tutions and the absorptive capacity of the labour market in both quantitative and
qualitative terms, and suggested corrective measures in different socio-economic
contexts. Twenty-one country studies and a series of methodological papers were
published along with a synthesis of the findings.
A related project was launched in the 1980s on deriving the implications of tech-
nological development for the planning of higher education, through an analysis of
the impact of technology on the employment and qualification structures of high-
level manpower. Six country cases and a synthesis report were published within this
project.
In the 1990s, higher education was faced with a growing financial crisis, leading
on the one hand to pressures for the scrutiny of student financial support, and on the
other to demands for improved managerial effectiveness in institutions of higher
education. To respond to the first issue, IIEP organised a series of regional forums
on student loans and published their reports. The second issue became the subject of
another comprehensive research project which was launched in 1990. This project
has published fourteen case studies, several methodological papers and a synthesis.
The results of the research are now being used for the training of senior university
managers.
During its current medium-term planning period (2002-2007), IIEP's research on
higher education will focus on the restructuring of higher education institutions
caused by the decline in state support and by the globalisation process which has
92 JAN SADLAK & KLAUS HUFNER

changed delivery mechanisms and increased cross-border competItIOn. These

changes in the social, economic and institutional environment of higher education
will be IIEP's point of departure for the coming years. Specifically, the research will
focus, inter alia, on enhancing the capacity of higher education in developing coun-
tries; on new mechanisms for assessing quality in the global higher education mar-
ket; on issues related to managing changing university-industry linkages; on ICT
and the "virtual university"; and on facilitating the transition from professional and
specialised training to the labour market. This research agenda will lead to a number
of case studies, synthesis reports and the development of training materials to be
used in different workshops and courses provided by IIEP (lIEP, 2002).

3. THE WORLD BANK

It is often overlooked that this international organisation - the World Bank / Interna-
tional Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) and its affiliate, the Inter-
national Development Agency (IDA) - is part of the United Nations system. In
general terms, its principal mission is to support equitable and sustainable long-term
development, first and foremost by dispensing various types of loans to developing
countries with relatively high per capita income (the task of IBRD) and by providing
assistance on concessionary terms to the poorest countries (the task of IDA). But as
a development bank, its role and its modes of both internal and external functioning
are distinctly different from those of other organisations in the UN system. One de-
cisive difference is that the principle of "one state one vote" is replaced by a system
of weighted-voting powers linked to capital subscriptions, which in turn are related
mainly to the member state's economic strength. The other difference is that the
World Bank obtains most of its financial resources through the sale of bonds in in-
ternational capital markets. Therefore the loans it provides have to be serviced on,
essentially, a commercial basis. Consequently, the World Bank's interests in educa-
tion, including its direct and indirect support for policy development and research,
reflect these specific structural conditions. These conditions also define its institu-
tional ideology and culture, including its view of the place of education in social and
economic modernisation.
The Bank's visibility with regard to educational development derives primarily
from the fact that it is the largest single source of multilateral external finance for
education in developing countries. It is one of the main international organisations
involved in current educational reforms in developing countries and in central and
eastern Europe. Total disbursements each year for education are approximately
US$2 billion. Looking at the sub-sectoral trends within the World Bank's overall
educational lending, it can be observed that support for higher education is about 25
percent of the total support for education. The Bank's direct interest in educational
research, including research related to higher education, goes back to the early
1960s, when specific references to the centrality of education in building "human
capital" entered not only the mainstream of economic thought but also the develop-
ment agendas of international organisations. Since that time a remarkable amount of
research and policy work has been undertaken, first within the World Bank's Educa-
 INTERNATIONAL GOVERNMENTAL ORGANISATIONS 93

tion and Employment Department, and later on by the Education and Social Policy
and Human Development departments. Their findings are published regularly in the
World Bank's Education Sector Policy Papers series and in discussion papers, pro-
ceedings, evaluation studies and regional and sectoral studies. Although a remark-
able record has been established in research and policy development, it was only in
1994 that the World Bank presented its first comprehensive policy statement on
higher education (World Bank, 1994). In 1995, the Bank also published an overall
policy study on education that reiterates its stand on the direction of reforms in
higher education (World Bank, 1995).
While the Bank recognises the contribution made by education to objectives in-
cluding nation-building and national cohesion, the enhancement of ethnic identity,
general health and population control, the strategic objectives of the educational
reforms advocated in the documents mentioned above are formulated in the context
of liberal economic reforms and also of concerns about the effectiveness of public
funding for education levels beyond primary schooling. A wearisomely familiar
theoretical construct supporting this policy rationale is the "rate of return" approach,
which makes a distinction between social and individual rates of return. Based on
this kind of analysis, the Bank points out that there is evidence that investments in
higher education have lower social rates of return than investments in primary and
secondary education, and that investments in basic education can have a more direct
impact on poverty reduction. The primary and secondary levels have therefore been
for many years the priority sub-sectors in the Bank's education lending to those
countries that have not yet achieved universal literacy and adequate access, equity
and quality at the primary and secondary levels.
In higher education, the Bank offers its support especially when it can contribute
to meeting the following key objectives:
greater diversity of types of higher education institutions and programmes, in-
cluding the development of private institutions and better use of distance educa-
tion technologies - in order to create alternative and better responses to labour
market needs and to increased social demand for education and training;
strengthening the financial sustainability of public higher education institutions
through the diversification of funding sources and the promotion of cost-sharing
by introducing tuition fees;
redefinition of the government's role towards greater emphasis on institutional
autonomy and accountability;
introduction of mechanisms and procedures, such as accreditation and assess-
ment systems, for the monitoring and evaluation of institutional performance and
of the achievement of equity objectives.
Consequently, in its lending practices for higher education the Bank intends to
move away from supporting individual institutions in favour of shaping a coherent
higher education sector well integrated into a national development strategy. The
Bank's financing of higher education is therefore increasingly being targeted to sup-
port national and regional programmes of excellence, whether public or private, to
provide access to funding on a more and more competitive basis, and to support the
establishment of accreditation and performance-assessment systems.
94 JAN SADLAK & KLAUS HUFNER

In general, the World Bank's approach plays an important, and sometimes even a
trend-setting, role with regard to higher education, not only through its lending prac-
tices but also by getting directly involved in analytical work, policy advice and tech-
nical assistance. On other occasions the Bank prefers to lend its support in
collaboration with other organisations, especially when seeking the external and
independent views of experts. A good recent example of such practice has been the
Task Force on Higher Education and Society, which was jointly convened by the
Bank and UNESCO and which brought together experts from 13 countries for the
purpose of exploring the future of higher education in the developing world (Task
Force on Higher Education and Society, 2000).
The Bank's current modernisation agenda emphasises the aims not only of mak-
ing economies more efficient but also of reducing world poverty, protecting the en-
vironment, improving nutrition, better family planning and helping people to
achieve their full potential through "better education." It remains to be seen how
effective such a conceptualisation of the education-development nexus will be, par-
ticularly in the context of the Bank's current work on its new strategy for the devel-
opment of tertiary education, in which that level of education is considered to be
fundamental to the construction of knowledge-based economies and societies.

4.0ECD
For some uninitiated observers, it can be a pleasant surprise to discover the degree to
which this organisation, primarily concerned with economic analysis and policy
development and with labour-related social issues among the industrialised coun-
tries, is also interested in the variety of policymaking, governance and management
issues in the field of post-compulsory education, including higher education. OECD
prefers to use the more inclusive term of "tertiary education".
OECD's involvement in higher education research goes back to the early 1960s,
when human capital theory in neo-classical economics penetrated the levels of eco-
nomic and social policy. The potential relevance of education's contribution to eco-
nomic growth became one of the most important messages upon which the leitmotif
of "education as an investment" was based. It was also a period of exceptional ex-
pansion of higher education in OECD's member states. In the 1970s, OECD's
agenda for higher education was supplemented by arguments related to greater
equality of opportunity for access to higher education. In recent years, particularly
since the early 1990s, it has become focused on problems pertaining to scarce finan-
cial resources, the consequences of massification, the internal economy of higher
education and better matching between higher education and employment (Papado-
poulos, 1994).
In order to realise these objectives, OECD primarily serves the national minis-
tries in charge of higher and other levels of education and the government agencies
responsible for educational planning. It also has close links to representatives of
higher education institutions and the research community, but with a clear prefer-
ence for those engaged in the "management and governance" area of higher educa-
tion research.
 INTERNATIONAL GOVERNMENTAL ORGANISATIONS 95

From the functional point of view, OECD does not have the typical features of a
funding administration, a policymaking body or a research institution: its strength
and relevance are due mainly to the combination of these three functions. Such a
mix allows OECD to be a kind of "think-tank", and to take up issues that are not
necessarily a priority of the national administrations of its member states. Because
of its balanced and flexible structure and the status of its various bodies, the organi-
sation is in a good position to initiate analysis and problem-solving debates which
allow for the development of a novel position or the formulation of alternative
strategies (even if often embroiled in management-speak) that do not necessarily
reflect the views of the political bodies of its member states. It might appear, as with
so many other international organisations, that the search for consensus is a key fea-
ture of OECD's work, but such differences as emerge are not permitted to block
publication or to otherwise limit the usefulness of the outcomes.
Currently, OECD carries out activities relevant to higher education primarily in
the framework of the Education and Training Division (ETD) (which serves the
OECD Education Committee, a ministerial-level body), the Centre for Educational
Research and Innovation (CERI) and the Programme on Institutional Management
in Higher Education (IMHE).
The most important output of the work of the Education Committee, at least
from the point of view of educational research and policy development, is the publi-
cation of reviews of national policies for education. In most cases, higher education
is addressed within the overall reviews of educational systems; however, this does
not preclude the occasional undertaking of topically-oriented reviews of higher edu-
cation policies. Over the years such reviews have been undertaken for Austria, Cali-
fornia, the Czech Republic and Slovak Republic, Finland, Hungary, Poland, Mexico,
the Russian Federation, Romania, Estonia and Latvia. It should also be mentioned
that OECD publishes similar national reports on science and technology, which also
indirectly relate to higher education. In very recent years, OECD has also carried
out, under the overall umbrella of the Stability Pact for South Eastern Europe, a
whole series of thematic reviews of national policies for education in that region,
which also include a section concerning higher education.
It should be pointed out that these reviews are prepared at the request of a given
OECD member state, and sometimes also of non-members, and are carried out fol-
lowing a standard organisational procedure which consists of the following four
steps: first, a national background report is prepared by the authorities of a given
country; second, and organised by OECD, a team of external examiners undertakes a
visit which usually lasts between one and three weeks; third, the examining team
presents its report; and finally, the report meeting is reviewed and the report pub-
lished.
Even though the national reviews are not subjected to the smoothing of rough
edges which characterises most of the publications of the international consensus-
seeking organisations, this does not mean that the reviews present a kind of "final
truth." It should be kept in mind that they are essentially reviews agreed upon, and
undertaken for, national governments in the context of OECD's wider concerns with
comparison and co-operation. As a result, depending on government priorities and
interests, some issues are given greater weight and attention than others; and related
96 JAN SADLAK & KLAUS HOFNER

to this, the composition and areas of expertise of the examining team may vary from
one review to another.
CERI, which was founded in 1968, has paid much attention in its recent work to
areas such as indicators, curriculum development, performance standards and inno-
vative practices and policies in education. The results of the work on indicators are
published under the title Education at a Glance: OECD Indicators and in companion
volumes. The latest (2001) edition of this comparative publication contains a com-
prehensive set of 31 indicators, including indicators for access to and participation in
tertiary education, public subsidies for students and the age-related output of the
tertiary sector (OECD, 2001). This comparative publication is updated and pub-
lished every year. CERI also has an important activity on the internationalisation of
higher education, which most recently has started to address the critical issues re-
lated to trade in educational services.
The other significant work carried out by or within CERI and ETD is that of
education policy analysis (EPA). For example, the volume published in 1999 pre-
sented an important analysis of how tertiary education institutions are making efforts
to re-orient themselves towards greater inclusiveness, by adopting teaching, financ-
ing and student support strategies that cater for a more and more heterogeneous stu-
dent population and for the growing demand for lifelong learning provision In
OECD member states (OECD-CERI, 1999; 2001).
OECD also maintains a specialist programme on institutional management In
higher education (lMHE). The 1M HE Programme's main objectives are the promo-
tion of greater professionalism in the management of institutions of higher education
through research, training and information exchange, and through the wider dis-
semination of practical management methods and approaches. IMHE conducts pro-
jects which lead both to publications and to the development of management
instruments, for example the Internationalisation Quality Review Process (IQRP)
(OECD-IMHE, 1999a; 1999b; and 2000). IMHE also organises, usually in collabo-
ration with the European University Association (EUA), strategic management train-
ing seminars designed for institutional leaders. In addition to project-based
publications, OECD publishes, in English and French, Higher Education Manage-
ment, a journal addressed to decision-makers and managers of higher education in-
stitutions, as well as to researchers in the field of institutional management. The
journal covers the field of institutional management through articles and reports on
research prospects. The newsletter IMHE-Info serves as a source of information on
activities and events organised by IMHE. Some of the 1M HE seminars also give rise
to publications (OECD-IMHE, 2001). IMHE's General Conference, organised each
second year, represents an important forum for the presentation of research findings
and the discussion of various issues in higher education.
The activities described above have their own specific focus with regard to is-
sues and methods, but all of them, through the elaboration of the relevant studies and
background documents as well as through participation in meetings, represent a
good opportunity to show the relevance of higher education research for policy de-
velopment, management and governance at the system and institutional levels. We
can also conclude that the more homogeneous composition of OECD's membership,
currently comprising 30 industrialised countries - particularly in comparison with
 INTERNATIONAL GOVERNMENTAL ORGANISATIONS 97

the global inter-governmental organisations - is a helpful factor with regard to its

involvement in higher education. The very fact that OECD can combine the func-
tions of policy administration and research, along with an internal structure based on
the relative autonomy of departments, centres, committees and programmes, allows
it to develop and diffuse new ideas and innovative processes which are then taken up
by its member states in the process of modernisation of their higher education sys-
tems. All this means that OECD is an intellectually attractive and professionally
relevant institutional partner, including for researchers on higher education.

5. THE COUNCIL OF EUROPE

The Council of Europe was founded in 1949 to protect and strengthen pluralist de-
mocracy and human rights, to promote European cultural awareness and identity and
to seek solutions to the problems facing European society. The 1954 European Cul-
tural Convention framed the laws of the organisation, reiterated those objectives and
set the aims for its activities in the fields of culture, education, sport and youth ac-
tivities among its member states. Particularly since the end of the 1980s, the Council
of Europe has been a truly pan-European organisation, as 48 states are currently
party to the Convention. The specific interest of the Council of Europe in higher
education goes back to 1960, when the Committee for Higher Education and Re-
search (CC-HER), one of the Council's oldest committees, was created. Each mem-
ber state is represented by one senior governmental official and one academic
representative nominated by the competent academic body, for example the national
rectors' conference. This dual composition became one of the characteristic features
of the committee. Following a structural reorganisation in 1990, CC-HER became
one of the Council's specialist committees and changed its name to the Standing
Conference on University Problems (CC-PU). In 1993 the Committee returned to its
old name, the Committee for Higher Education and Research. As of 2002, it became
a Steering Committee for Higher Education and Research.
The roots - and current aims - of the Council of Europe, concerned with human
rights, the rule of law and democracy, have also influenced its approach and its
choice of activities related to higher education. Hence the Committee's terms of
reference state, in a precise way, that its task is
to promote the development of European higher education on the basis of common de-
mocratic principles and of the values of the European university heritage, including the
freedoms of learning, teaching and research, and the self-government of academic insti-
tutions within a democratic society. (Council of Europe, 1995: 8-9)

In order to meet this objective, it undertakes such activities as the exchange of

ideas and experience on issues of European higher education policy and good prac-
tice; the organisation of advice to national governmental and academic bodies; the
promotion of pan-European international co-operation; and the facilitation of aca-
demic mobility, especially through the support and development of legal instruments
on the recognition of qualifications. The outcome of this last activity was adopted in
1997 as the Council of Europe I UNESCO Convention on the Recognition of Quali-
fications Concerning Higher Education in the European Region, the so-called Lis-
98 JAN SADLAK & KLAUS HOJ-<NER

bon Convention. Follow-up activities are being carried out by the so-called ENIC
Network, for which the Council of Europe and UNESCO-CEPES jointly provide the
Secretariat. The Council of Europe is an active contributor to the Bologna Process to
create the European Higher Education Area by 2010, and it is heavily engaged in
supporting the reform of higher education in south-east Europe.
An important orientation of the CC-HER has been the process of reform of
higher education in central and eastern Europe. The political and cultural demand for
this emphasis is obvious. The Council's grassroots approach of respecting institu-
tional autonomy as strongly as governmental policy, which is rightly perceived not
as a luxury but as a precondition for success, is particularly relevant for establishing
democratic principles in the organisation of higher education in these new democ-
ratic societies. The researchers from the "old" western democracies whose inspira-
tion and contribution was so important, particularly at the early stage of this process,
can also benefit from this experience as their own countries struggle with cont1icts
of their own in the course of the present-day processes of development and of badly
needed reforms of higher education. In this context, one of the most important and
most original activities, from the intellectual and research point of view, was under-
taken by the Council as the Legislative Reform Programme (Papadopoulos, 1995;
Neave, 1995).
Other items on the organisation's higher education agenda are the role of univer-
sities in research; the recognition of academic credentials (in which the CC-HER is
working closely with UNESCO-CEPES); the contribution of higher education to
democratic society; the development of European studies; and the renewal of the
academic profession. But CC-HER decides carefully on its next move and only de-
termines the advisability of launching work on a particular subject after undertaking
exploratory studies. The same approach is used when considering an extension be-
yond the original duration of a particular activity, as was recently done in the case of
the Legislative Reform Programme. Views were sought from experts and partners,
and generally also from the higher education researchers who participated in this
programme, before the decision was made to seek its continuation. This cautious
approach is also related to the Council's clear preference for fixed-term and joint-
funding approaches - based on combining the organisation's own resources with the
mobilisation of voluntary contributions.
It can be argued that generally speaking, the modalities of CC-HER's work, such
as advisory missions, multilateral workshops, study visits, comparative studies, ex-
pert reports and information, suit the higher education research community well. Its
involvement, even if it is relatively limited in quantitative terms, can nevertheless be
easily detected if one takes a closer look at the reports of the results of these activi-
ties, reports which, although austerely produced, are distributed free of charge.

6. CONCLUSIONS

There is little doubt that knowledge which has been generated from research and
incorporated into policymaking and its implementation not only facilitates the ra-
tional attainment of the desired political or institutional objectives, but also supports
 INTERNATIONAL GOVERNMENTAL ORGANISATIONS 99

their legitimisation. Studying and comparing problems, experiences and policy op-
tions by analysing actions and their outcomes at the national, regional and interna-
tionallevels is now becoming a conspicuously important part of policy development,
in the field of higher education as elsewhere. International organisations have tradi-
tionally seen their role when sponsoring research activities as primarily a compara-
tive one, and as facilitating the exchange of information on relevant research
outcomes. The analysis presented in this essay attests that even if academic organi-
sations - universities and other research-oriented institutions as well as the research-
ers working there - are, by definition, the principal place for research on higher
education, international organisations also play their part, in multiple manifestations,
in this mostly phenomenological endeavour. At the same time, the growing impor-
tance of education and science for sustainable human development and for con-
structing knowledge societies makes educational research more essential than ever.
The picture presented in this essay shows that international organisations can
make an important contribution to the field of research on higher education. More-
over, the growing demand for reliable and internationally comparative information,
in a world which is becoming more and more interdependent, invites international
organisations to develop their activities in supplying information and in research
related to it. The international organisations, despite all the fashionable and well-
founded criticisms of their limitations and shortcomings, are major producers of
internationally comparable social and economic data, which feeds usefully into na-
tional and regional policies. They also enhance the analytical capacity of a range of
governmental and academic institutions by offering a broader vision of their own
and other countries' higher education systems. All of these functions accentuate the
need for scholarly advice and expert views. This is why all the organisations re-
viewed in this essay are promoters of higher education research with regard to the
issues relevant to their respective constituency or field of competence, even if they
only possess a rather limited in-house capacity for policy analysis and the compila-
tion of data. The argument for close links with the higher education research com-
munity is self-evident, and this is where the expertise of distinguished individual
scholars such as Ulrich Teichler is most visible. In this regard, Teichler's recent
work on the introduction of the new Europe-wide structure of degrees, based on
Bachelor's and Master's levels, is a good example of the contribution such activities
are making to the on-going process of major reforms of European higher education,
sometimes referred to as the Bologna Process. In this context, Teichler's observa-
tions on the role of the higher education researcher are particularly illuminating,
especially at a time when the international organisations are involving researchers in
their work, and are in particular need of researchers for whom an independent and
intellectually honest stance is of prime importance. He rightly points out that it is not
the role of researchers to legitimise political decisions in favour of certain policy
options (in this case the introduction of Bachelor's-Ievel programmes and degrees).
As Ulrich Teichler pointed out in a recent keynote speech, research's prime contri-
bution is to "provide the relevant basic information and sort out the rationales of the
debate" and to:
100 JAN SADLAK & KLAUS HOmER

provide a broad range of experience and concepts which might stimulate a more bal-
anced view and develop ideas [on] how to prevent the anticipated problems
(Teichler, 2001: 15).

And it is in this context that international organisations have, over the years, re-
lied on collaboration with scholars like Ulrich Teichler, precisely in order to avoid
such problems.

NOTES

Parts of this essay draw on the findings presented in a chapter written by K. Hiifner, J. Sadlak and D.
Chitoran, "Research on higher education and the activities of international organizations: multiplicity
of interests, needs and forms", which was published in J. Sadlak & P. O. Altbach (eds.), Higher Edu-
cation Research at the Tum of the Century: Structures. Paris and New York: UNESCO Publish-
ing/Oarland Publishing, 1997, 321-347. The authors would also like to thank Jarl Bengtsson,
Jacqueline Smith, Ian Whitman and Richard Yelland of OECD, and Sjur Bergen of the Council of
Europe, for their thoughtful comments on a draft of the text.

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tion in the Twenty-First Century: Vision and Action. Paris: UNESCO.
 PART 2

GLOBAL CHALLENGES AND VARIED RESPONSES

 FRANS VAN VUGHT, MARUK VAN DER WENDE &
DON WESTERHEUDEN

GLOBALISATION AND INTERNATIONALISATION:

POLICY AGENDAS COMPARED

I. INTRODUCTION

In recent decades, the international dimension has gained importance in higher edu-
cation policy. First of all, higher education trends have been increasingly analysed at
the international level, with an important role played by international and intergov-
ernmental organisations such as the OECD and UNESCO. On the academic side,
these analyses have been supported by international comparative higher education
research, carried out by research centres such as the Centre for Higher Education
Policy Studies (CHEPS) in the Netherlands. Second, it has been acknowledged that
government policies need to address the internationalisation of higher education
directly, and should aim to move beyond existing schemes for academic mobility
towards policies which encourage higher education institutions to internationalise
their core functions. And third, the awareness has grown that policy initiatives are
also needed at an international level.
In Europe, the second trend has for the most part resulted in increased mobility
and inter-institutional co-operation. The third trend has brought some inter-
governmental agreements (e.g. on the recognition of academic qualifications), but
more importantly it has led for the first time to a European initiative aimed at reform
on the level of higher education systems: the Bologna Declaration. The Declaration
was signed in 1999, in a period in which another phenomenon is emerging: the lib-
eralisation of international higher education markets in order to enable free cross-
border trade in educational services.
In this chapter we shall argue that the international policy trends provide an ex-
ample of how globalisation, and the increased competition associated with it, are
starting to impact on higher education, whereas the national initiatives can be re-
garded as a demonstration of increasing internationalisation, essentially a co-
operative process. The central question that will be ad-dressed is whether the Bolo-
gna process will be an adequate European response to the wider challenges of glob-
alisation.
In order to answer that question, we start in section 2 by substantiating our claim
that the economic rationale is of growing importance in higher education interna-
tionally. The key concepts of globalisation and inter-nationalisation are then treated
analytically in section 3. As a consequence of the increasing importance of the eco-
nomic rationale, co-operation often gives way to competition as the paradigm for

103
1. Enders and O. Fulton (eds.). Higher Education in a Globalising World, 103-120.
© 2002 Kluwer Academic Publishers.
104 FRANS V AN VUGHT, MARIJK V AN DER WENDE & DON WESTERHEIJDEN

internationalisation, as we illustrate in section 4. Having set the stage in this way, in

section 5 we focus on a comparison of the policy agendas and their behavioural
paradigms in the globalisation process, as exemplified in the GATS negotiations on
the one hand, and the internationalisation response in Europe through the Bologna
process on the other. In particular, we argue that the co-operation implied in the Bo-
logna process will require an extended role for quality assurance, so that in the sec-
ond part of section 5 we concentrate on this element of the emerging new
institutional arrangements. In the concluding section 6, we will reverse the previous
logical order, moving from specific observations on quality assurance to broader
issues of the Bologna process in its context of globalisation.

2. INTERNATIONAL TRENDS IN HIGHER EDUCATION

Internationalisation has become a widespread and strategically important phenome-

non in higher education (Teichler, 1999). It includes a broad range of activities, such
as the trans-national mobility of students and staff, internationalisation of curricula
and quality assurance, inter-institutional co-operation in education and research, and
the establishment of international university consortia. Furthermore, there has been
strong growth in the cross-border delivery of education, leading to a substantial
market in export and import of higher education products and services. This process
is being prompted by both demand and supply factors. There is a growing and diver-
sifying demand for higher education in countries with an inadequate national higher
education infrastructure; and established universities in western countries, motivated
by decreasing public (national) funding for higher education to search for new mar-
kets to supply, have perceived this demand as opening up opportunities which they
are actively exploring. This process is also being driven by the liberalisation of edu-
cational markets through initiatives of the World Trade Organisation (WTO), in par-
ticular the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS). In the GATS
negotiations, there is an agreement to classify primary and secondary education as
public consumption goods, with predominantly public rather than individual bene-
fits, and with important functions for the conservation and development of national
society and culture. However, for higher education, the balance of public and indi-
vidual benefits is often seen by educational economists as leaning more towards the
individual side. For this reason, there is said to be a stronger case for exposing
higher education to market co-ordination than for primary or secondary education I.
As the WTO observes, "a relatively small, but possibly growing, number of coun-
tries allows for effective private participation" (Council for Trade in Services Secre-
tariat, 1998, § 13). The GATS process came to a temporary standstill with the failure
of the Seattle round of negotiations in 1999, but it will undoubtedly will pick up
speed again in years to come. Recent proposals from the USA, New Zealand and
Australia suggesting further opening-up of markets are already leading to intensive
discussions prior to the 2003 WTO meeting (Australian Delegation, 2001 b).
Overtly, the US proposal is to "create conditions favourable to suppliers" in the area
of job-oriented "training services" and educational testing services (United States
 GLOBALISATION AND INTERNATIONALISATION 105

Delegation, 1998), but the fear seems to be that in this way the whole higher educa-
tion sector will be opened up to globalised trade.
In addition, the globalisation process is being facilitated by information and
communication technology (lCT), which is increasingly used to reach out to distant
students who are interested in earning a foreign degree while staying in their own
country.
These trends are leading to a growing international competition in higher educa-
tion and an enhanced economic rationale for internationalisation, as compared to the
political, cultural and academic rationales which were the main driving forces for
internationalisation until recently (Kalvermark & Van der Wende, 1997). The eco-
nomic potential of international higher education markets has attracted new types of
higher education providers (e.g. corporate universities, virtual universities, on-line
providers, etc.), operating on a purely commercial basis, and so leads to even more
competition.
The significance and reach of these developments can be illustrated by some data
on the three leading countries in this area: the USA, the UK and Australia. Educa-
tion and training services rank among the USA's top five classes of service exports,
accounting for 4% of total services revenue in 1999 and over US$14 billion of ex-
port receipts in 2000. In the UK they also account for approximately 4% of services
revenues. The UK's share of the global market for international students is 16% at
present, and the government's aim is to increase this to 25%. In Australia the sector
ranks fifth in general exports (US$3.2 billion). 150,000 foreign students attended the
country's universities in 2000 (Council for Trade in Services Secretariat, 1998, ta-
ble 4).
However, these developments are not problem-free. The main generally per-
ceived problems relate to the fear that opening borders will threaten the quality of
higher education. Accordingly, discussions have centred on the recognition of quali-
fications and on quality assurance processes (Campbell & Van der Wende, 2000).
It is generally agreed that the sharp increase in the international mobility of stu-
dents since the early 1990s demands more sophisticated methods for both academic
and professional recognition of foreign qualifications. In response to this problem,
the Lisbon Convention on the recognition of academic qualifications was signed in
1997, and various international or global professional organisations have interna-
tionalised their procedures for accreditation of higher education programmes. In line
with their internationalisation efforts and in response to the increasing global com-
petition in higher education, universities are seeking to benchmark their quality at an
international level. They may use their international links and consortia for this pur-
pose, or they may turn instead or in addition to international accreditors. National
quality assurance systems, however, have been much slower in responding to this
phenomenon. Clearly, the fact that higher education is internationalising at such
speed and size, while quality assurance systems and responsibilities are still largely
based at the national level, is creating major tensions and challenges. Increasingly
large parts of higher education's provision may be able to evade or bypass national
quality assurance systems, giving rise to questions about where responsibilities for
quality, for quality assurance and for consumer information and protection should
now most properly lie.
106 FRANS V AN VUGHT, MARUK V AN DER WENDE & DON WESTERHEUDEN

3. GLOBALISATION AND INTERNATIONALISATION

As we illustrated in the previous section, the concepts of both globalisation and in-
ternationalisation are relevant in the higher education arena. Globalisation generally
relates to the process of increasing convergence and interdependence of economies
and to the Iiberalisation of trade and markets, although it also extends into the in-
creasing interdependence, on an intercontinental scale, of other realms of activity
(cultural, social, biological) (Friedman & Ramonet, 1999). From the political per-
spective, the globalisation literature claims that the process of globalisation will turn
nation states into powerless institutions and that ultimately their role will vanish.
The concept of internationalisation appears to refer mainly to the process of increas-
ing co-operation between states or to activities across state borders, and reflects a
world order in which nation states (still) playa central role (Scott, 1998). Besides,
the term internationalisation is frequently used to identify certain internal changes in
higher education, defined as "the integration of an international dimension into the
teaching, research and service function of higher education" (Knight & De Wit,
1995), or more widely as
any systemic, sustained effort aimed at making higher education (more) responsive to
the requirements and challenges related to the globalisation of societies, economy and
labour markets (Killvermark & Van der Wende, 1997).

Consequently, in the view of many European university leaders, globalisation is

an external macro-socio-economic process which cannot be influenced at the institu-
tional level, whereas internationalisation is interpreted as the policy-based internal
response to globalisation, which certainly can be shaped and influenced at the insti-
tutional level (van der Wende, 1999). This distinction is reflected in Scott's com-
ments:
Not all universities are (particularly) international, but all arc subject to the same proc-
esses of globalisation - partly as objects, victims even, of these processes, but partly as
SUbjects, or key agents, of globalisation (Scott, 1998: 122).

In any case, it cannot be denied that globalisation is impacting on the higher edu-
cation field. As pointed out before, the proposed GATS paragraphs on free and
cross-border trade in educational services will add further competitive pressure, cre-
ating tensions in the fields of recognition of degrees and quality assurance. And al-
though the nation state still plays a strong role in higher education (most obviously
because most institutions in Europe are (stiII) to a large extent state funded), higher
education institutions will have to address these globalisation trends. At the national
policy level, in many countries deregulation and increased institutional autonomy
are seen as an approach which will enable institutions to become more responsive to
their environment, including its international dimension. Deregulation has coincided
in many cases with decreasing per capita public funding of higher education, leading
to more mixed funding arrangements and so prompting greater institutional entre-
preneurialism. Those higher education institutions that take globalisation trends se-
riously arc focusing their entrepreneurial activities more and more often on
generating income from international sources, such as cross-border marketing of
courses and study programmes, and international co-operation in research.
 GLOBALISATION AND INTERNATIONALISATION 107

In line with the general thrust of anti-globalisation criticism, it is sometimes ar-

gued that globalisation, and in particular the influence of the WTO, will be detri-
mental to higher education in small nations and language areas. It will exacerbate
already dramatic inequalities among the world's universities, strengthening the
dominant role of the "world class" universities in western industrialised countries.
Smaller and poorer countries will have little autonomy and little competitive poten-
tial in the globalised world (Altbach, 2001). However, it needs to be realised that the
WTO's influence in a particular country depends on the commitments that its own
government may make to the various agreements. Furthermore, the size of a country
is not the main issue in a free market environment (the Netherlands, for instance, is
one of the main foreign investors in the USA). But obviously, the developing coun-
tries are vulnerable because of general trade inequalities and access-to-market prob-
lems, and these issues are clearly relevant in the higher education area. Nevertheless,
there are examples of states (e.g. Malaysia) which have deliberately invited foreign
higher education institutions to move into their country, under a clear regulatory
framework, in order to enlarge the range of higher education provision which the
country is unable to develop on its own. Other states which are facing uninvited
providers (e.g. South Africa and Israel) are trying to respond to that by putting ap-
propriate regulation in place (McBurnie & Ziguras, 2001).
Another aspect of the critique of globalisation refers to its potential negative im-
pact on traditional academic values. The fear is that these values are endangered by
the heavier emphasis in higher education on for-profit activities and on response to
market forces. At worst, higher education might become just another industrial in-
terest, gradually adopting the defining characteristics of the corporate world and in
the process, risking losing sight of values such as the pursuit of scholarship, curios-
ity-driven research, social criticism, preparation for civic life (Newman, 2000) and
equality of access.
Whatever the more abstract threats, if we turn to the direct behavioural implica-
tions for higher education institutions, the processes of globalisation imply an open-
ing up of higher education markets and therefore of a whole array of new
opportunities, both for existing institutions and for new providers. Perhaps there is a
danger that a number of these actors will focus only on short-term profits and on the
maximisation of revenues, at the expense of the more fundamental academic values.
However, it is conceivable that universities may respond effectively to these chang-
ing circumstances while still preserving the traditional academic values that have
characterised them in the past. Universities may very well understand, and embrace,
the challenge of combining the opportunities of globalisation with the traditional
values of scholarship and academic learning. There is no need for pessimism or
cynicism as long as higher education institutions are willing to face their new envi-
ronments with their academic background in mind. To enable institutions to do so,
continuing public commitment to the funding of higher education is essential, for
otherwise higher education institutions would not have the basic security with which
to face the challenges of their global environment2.
108 FRANS V AN VUGHT, MARUK V AN DER WENDE & DON WESTERHEUDEN

4. CO-OPERATION AND COMPETITION

As the economic rationale for internationalisation becomes increasingly important,

there are further implications for its behavioural consequences. We can see the eco-
nomic rationale being reflected in a change in the paradigms of internationalisation.
This change has been described by Haug (1999) and Van der Wende (2001) as a
shift from co-operation to competition.
The evidence of international competition between higher education systems and
institutions is increasingly being observed and discussed. To begin with the system
level, in Europe, comparisons with US higher education appear to be an issue of
growing concern. More generally, a powerful threat is being identified from the An-
glo-Saxon higher education systems and their strong position in the world-wide
higher education market. With the advantage of English as the lingua franca, flexible
degree structures, strong traditions in distance learning, off-shore delivery strategies,
(differential) fee systems which provide incentives to institutions to actively market
themselves overseas, and governments that actively support such international mar-
keting strategies, the Anglo-Saxon countries have an undeniably strong foothold in
the world-wide market. Several have adopted an explicitly, and sometimes even
aggressively, competitive approach to the internationalisation of higher education. In
contrast, most continental European countries seem to be pursuing a rather more co-
operative approach. Although various countries are developing a degree of market
orientation, in general continental Europe still tends to avoid a completely market-
and trade-oriented perspective in its higher education policies (cf. Prague Commu-
nique, 2001). This can mostly be explained from a political and value-based per-
spective; in many countries free access to higher education is seen as a social and
democratic necessity. Any view of higher education which treats it as a commodity
that can be traded on a world, or other, market is perceived to be in contlict with
this. As a consequence, there may be no motivation or justification for competing
internationally, or the benefits may be seen as outweighed by the costs, whether at
national or institutional levels. Moreover, in cases where higher education funding is
virtually completely provided by the state, no fees are charged to students and lim-
ited autonomy is granted to institutions, there may actually be few incentives and no
real options for competing internationally.
Yet the threat of competition from the Anglo-Saxon world is being felt in
Europe, and this was in fact one of the rationales for the Bologna Declaration, which
we discuss in more depth below. Since 1999, more than 30 countries have signed
this declaration with the objective of redefining the higher education structures of
Europe. One of the main aims of the Bologna Declaration is to improve the interna-
tional competitiveness of European higher education by increasing its transparency,
and in particular by enhancing the comparability of higher education degrees and
qualifications by introducing in each country a two-cycle (undergraduate-graduate)
system.
Self-evidently, if such a convergence of systems is to be achieved, more co-
operation will be required between countries. And although the ultimate rationale
may be enhancing international competitiveness, in line with continental European
traditions the Bologna Declaration stays clear of a market or trade perspective and
 GLOBALISATION AND INTERNATIONALISATION 109

calls its ultimate aim a "European higher education space". The question that will be
addressed in the next section is whether the Bologna approach can provide an ade-
quate response to the challenges of globalisation and the consequent increase in
competition. While addressing this question we will focus on two main issues for
analysis: the institutional arrangements suggested in the Bologna process and, more
specifically, its quality assurance provisions.

5. POLICY AGENDAS COMPARED

So far, we have examined current trends in higher education regarding globalisation
and internationalisation, and we have analysed these two concepts and their likely
behavioural consequences. Thus, we have set the stage for addressing the main ques-
tion of our essay, i.e., whether the Bologna process will be an adequate European
response to the wider challenges of globalisation. This issue is relevant for students
of social science, because the Bologna process is an eminent example of how Euro-
pean integration is proceeding in practice. And, in the words of Castells:
European integration is, at the same time, a reaction to the process of globalisation and
its most advanced expression. It is also the proof that the global economy is not an un-
differentiated system made up of finns and capital flows, but a regionalised structure in
which old national institutions and new supranational entities still playa major role in
organising economic competition, and in reaping, or spoiling, the benefits of it (Cas-
tells, 1998: 318).

5.1. Globalisation and the Bologna Institutional Arrangements

The first broad issue under our general problem statement concerns whether the in-
stitutional arrangements proposed in the Bologna process would seem to be an ade-
quate response to the challenges set by globalisation, or more concretely, by the
"WTO agenda". Still more concretely, in the previous sections this issue was nar-
rowed down to the question of competition (the WTO agenda) versus co-operation
(the Bologna response). However, this simple contrast seems to cover at least two
issues, viz. who are the relevant actors and how do they behave?
In our discussion so far, the relevant actors have unquestionably been state
agents: governments as such, ministers of education, ministers of international trade,
etc. Especially in Continental Europe, the role of higher education institutions hardly
comes to the fore. Yet the latter are the "providers" (in WTO parlance) of higher
education, while state governmental agents "only" set the conditions for them to
operate. For the same reason, it is higher education institutions that are in mind
when popular forecasts are made about "global players" developing in the interna-
tional higher education market. Our observation above, that the USA, the UK3 and
Australia are the three largest exporters of higher education, is a statistical simplifi-
cation, because statistics in the international arena tend to be aggregated by country.
It implies neither that all the higher education institutions in those countries are big
exporters of higher education, nor yet that large higher education exporters cannot
exist outside these three countries. We too would argue, therefore, that individual
110 FRANS VAN VUGHT, MARUK VAN DER WENDE & DON WESTERHEUDEN

higher education institutions must be included in our analysis. On the other hand, we
do not want to suggest that the game of global higher education is played only at this
level. As we mentioned before, state governments are still the main providers of
funding for most higher education institutions in most countries, including the three
countries just referred to. And governments set the rules of play for higher education
institutions in their country.
And there is the rub, in the previous sentence: governments only set the rules for
higher education institutions in their country. As we have argued elsewhere (Van der
Wende & Westerheijden, 2001), there is a growing margin of trans-national higher
education which invites the question whether its regulation (regarding degrees, qual-
ity, tuition and fees, etc.) should be the responsibility of the "sending country", of
the "receiving country", or of both? This is not the place to answer this question, nor
is it our intention to survey the different practices in this regard around the world or
even in Europe (cf. Campbell & Van der Wende, 2000), the question does point to
the gap that is widening between the traditional institutional arrangements in conti-
nental Europe and the emerging global higher education market game. Higher edu-
cation is "denationalising", which reinforces our argument that analysis will have to
focus more than it has previously done on the level of the higher education institu-
tion rather than the government.
The assumption underlying the Bologna process is that national state govern-
ments retain the responsibility for higher education as before. The group organising
the Bologna process is a complex set of governmental agencies, including the
Commission of the ED, and with revolving chairmanship4. There is no mention in
the Bologna Declaration of any challenge to the traditional arrangements whereby
governments dominate higher education systems. On the contrary, the Prague Com-
munique states that:
higher education is perceived as a public good and governments are the agents in soci-
ety that are responsible for providing public goods (Prague Communique, 2001).

In a large group of countries, the Bologna Declaration statements are not just
rhetoric, but the actual basis of higher education policy: higher education institutions
are all or almost all public, there are no tuition fees, etc. At the same time, in their
national higher education policies, another group of state governments has been
moving beyond this public service rhetoric for almost two decades 5. In fact, in ever
more countries, ever more (quasi-)market arrangements have been introduced in
public higher education.
The discourse of higher education as a public good presumes the existence of
harmonious relations between a paternalistic government and higher education insti-
tutions as loyal state agencies (Bleiklie, 1998). Within such a national higher educa-
tion system, the basic rule of behaviour is co-operation. That this is rhetoric rather
than a good explanation of behaviour in higher education systems has been borne
out by studies of reforms since decades (Cerych & Sabatier, 1986; Grondsma, 1987:
Van Vught & Westerheijden, 1991 and many others). Yet the rhetoric lives on. This
rhetoric is perhaps even stronger at the international level, because at this level dip-
lomatic rules of conduct prevail. In diplomatic language, the pressure to use co-
operative phrases is particularly strong, especially among states that are trying hard
 GLOBALISATION AND INTERNA TIONALISA TION 111

to define their common future in the European Union. Accordingly, it is understand-

able that in the Bologna process co-operation should be the main rule of (written)
behaviour. Moreover, as we have argued above, any view of internationalisation as
an economic process has been, until recently, rather marginal. Institutions and gov-
ernments could therefore easily afford to be co-operative. Now that internationalisa-
tion, spurred on by continuing globalisation, has gained real and substantial financial
and strategic importance, the stakes are higher - and the actors must be much more
careful in their behaviour.
Another aspect of the discourse is revealed by the wisecrack that co-operation is
best organised by finding a common enemy. To the extent that the Bologna process
aims to make European higher education more attractive to students from outside
Europe, co-operation within Europe is certainly a viable option: the USA would be
the main "enemy" reference point in a world-wide competition in which Europe can
gain if it stands together 6. To the extent, however, that the process aims to enhance
student mobility within Europe, participant countries' higher education systems are
fishing in the same pool of (highly talented) students, which by its very nature im-
plies competition.
Market behaviour derives from the structure of the system rather than from its
rhetoric. In any higher education system a number of higher education providers
offer degrees, certificates etc. to a clientele of students. In many European higher
education systems the number of higher education institutions is limited, so that for
the existing suppliers one would expect that the rules of oligopoly would prevail.
However, in the public higher education systems of the post-World War II western
world, governmental (welfare state) planning ensured that higher education institu-
tions hardly had to compete with one another at all. Each institution was to a large
extent a regional monopolist: for most of its general programmes, it attracted most
students from its own region. For specialised studies, governments often planned for
a single provider for the whole country or for large regions. Both options resulted in
little competition among providers. Moreover, student numbers were growing at
enormous rates in most western countries in the second half of the 20 th century.
These conditions of growing demand, often related (at least until the 1980s) to grow-
ing state budgets for higher education, also meant that there was not much reason for
higher education institutions to engage in competitive behaviour.
In the late 20 th century, the market structure of higher education systems changed.
As we have written on earlier occasions (e.g. Van Vught, 1994), around 1980 in
several countries, although for various reasons, governmental budgets reached their
limit and student numbers stopped growing as quickly as before7. In and of itself,
this change meant that the suppliers found themselves in a much more competitive
relationship to one another: if the "pie" is not growing any more, suppliers will vie
for market share. But in addition to this, under the influence of neo-liberalism gov-
ernments changed their steering philosophy from comprehensive central planning to
steering that emphasised market-like relationships. Higher education institutions
were expected to compete for limited governmental funding (most notably in the
British Research Assessment Exercises: Lindsay & Rogers, 1998; Mace, 2000;
McNay, 1997). This combination of events meant that institutional behaviour in the
112 FRANS V AN VUGHT, MARUK V AN DER WENDE & DON WESTERHEUDEN

higher education system quickly came to be ruled more by competition than by co-
operation.
A further reason why higher education is becoming more of a competitive mar-
ket lies in the dynamics of the globalisation process. Traditional public and private
higher education institutions, especially in the USA, began to develop lucrative edu-
cational activities such as executive MBA programmes. Once a number of prestig-
ious US higher education institutions started to exploit international demand not
only by accepting international students, but by actively seeking them out through
offerings outside the USA, the term "trans-national education" was coined and the
globalisation game had begun (Sporn, 2000). Other higher education institutions in
the USA mimicked this behaviour (van Vught, 1996), hoping to take their share of
the gains. In addition, new private providers of higher education entered the market
(the University of Phoenix being the standard example), and public universities in
some continental European countries followed suit (Westerheijden, 2000).
The conclusion, we argue, is that although competitive characteristics are clearly
becoming more dominant in higher education, the Bologna process appears to re-
main mainly focused on co-operation. The institutional arrangements suggested in
the Bologna process assume that national governments can still largely set the be-
havioural rules for higher education institutions, and that these institutions will not
respond to broad international opportunities even when the growth in their national
markets is coming to a halt. However, as can be observed from the behaviour of a
growing number of higher education providers, the opportunities of globalisation
appear to be very attractive - certainly for those institutions that have gained the
autonomy that allows them to exploit these opportunities. Higher education institu-
tions are increasingly responding to their new environmental conditions, in which
competition rather than co-operation appears to be the name of the game. Therefore,
the Bologna process is not an adequate response to the challenges of globalisation.
Its institutional arrangements lack a view on competitive behaviour at the level of
higher education institutions, and they focus too narrowly on co-operation between
national governments. Besides, the crucial challenges which many countries face in
providing sufficient public funding for higher education and for its further expansion
into life long learning have been excluded from Bologna's focus.

5.2. Globalisation and Quality Assurance in the Bologna Process

Another issue pertaining to our key question is the degree to which the forms of
quality assurance which are now emerging on a European level in the Bologna proc-
ess will be adequate to respond to the global challenges. We focus on quality assur-
ance, because it is agreed that a key condition for the achievement of convergence,
as implied by the Bologna Declaration, will be to reach a common understanding of
the meaning - in terms both of graduates' knowledge and competencies, and of the
educational process leading to these outcomes - of bachelors and masters level pro-
grammes across Europe. Unearthing and then interpreting the information needed
for this understanding, in other words increasing transparency, will be one of the
main functions of quality assurance in the European "higher education area".
 GLOBALISATION AND INTERNATIONALISATION 113

The fIrst observation to be made is that in the Bologna Declaration, the phrase
about quality assurance is both short and vague. The Declaration called on signatory
countries to engage in the
promotion of European co-operation in quality assurance with a view to developing
comparable criteria and methodologies (Bologna Declaration, 1999).

Evidently the text was written this way, not because the signatories believed
quality assurance to be unimportant, but rather because the process of reaching a
compromise on a sharper statement would have provoked too many sensitivities.
The main impact of the Bologna Declaration on the countries involved is of
course the commitment to redefIne their present higher education structure into two-
cycle degrees, commonly called the bachelors and masters levels of study. The aim
of the Declaration, to attract more students into European higher education, assumes
that potential students from around the world will be able to know precisely what a
bachelors or masters degree from a particular institution means, whether for entrance
to further studies or to the labour market. But given the present ')ungle of degrees"
across Europe, even though the bachelors-masters structure is supposed to be the
solution, simply relabeling existing programmes and degrees will not lead to the
required clarity (Haug & Tauch, 2001). A student aiming to select, for example, a
masters degree in electrical engineering from the total European offering will not
know if a programme from an institution in Ireland has the same value as one from
an Estonian or Maltese higher education institution - just to pick some geographical
extremes. As a result, the issue of quality assurance has acquired a prominent place,
in principle, in the Bologna process. This is how the rhetoric of similar labels across
Europe is to be turned into reality. No wonder, then, that at the diplomatic level the
issue of quality assurance is being shunned as far as possible.
Precisely what kind of reality is to be inferred from the new common labels is an
unsolved question in itself. The use of the term "easily readable and comparable
degrees" in the Bologna Declaration may mean either "similar degrees" or "degrees
that can be compared", for example on a number of common dimensions such as
students' time investment (the ECTS approach), the types of knowledge and skills
which are taught, the level of knowledge contained in the curriculum, the knowledge
and skills which are acquired by students, their competencies and so on. If the term
is interpreted to mean "similar degrees", which we would call the maximal defIni-
tion of comparability, this implies a high degree of homogenisation of higher educa-
tion programmes across Europe. Even if academics at the basic-unit level in some
internationally oriented fIelds may agree that the homogenisation of programmes in
their fIeld would be a development to be expected or even to be desired, at the level
of national politics this option is clearly out of the question at present. The discourse
still mainly asserts that "Europe's diversity is its richness", with only small inroads
being made in recent years by "comparability" arguments - in all their ambiguity 8.
The alternative, minimal definition of comparability, insists not on homogeneity, but
on transparency of differences. Is it possible that the institutional arrangements for
quality assurance which are embodied in the Bologna process can provide this trans-
parency?
114 FRANS V AN VUGHT, MARUK V AN DER WENDE & DON WESTERHEUDEN

The Bologna Declaration itself repeats the ambiguity game in the statement on
quality assurance quoted above: the aim is co-operation focusing [but how?] on
"comparable" [sic] "criteria and methodologies". If the emphasis turns out to be on
criteria, the maximal approach towards homogenisation may win the day. But if it is
on methodologies [in the plura!!], the minimal approach will be adopted, leading to
transparency at best - and then only if these methodologies are themselves both
transparent and comparable.
What, in fact, are the institutional arrangements for quality assurance at which
the Bologna process has arrived? The Bologna Declaration itself, as quoted above,
was silent on that point. However, between Bologna (1999) and Prague (the first
follow-up meeting in the Bologna process, in 2001), much has happened, especially
regarding quality assurance. In a number of countries, including Germany, Switzer-
land, the Netherlands and Belgium (Flanders), the idea of programme accreditation
as a new approach to quality assurance has burst into the policy arena. Develop-
ments have progressed furthest in Germany (which had a head start, since its discus-
sions of accreditation had already begun in the light of the 1998 Sorbonne
Declaration). Here an Accreditation Council has been established, mainly for the
recognition of the actual accreditors of programmes in the new bachelors-masters
degree structure. A similar arrangement is to come into being in the Netherlands
shortly after the writing of the present chapter (see also Commissie Accreditatie Ho-
ger Onderwijs, 2001; Van der Wende & Westerheijden, 2001; Westerheijden, 2001).
Both systems are open in principle to accreditors from other countries, but both lan-
guage and regulatory barriers seem to favour national agencies. At least, this is what
experience in Germany suggests: the six agencies which have been recognised up to
the end of 2001 are all based in Germany.
With approaches such as in Germany and the Netherlands, based on nationally
organised accreditation agencies each applying their own, nationally defined, sets of
criteria for bachelors and masters degrees,
there is ... a danger that Europe may be moving out of a jungle of degrees but into a
jungle of quality assurance and accreditation standards, procedures and agencies (Haug
& Tauch, 2001: 43).

The education ministers at the Prague follow-up conference in 2001 chose the
following solution to this danger:
Ministers called upon the universities and other higher education institutions, national
agencies and the European Network of Quality Assurance in Higher Education (ENQA)
... to collaborate in establishing a common framework of reference and to disseminate
best practice (Prague Communique, 2001).

In other words, the ministers of education put the initiative in the hands of their
own national quality assessment agencies collaborating through ENQA, and not of
the higher education institutions which, in the run-up to the Prague summit, had de-
veloped a scenario for a "European platform" which would include all stakeholders
(Sursock, 2001). We note that, continuing the Bologna Declaration's approach of
co-operation aimed at comparable criteria and methodologies, ministers' hope is
now vested in a "common framework" - which, again depending on interpretation,
could mean a focus either on criteria or on methodologies. With ENQA in the lead.
 GLOBALISATION AND INTERNATIONALISATION 115

it looks probable that in practice the interpretation will be a focus on methodologies

to be applied by national quality assessment and accreditation agencies, even if the
ministers may have had something more substantial in mind 9. Given the different
approaches which have been used so far by national quality assessment and accredi-
tation agencies in Europe, given the diplomatic sensitivities in the inter-
governmental education field, and in view of the practices developed over time in
the area of international recognition of degrees, one possible scenario for ENQA
would be to end up by promoting the principle of trust. That would imply accepting
that similarly named degrees are of equivalent value to those issued nationally -
perhaps also making use for enhanced transparency of the Diploma Supplement
which followed the Lisbon Convention. In our opinion such a scenario would mean
another opportunity lost. But more importantly, it would seem to prolong the gov-
ernments' refusal to acknowledge a growing trend:
The still limited, but growing phenomenon of European universities seeking accredita-
tion from overseas seems to be largely ignored. . .. The fact that foreign accreditation
produces no direct legal consequence in any of the countries concerned should not oc-
cult the main issue, which is related to the reasons why European universities seek in-
ternational acceptance and credibility from abroad (Haug & Tauch, 2001: 43).

At this point, we return to our earlier observation that the institutional level must
be given a more prominent place, not only in the analysis of higher education, but
also in the institutional design of higher education systems.
The Bologna process, as we argued earlier, starts from the assumption that state
governments can validly represent "their" respective higher education systems. This
is based on further assumptions of central control and of the "legal homogeneity"
(Neave, 1995) of higher education institutions within countries. However, we must
repeat that higher education institutions are increasingly seeking their own path to
reduce their dependence on their state government. Trans-national education is an
important option in this regard, and stimulated by the European higher education
area promised in the Bologna Declaration, institutions are developing their own
quite different demands for internationally readable quality "kite marks" for their
programme offerings. However, what is "internationally readable" may well depend
on the particular student market niche which is targeted by a programme. For in-
stance, upwardly and internationally mobile managers will attach more value to a
US or European MBA accreditation awarded by a professional organisation, while
bachelors graduates seeking a research career may be more impressed with a disci-
pline-based or governmental accreditation for a top European Masters programme.
As mentioned before, the new arrangements for programme accreditation in Ger-
many and the Netherlands are in principle open to what we have called a multiple
accreditation system (Van Vught, 1994; Westerheijden & Van der Wende, 2001). In
such a system higher education institutions would be free to acquire all the accredi-
tations they want, to correspond to the programme profile they wish to display, and
accrediting agencies are free to offer accreditation in all countries. Both freedoms
should only be regulated by the national accreditation board, or its equivalent, so far
as is necessary to ensure the soundness and credibility of the various accreditations
which may be demanded and offered. Such an arrangement would serve as a gate-
116 FRANS V AN VUGHT, MAR UK V AN DER WENDE & DON WESTERHEUDEN

keeper for the government, which in turn could base its own recognition and funding
decisions on those accreditations recognised by the national accreditation board. In
practice, that is in the actual implementation of the accreditation board schemes in
Germany, the Netherlands and other countries, it still remains to be seen if such
openness to multiple accreditation will materialise. Early signals from Germany are
not very promising, as we mentioned above.
If it indeed proves to be the case that, in practice, the new national accreditation
systems will not be open to international accreditation agencies, the status quo ante
the Bologna Declaration will still prevail, and no progress will have been made to-
wards "readable and comparable" degrees. This is a (close to) worst-case scenario,
but it cannot be ruled out at the outset: the use of the ENQA framework to provide
comparison and mutual acceptance of nationally different quality assessment meth-
odologies may be a politically achievable compromise, but this would not really
increase the transparency of Europe's higher education on a global or even a Euro-
pean scale.
A best-case scenario, with harmonious relations developing between national
gatekeeper boards and a relatively open Europe-wide market of accreditation agen-
cies, would answer the requirements of the signatories to the Bologna Declaration.
For it would give state governments some form of control over the quality of higher
education provision in their country: non-accredited programmes would not lead to
recognised degrees and no funding would be given to students and institutions for
such programmes. Simultaneously, it would give higher education institutions a
large degree of freedom to develop and display their own profile by choosing among
alternative accreditors. At the same time, it would answer the demands of students,
employers and other stakeholders for transparency about equivalences and differ-
ences between degree programmes across Europe lO .
But more than that, a multiple accreditation system may be the only quality as-
surance scheme that would also answer the demands of the WTO agenda for free
trade in education services. It would give state governments control over the mini-
mum quality of higher education provision in their countries, but without excluding
any higher education provider, from any country, in advance.
Of course a multiple accreditation system has drawbacks as well. Some observ-
ers fear that a mUltiple accreditation system will replace the "jungle of degrees" with
a jungle of accreditations. Admittedly, more options for accreditation would be on
offer than if there were only a single "kite mark" per country. On the other hand, the
credibility of the various accreditations on offer could be verified by looking at the
national recognition that the accreditors had been given. That would still leave a
student with the task of assessing the relative value of the judgements of thirty-odd
national accreditation boards. In this respect the collective European platform pro-
posed by the higher education institutions, and mentioned above, would be a consid-
erable advance towards a European multiple accreditation system (Sursock, 2001).
Another drawback is that any accreditation scheme would be limited to officially
recognised degrees with titles such as bachelors and masters; it will always be pos-
sible for higher education institutions - and governments - to invent new certificates
or degrees. Yet maybe that is the margin of the higher education market that gov-
 GLOBALISATION AND INTERNATlONALISATlON 117

ernments do not need to control too closely, as long as graduates from the accredited
bachelors and masters degrees have the requisite knowledge and skills to decide for
themselves what is a credible and what is a bogus post-graduate course.

6. CONCLUSIONS
Internationalisation has become an important phenomenon in higher education, cov-
ering a broad range of activities of increasing strategic importance. Especially in
continental Europe, the process of institutional change in response has largely been
based on co-operation across state borders, but with an important role to be played
by nation states and national policies in stimulating and facilitating this co-
operation. In contrast to internationalisation, the concept of globalisation emphasises
the increasing convergence and interdependence of economies and societies, while
both the de-nationalisation of regulatory systems and a blurring of the role of nation
states are taken for granted. And the further liberalisation of international trade in
educational services, as proposed for the next round of GATS negotiations, is al-
ready presenting new challenges to higher education systems and institutions.
The central question raised in this article was whether the Bologna process is an
adequate European response to these wider challenges of globalisation. It became
clear that in terms of both practice and perceptions, internationalisation is closer to
the well-established tradition of international co-operation and mobility and to the
core academic values of quality and excellence, whereas globalisation refers more to
competition, pushing the concept of higher education as a tradable commodity and
challenging the concept of higher education as a public good.
Both the Bologna Declaration and the Prague Communique emphasised co-
operation and public good arguments exclusively. In that way, they are largely deny-
ing that competition in higher education also exists within and between European
countries, and that certain countries have deliberately introduced market mecha-
nisms and competition as part of new steering concepts, while even in some of the
countries where public good arguments are strongly supported, public higher educa-
tion is funded inadequately. Although we cannot address these issues more exten-
sively, judging by our analysis it seems at least doubtful whether the Bologna
process can result in an adequate answer to the challenges of globalisation, and to
WTO liberalisation in particular.
The often-voiced arguments against globalisation contend that global competi-
tion and free trade in the area of higher education will be disadvantageous to smaller
nations and languages, and will threaten national sovereignty over educational sys-
tems (eventually including its public funding), institutional autonomy, academic
freedom and job security. Furthermore, the opposition to the globalisation of higher
education is largely founded on arguments about quality. Yet our conclusion is that,
so far, the Bologna process has not yielded an adequate response to the challenges of
globalisation in the field of quality assurance. Proposals developed up to 2001 have
been limited to developing a "common framework" of national systems of quality
control. A truly open, Europe-wide perspective is apparently still a bridge too far for
the education authorities and for (most) higher education institutions. The effect of
118 FRANS VAN VUGHT, MARUK VAN DER WENDE & DON WESTERHEUDEN

this over-careful approach may well be that some more entrepreneurial European
higher education institutions, inspired by the challenges and opportunities of global-
isation, will seek their quality assurance and accreditation outside Europe. Under
such a scenario, the tensions between the WTO agenda and the Bologna agenda
would increase in the years to come.

NOTES

In response to this pro-market position, it can also be argued that higher education is not like other
services, since its full value can only be assessed after many years; moreover the aim, especially of
initial higher education, is no less than to transform young people (Harvey & Knight, 1996), imply-
ing that they will assess the value of higher education quite differently before and after they under-
take their studies.
2 However essential, public support does also complicate the task for higher education institutions, as
the tendency is for governments, in exchange for (often at best) stable public contributions, to de-
mand ever greater output, quality and relevance - and these goals may be at odds with the require-
ments for market success.
3 The United Kingdom is in a hybrid situation. On one hand, British universities are among the major
'global players', while on the other, the UK government is among the signatories of the Sorbonne
and Bologna declarations.
4 The communique of the Prague follow-up conference can be found on http://www.msmt.czlSum-
mitlindex.html, or through http://www.esib.orglprague (both accessed 18.1.2002).
And even in countries where the rhetoric can still be heard, public higher education is often under-
funded and policymakers may choose to deny the existence of a private sector which has grown up to
serve the consequent unmet demand.
6 Of course, more work will be needed to make intra-European co-operation the preferred option. for
example a consensus on quality and levels. Paradoxically then, it seems that a successful Bologna
process may be a precondition for the success of the Bologna process; a case of bootstrapping that
would make Von Miinchbausenjealous.
7 In Southern, Central and Eastern Europe no stabilisation of student demand has yet been reached, but
the limits of state budgets are definitely making themselves felt.
8 An ambiguous example can be seen in the communique of the 2001 Prague summit, suggesting a
slow but continuing shift in perspective: 'Ministers committed themselves to continue their co-
operation based on the objectives set out in the Bologna Declaration, building on the similarities and
benefiting from the differences between cultures, languages and national systems .. .' (Prague Com-
munique,2001).
9 At least this might be concluded from the statement later in the Prague communique about 'coherent
quality assurance and accreditation I certification mechanisms' - 'coherent' seeming to be a stronger
formulation than 'comparable'.
10 This still leaves open how state governments can evade other prohibitions, e.g. unequal funding of
public and private higher education (,unfair competition').

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 LAD IS LAV CERYCH

SORBONNE, BOLOGNA, PRAGUE: WHERE DO WE

GO FROM HERE?1

1. INTRODUCTION

The purpose of this paper is not an analysis of the outcome of the three conferences
named above, but a kind of reflection on the declared main aim of these conferences,
namely the achievement of, or at least a stride towards, a "European Higher Educa-
tion Area".
But first of all, what exactly should be understood by the goal of a "European
Higher Education Area"? No single clear definition has been provided by any of the
documents underlying or resulting from the three conferences. However, a certain
general consensus seems to exist. It turns around a certain number of general con-
cepts such as "harmonisation", "convergence" or "co-ordination". About all of these
concepts one can say that they are not particularly new but that, on the contrary, they
have accompanied the development of higher education for several decades, if not
much longer. This will be clearer once we examine, one by one, the specific recom-
mendations of the three conferences, and especially of Bologna and Prague.
The main recommendations of the Bologna Declaration, which are, to a certain
extent at least, a follow-up to the Sorbonne conference, can be summarised as fol-
lows:
adoption of a system of easily readable and comparable degrees;
adoption of a system based on two main cycles (undergraduate and graduate) of
higher education study;
establishment of a system of transferable credits (similar to the ECTS) as a
means to promote student mobility, including credits acquired in non-higher
education contexts and recognised by universities;
overcoming obstacles to student, teacher, researcher and other staff mobility;
promoting European co-operation in quality assurance;
promoting European dimensions in higher education with regard to curriculum
development, inter-institutional co-operation, mobility schemes and integrated
programmes of study and research.
The Prague Communique (of May 19, 2001) does, in its first part, subscribe to
the above six recommendations making at least some of them clearer and more pre-
cise. One of the recommendations has, in this respect, acquired almost a new mean-
ing or at least a new interpretation, namely the point concerning the adoption of a
system based on two main cycles of higher education studies. Whereas in Bologna it
was clearly stated that all those trying to accede to the second cycle must have suc-

121
J. Enders and O. Fulton (eds.), Higher Education in a Globalising World, 121-126.
© 2002 Kluwer Academic Publishers.
122 LADISLAV CERYCH

cessfully completed a first undergraduate cycle and degree, the Prague Communique
is in this respect more flexible by stressing that different types of undergraduate de-
grees and programmes with different orientations might be envisaged, e.g. those
which are implicitly destined as preparation for graduate studies versus those re-
sponding primarily to immediate labour market needs.
The second part of the Prague Communique includes three not necessarily new
points but at least three points of emphasis which were not stressed or mentioned in
the Bologna Declaration: emphasis on lifelong learning, emphasis on the importance
of the role of students (and of higher education institutions generally), and increased
concern for the attractiveness of the European higher education (implicitly meaning
also concern for transnational education and its perspectives). It should also be
stressed that the Prague Communique puts much more weight than the Bologna
Declaration on European co-operation in quality assurance. Without recommending
the setting up of new institutions for that purpose, it clearly calls for a certain co-
ordination (a "European network") in this respect.
Does the Bologna-Prague process imply a major innovation in the development
of higher education?
There are probably several answers to the above question with two extreme
statements: Yes, it represents an important and innovative new trend; or: No, it re-
flects a process with a long tradition.
Let us examine first the second of these two arguments. This, in fact, is not diffi-
cult since most of the supporting points are well known: In a sense, a European
Higher Education Area existed already in the middle ages. Bologna, Paris, Oxford,
Salamanca, Coimbra and many other institutions created slightly later were part of a
network with a certain degree of students' and scholars' mobility and mutual recog-
nition, even if these terms were not used at that time. More recently, and especially
in the course of the 19th century, particular models of higher education patterns
spread over several countries. For example the German Humboldt model with its
influence and impact on central and eastern European and many other continental
European countries as well as on British civic universities and several of the most
prestigeful American institutions. To a lesser extent, the same can be said of the
French Napoleonic model with its influence especially in southern Europe and Latin
America. In other words, it can probably be said that a "European Higher Education
Area" was always there, or certainly during the middle ages and in the 19th century.
But maybe most important for the "nothing new in the Bologna-Prague process"
argument is the development of the European Community (and later European Un-
ion) higher education policy and programmes since the 1970s. Some of the specific
aims of the Bologna Declaration (see above) are in fact virtually identical to those of
ERASMUS, SOCRATES, Cornett, Leonardo etc. of the EC or EU. This is in par-
ticular true of the goals of increased student and staff mobility but also of certain
memoranda of the European Commission dealing with issues - and stressing corre-
sponding measures - in the area of distance education or lifelong learning.
Why was it necessary to have a Bologna-Prague process in addition to all what
already existed or was pursued within the framework of the EC or EU? Moreover,
why were the existing non-governmental mechanisms such as the European Rectors'
 SORBONNE,BOLOGNA,PRAGUE 123

Conference (now the European University Association) not considered as sufficient

and another institutional framework was required?
To answer these questions we have to turn to the opposite argument: yes, the Bo-
logna-Prague process represents an important new trend (we might even add: an
indispensable trend).
First of all, it can be said that, up to the 1970s, all the past measures and facilities
mentioned above (with regard to student and staff mobility or mutual exchanges and
recognition) concerned only a tiny minority of the populations concerned - less than
I % and probably less than 2 to 3% even in the course of the 19th century. The quan-
titative expansion - the transition from "elite to mass higher education" to use Mar-
tin Trow's terms - of the past 40 to 50 years implied, however, not just a growth of
numbers, the whole nature of the problem has changed. Higher education involving
only few percent (may be up to 10-15%) of the age group is one thing - 25 to 50%
or more is another. Added to that another two processes, besides the quantitative and
qualitative expansion of higher education, are taking place and are closely related to
it, namely on the one hand, the development of what is known as the knowledge
society, and the globalisation process, on the other. All these phenomena combined
imply, it can be argued, that a European Higher Education Area as proposed and
indirectly postulated by the Bologna Declaration and two years later by the Prague
Communique is significantly different from what existed (without necessarily these
terms and this label being used) in earlier times and before the large programmes of
the EC and EU have been launched. But why then was it necessary to add Bologna,
Sorbonne before and Prague later to these programmes?
There are at least two answers to this question. On the one hand, the Bologna-
Prague process covers presently over 30 countries, the EU only 15 (even if their
number will increase sooner or later). This wider coverage of the former is surely
significant from both political and practical reasons linked to the nature and devel-
opment of higher education. The universities of Sofia or Bucharest (not mentioning
Prague or Budapest) want to be part of the European Higher Education Area - and
already consider themselves to be its integral component - without waiting to be-
come member of the EU, which might take several years if not a decade or more.
The other reason why the Bologna-Prague process and area can (should?) be pre-
ferred to the EU framework is of another nature. The EU is in many ways a supra-
national institution, which many consider - rightly or wrongly - as a very heavy and
bureaucratic organisation limiting through its regulations true university autonomy
and the desirable diversity of European higher education. On the contrary, the Bolo-
gna-Prague process represents a more or less traditional inter-governmental process,
relatively flexible, respectful of university autonomy and automatically supportive
of diversity of higher education (at least considered internationally). This inter-
governmental stance is clearly expressed in the closing section of the Prague Com-
munique when it says:
Ministers committed themselves to continue their co-operation based on the objectives
set out in the Bologna Declaration, building on the similarities and benefiting from the
differences between cultures, languages and national systems, and drawing on all possi-
bilities of inter-governmental co-operation and the ongoing dialogue with European
124 LADISLA V CERYCH

universities and other higher education institutions and student organisations as well as
the Community programmes.

Community programmes are, as can be seen, mentioned but they certainly don't
play a central role whereas in the Bologna Declaration they were not mentioned at
all.
We shall return to the issue of relations between the Bologna-Prague process and
the EU, or rather the European Commission, in the concluding part of this paper.

2. BOLOGNA-PRAGUE AND THE GLOBALISATION PROCESS

Obviously, the trend towards a "European Higher Education Area" can be consid-
ered, and no doubt is a part of the more general process of globalisation. Strictly
speaking, it is one of its non-economic features even if it includes also same impor-
tant economic aspects (e.g., emphasis on the need of responding to labour market
needs and, to some extent, the whole dichotomy between undergraduate and gradu-
ate studies).
However, here again, we can ask a similar question to the one posed earlier in re-
spect to the issue of the relative novelty of the Bologna-Prague process. Is globalisa-
tion in the development of higher education indeed a completely or more or less new
phenomenon? We would argue that it is not and more so in higher education than in
almost any other area. A certain community of scholars always existed, universities
were or tried always to be universal also in the geographic sense and both the church
and later science attempted always to be "global". Thus, universities have been not
only part but in a certain sense an advanced agent of the globalisation process. Of
course, there were periods in many countries when higher education assumed purely
national if not nationalistic and ideologically biased goals (e.g. Lysenko in the So-
viet Union or the Nazi Germany racist doctrines) but overall, the universal, the
"globalistic" preoccupations in higher education certainly predominate. What is new
in the present globalisation process are certainly its economic aspects and their im-
pact on higher education. With or without Bologna or Prague, and even with or
without ERASMUS and the EU, there would be an increasing pressure on graduates
and students of different European countries to move from one system to another.
Bologna-Prague and the EU make simply these movements easier.
In summary, therefore, the globalisation process is an important factor in the de-
velopment towards a European Higher Education Area but the latter is, at the same
time, one of the forces of globalisation.
An additional point concerning the relation between globalisation and the Euro-
pean Higher Education Area can be raised. To our knowledge it has seldom if ever
been formally mentioned although it seems pertinent. Is not the concept and aim of a
European Higher Education Area a certain means by which some of the negative
aspects of globalisation can be limited in their effects? Whether "Mac-
Donaldisation" is a danger not just for European gastronomy but also for European
higher education can not be discussed here but, clearly, the emphasis of the Bolo-
gna-Prague process on quality assurance and control is, among other measures pro-
posed, a development towards a diversified and not "mac-donaldised" system of
 SORBONNE,BOLOGNA,PRAGUE 125

higher education. At the same time we can argue that one of the main aims of the
European Higher Education Area is to increase the competitiveness of European
higher education which practically means to strengthen its role within a globalised
world. In a simplified way we might, therefore, say that the Bologna-Prague process,
as a development towards a European Higher Education Area, is at the same time, a
consequence and one of the responses to the globalisation trend and to some of its
negative aspects.

3. WHO SHOULD TAKE CARE?

What are the future perspectives of the Bologna-Prague process, what should be
aimed at in Berlin in 2003 and especially, as implied in the above subtitle, who
should be responsible?
The answer to the last of these questions is provided in the concluding part of the
Prague Communique. Basically, it proposes the same structure as the one existing
since Bologna and before Prague: a large follow-up group composed of representa-
tives of all signatories of the Bologna and Prague declarations, new participants and
the European Commission, and a preparatory group composed of representatives of
the countries hosting the previous and the next ministerial meetings, two EU mem-
ber states and two non EU member states, the European Presidency at the time and
the European Commission.
At least four points should be mentioned in connection with the proposed follow-
up. Firstly, it is no doubt a relatively heavy mechanism. Secondly, this mechanism
tries to conciliate the already stressed inter-governmental nature of the Bologna-
Prague process (or rather, of the "official" trend towards a European Higher Educa-
tion Area) with a certain involvement of the European Commission. Thus, the latter
is increasingly (although still not quite formally) being recognised as an important
actor in the development towards a European Higher Education Area.
Thirdly, the Prague Communique does not mention - and the same was true of
the Bologna Declaration - any secretariate or more or less permanent co-ordination
body responsible for the management of the whole scheme and process. This is left
to the different country representatives and may be, implicitly but without mention-
ing it, to the European University Association which so far played a key role in the
Bologna conference and its follow-up.
Fourthly and finally, a curious mixture between the inter-governmental process
mentioned above and the EU involvement is emerging (in fact, it took place already
before Prague): the key if not dominating role of the EU presidency (changing every
six months). In the Prague conference, for example, the Swedish presidency played
a most important role, which, in a way, made the EU a key actor in the whole Bolo-
gna-Prague process. To some, this might seem almost paradoxical: Sweden is cer-
tainly not known as a major protagonist of closer EU integration.
To conclude with a personal view: We don't believe that the follow-up proposals
of the Prague Communique are adequate. They surely imply the continuation of a
rather confused situation in which the responsibilities of the different actors are not
clearly defined, and especially, where the role of the European Commission is not
126 LADISLAV CERYCH

ascertained, although as everybody knows, it remains the main financial source of

the Bologna-Prague process. This process implies many important innovations (even
in respect to past and existing EU policies) but somebody has to take care of them.
We see only three possibilities:
a) The present and (both in Bologna and Prague) proposed follow-up mechanisms
and procedures will continue and remain the only ones available. This will pro-
duce rather modest results and not really a significant drive towards a European
Higher Education Area because the process will not be guided, no priorities set
and the confusion between EU, national and inter-governmental responsibilities
will remain as it prevails today.
b) The European Commission would take over and would be more or less formally
recognised as "implementor of the process towards a European Higher Educa-
tion Area". A special division would probably be created for that purpose. The
important point here will be to take sufficient care of interests and aspirations of
non EU member countries and leave the scheme flexible and open for further
modifications.
c) The co-ordination of the whole programme becomes a responsibility of an exist-
ing (or ad hoc created new?) non-governmental body such as the European Uni-
versity Association (former CRE and Confederation of Rectors' Conferences)
with close links to, and co-operation with, European Universities, governments
and the EU. Appropriate contractual arrangements should be made between
these different actors.
We would strongly favour a combination between the second and third of these
three solutions.

NOTES

The present article has no academic ambitions and is certainly not a research piece. It is merely a
personal reflexion on one of the many projects Ulrich Teichler and I have been jointly involved in.
 AKIRA ARIMOTO

GLOBALISATION AND HIGHER EDUCATION

REFORMS: THE JAPANESE CASE I

The university is by nature a knowledge-based association, an organisation whose

foundation is knowledge. Now, however, society in general is becoming, to an in-
creasing extent, a knowledge-based association. One of the key terms used in this
chapter is the concept of knowledge-based society. Analytically, a tentative distinc-
tion can be made between what I define as Knowledge-Based Society 1 [KBS1] and
Knowledge-Based Society 2 [KBS2]. The former refers to the academic enterprise,
whose main aim is the development of knowledge; the latter refers to society at
large, which is increasingly induding academic activities within its own functions
and roles. Society has lagged many years behind academia in carrying out the three
functions of research, teaching and learning - based on the advancement of knowl-
edge, the resources of knowledge, and the academic discipline. However, the impor-
tance of knowledge is now part of the social fabric, and the distinction between
society in general (KBS2) and the knowledge-based society of the university
(KBS 1) has begun to blur.
Globalisation, meanwhile, is spreading from the economic and political spheres
into culture, and higher education is being globalised. The university, by its very
nature, has the edge on society at large in terms of globalisation, belonging as it does
to the international network of knowledge-based organisations that we call academe.
Today, when we are seeing the birth of a global knowledge-based society and are
approaching an age in which there is greater commonality, communicability, and
contemporaneity among universities and throughout higher education, reforms of
higher education are imperative. This essay uses the Japanese case to focus on ef-
forts in that direction.

1. KNOWLEDGE-BASED SOCIETY AND THE REFORM OF HIGHER

EDUCATION

Today, when the raison d'etre for the university is being questioned and its struc-
tures and functions are being reconsidered, deep reforms of higher education are
essential world-wide. Unless the university responds to internal and external criti-
cisms and pressures by carrying out thorough reforms, it will be impossible to build
universities that can meet the needs of the new era.

127
J. Enders and O. Fulton (eds.). Higher Education in a Globalising World. 127-140.
© 2002 Kluwer Academic Publishers.
128 AKIRA ARIMOTO

1.1. Knowledge-Based Society 1

First, let us look at internal pressures: demands for a new rationale for scholarship or
for the knowledge-based society that has its origins within the university. Academic
work takes place at the university, the seat of learning. The fundamentals of that
academic work are research to create knowledge, teaching to communicate knowl-
edge, and other services to apply that knowledge; of these three, research and teach-
ing are particularly important. That is why we speak of the university as a society
based on scholarship, a knowledge-based society: its very foundation is knowledge.
When we look at the creation and transmission of knowledge, the core functions
of the knowledge-based society, we find that Japanese universities have followed the
German model, which first institutionalised research as a university function. Japan
has groped towards a union of research and teaching, but in the end, research has
become the top priority. Beginning in the Meiji era (1868-1912), Japan modelled
itself on the advanced nations of the West, and concentrated investment in its impe-
rial universities (the predecessors of today's national universities) in an effort to
catch up with other countries. Their focus on research has thus been the result of
government policy measures aimed at building international competitiveness. A cen-
tury of effort has resulted in dramatic advances by Japan's "research universities",
which now occupy a central place in global academe, as various measures demon-
strate (Arimoto, 1994; Monbusho, 1997). Studies of thesis production and citations
in engineering and science have demonstrated that Japan ranks second only to the
United States in these respects: its universities are in the top rank world-wide, on a
par with, or surpassing, those of Britain, Germany, or France. That standing attests
to the high scholarly productivity of Japanese universities.
Even though the faculties that make up Japanese universities do try to integrate
research and teaching, they are in fact research organisations; the teaching side of
the organisation is largely a shell, thanks to faculty members' strong,ly rooted re-
search orientation. Given the strength of that tradition, Japanese university faculty
members cannot readily change. An international study of university staff conducted
by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching revealed that in Ja-
pan, 70 percent of university faculty members were primarily research-oriented
while only 30 percent were teaching-oriented (Altbach, 1996; Arimoto & Ehara,
1996). This follows the German pattern: research orientation is strong in Germany,
the Netherlands, Sweden, Israel, South Korea, Japan and other countries that have
adopted the German model. By contrast, in Britain, the United States, Australia and
Hong Kong, faculty members were evenly divided between research and teaching
orientations. It was hoped that Japan would achieve the Anglo-Saxon pattern of a
fifty-fifty weight given to research and teaching, but a nation-wide survey carried
out in 1999 revealed that 63 percent of faculty members are "orientated to both re-
search and teaching"; while there are signs of improvement, research orientation still
predominates (Arimoto, 2001).
The teaching function of schools and universities has, however, had a huge im-
pact. Government policies of investing proactively in schools and universities and in
training personnel have resulted in high educational levels for a high proportion of
 GLOBALISATION AND HIGHER EDUCATION REFORMS 129

the population of Japan, viewed in world-wide comparative terms. Today, about 50

percent of high school graduates go on to universities or junior colleges.

Table 1. Number of Higher Education Institutions in Japan by Type and Control (2000).

Universities: Universities Junior Colleges Total: Specialised

All (including providing post- Colleges of Tech- Universities, Training
undergraduate- graduate and nology Junior Col- Colleges
only) undergraduate leges, Col-
education leges of
Technology

National (%) 99 (15) 99 (21) 20 (4) 54 (87) 173 (14) 130 (4)

Local! 72 (11) 50 (10) 55 (10) 5 (8) 132 (10) 208 (7)

Public (%)
Private (%) 478 (74) 330 (69) 497 (87) 3 (5) 978 (76) 2665 (89)

Total (%) 649 (100) 479 (100) 572 (100) 62 (100) 1283 (100) 3003 (100)
..
In addition, there IS one Air University .
Source: MEXT (2000). Gakko kihon chosa hokokusho (Report of school basic survey).

Table 1 shows that as of 2000, there are a total of 1,283 higher education institu-
tions in Japan, including 649 universities, 572 junior colleges and 62 colleges of
technology; of the same total, 173 are national institutions, 132 local public and 978
private.

Table 2. Number of Students in Higher Education Institutions by Type and Control (2000).

Universi- Universities: Junior Colleges of Total (Universi- Specialised

ties: Post- Under- Colleges Technology ties, Junior Col- Training
graduates graduates leges, Colleges of Colleges
Technology)

National 128,624 471,631 7,772 18,417 641,316 14,872

(%) (63) (19) (2) (88) (18) (2)
Local 9,719 93,062 21,061 1,652 156,820 31,326
Public
(%) (4) (4) (6) (8) (4) (5)
Private 66,968 1,907,062 298,847 937 2,864,924 591,110
(%) (33) (77) (91) (4) (78) (93)
Total 205,311 2,471,755 327,680 21,006 3,663,060 637,308
(%) (100) (100) (99) (100) I (I (0) I (1 (0)
Source: MEXT (2000). Gakko klhon chosa hokokusho (Report of school basiC survey).

Table 2 shows that the total number of students is more than 3,500,000, of whom
18 percent are studying in national institutions, 4 percent in local public institutions
130 AKIRA ARIMOTO

and 78 percent in private universities and colleges. The popularisation (or massifica-
tion) of higher education is the result of increasingly open opportunities for higher
education, and is one of the underpinnings for the rise of the knowledge-based soci-
ety.
As this overview indicates, the university as a knowledge-based society (KBS 1)
has sought and achieved progress throughout its academic work, building on knowl-
edge as its material. As a result, it has achieved real advances in research and teach-
ing. However, internal pressures, while still reflecting the academic rationale, now
require reforms of higher education in order to further improve the quality of re-
search and teaching, to advance scholarship and to make a larger contribution to
society as a whole.

1.2. Torn Between Quality and Quantity: Post-Mass Higher Education

Even at a time when knowledge-based society was still largely confined to univer-
sity campuses, a shift was under way: from a higher education system which was
still, by and large, elite to a new, popular phase of the system. In so far as the re-
search paradigm dominated, however, the response to the new teaching needs which
resulted was inadequate. Because the research-teaching relationship had tilted so far
towards research, teaching took place in name only; the universities lost their reputa-
tion as institutions of higher education, were criticised by students and by the pUblic,
and lost social credibility.
Although a university education was opened to the masses, universities fell be-
hind in putting the necessary structures in place and providing the necessary func-
tions to cope with the increasing number of students and meet their increasingly
diverse needs. The universities were filled with contradiction and discord. The stage
was set for the universities' inability to cope with the rising pressure to deliver post-
mass or universal higher education. In the age of KBS2, when knowledge-based
society has expanded beyond the confines of the university and into the wider soci-
ety, the ties between university and society have become borderless on both the re-
search and teaching fronts, and the conflict between quality and quantity has become
a pressing problem.
As university education reached a certain level of popularisation, the phenomena
became more common of the "general student", who could not determine his or her
future academic path, and of the "reluctant student", who went on to university de-
spite not really wanting to attend. The results of mass education at the university
level were thus a decline in students' academic abilities, quality, morale and spirit of
inquiry. There is, in fact, growing concern about students' ability to study and learn,
in other words about their interest in and perceived need for learning - factors which
are more fundamental than academic ability (Amano, 1999).
The year 2009 is forecast to be a watershed in Japan; that is the year in which,
for the first time, everyone who applies to university is expected to be admitted.
With totally open admissions, the sorts of problems just described will become more
severe. In the near future, when the universities will be thrust into the age of univer-
sal access and lifelong learning, the student body will include not only conventional
 GLOBALISATION AND HIGHER EDUCATION REFORMS 131

students aged 18 to 22 or, in the case of doctoral candidates, in their early thirties,
but also, it is expected, an increasing number of adult students, even people in their
eighties and nineties, with a wealth of experience of the wider world. The universi-
ties will need to respond to the needs of a more and more diverse student body.
As student bodies become more diverse, it will be impossible to meet the needs
of students at many different levels of development unless universities assign new
importance to teaching, and pay more attention to how knowledge is to be imparted.
It is, I believe, more important for students to study, and for university faculty mem-
bers to provide support for their learning, than for faculty members to teach as such.
The teaching-learning process must be transformed from its current instructor-
centred format to become more student-centred. Although the academic rationale
that stresses links between research, teaching and learning will underpin the quest
for reform, service will become the driving force (Clark, 1995).

2. GLOBALISATION AND REFORMS IN HIGHER EDUCATION

The external pressures driving reform are the societal conditions which surround the
university. The primary factor is globalisation, in which I include shifts to KBS2 and
to a post-mass society, internationalisation, globalisation and the shift to a market
economy. All of these types of social change have a direct or indirect influence on
the university, inducing or triggering reforms.

2.1. Knowledge-Based Society 2

The university is fundamentally a knowledge-based society, and the knowledge-
related functions of research and teaching are its raison d'etre. Today, what we call
KBS2, which gives as much priority to knowledge as does KBS1, is forming outside
the university and subsuming it. What might be called the fusion of the university
and the wider society is occurring. The potential for scholarly research and higher
education to have a direct or indirect influence on a country's economic develop-
ment is even greater in the knowledge-based economy, a higher-order knowledge-
based society in which intellectual capital has great value. Thus, not only is higher
education regarded as the proper object of investment by the national government
and by society in general, but at the same time there are demands for an improve-
ment in the productivity of education which is commensurate with that investment.
The advance of knowledge-based society, which increases the importance placed on
producing or reproducing knowledge through the medium of the human brain, her-
alds an age in which the existing structures and functions of knowledge will be
transformed.
Scholarly values dominate in KBS 1, where academic science developed. What
Robert Merton called CUDOS (communality, universalism, disinterestedness, organ-
ised scepticism and originality) is seen as the appropriate normative framework for
the scholarly world, that is the traditional scientific system. In KBS2, however, we
are seeing a move away from academic science towards industrial science and from
"big science" to "small science." Recent studies have highlighted the importance of
132 AKIRA ARIMOTO

the shift from Mode I to Mode 2, from analogue to digital science, and from formal
to tacit knowledge (Gibbons et al., 1994; Kobayashi, 2001). In KBS1, there was a
considerable gap between the world of the university and society at large. In KBS2,
the gap has disappeared, and the university is expected to provide not only basic
knowledge but also applied knowledge, knowledgeable and trained personnel who
are useful to society, and services which are useful to society. The application of
knowledge through service has become a key university role, and partnerships be-
tween academe and industry have become significantly more important parts of the
work of the university.
We must not overlook the development of information technologies (IT) as the
catalyst that connects KBS I and KBS2, and drives the growing linkages between the
university and the wider society. While the IT industry seems in something of a
holding pattern at present, from a longer-term perspective significant further devel-
opments can be expected. The IT revolution has made new forms of the university
possible: the virtual university, the Internet university and the university of the air. It
has also made possible universities very different from the traditional university, in
which the teaching-learning process was campus-based, and started from rigorous
screening to determine who should be admitted to that site of learning. The forms
and methods of instruction with their roots in the medieval universities urgently
need rethinking and reforming. These reforms will promote a deeper dialogue be-
tween the traditional university and the new university, make possible productive
partnerships between them, and facilitate the emergence of international higher edu-
cation networks making effective use of IT.

2.2. From Internationalisation to Globalisation

Since the days of the medieval universities, KBS I has been international in scope. In
the Japanese case, policy measures to promote globalisation have been implemented
ever since the Meiji era in the economic, political, and cultural spheres, to aid Ja-
pan's drive to catch up with the advanced industrialised nations. To achieve the level
of higher education found in those nations, Japan imported their university model
and, through a combination of imitation and creativity, built universities that worked
in Japanese terms. At the same time, Japan was sending scholars and students to the
major academic centres abroad. Table 3 shows the number of Japanese students
studying abroad: out of 76,000 students, 46,000 are studying in the United States
followed by 15,000 in China, 5,000 in the United Kingdom, and so on.
As Peter Scott has pointed out, we can take exchanges of students, scholars, uni-
versities and knowledge as measures of internationalisation (Scott, 1998, pp. 116-
122). North America and Europe, the centres of the scholarly world, attract about 80
percent of all the students studying abroad throughout the world; Japan has sought
both to send people to those centres and also to accept students from elsewhere in
the world.
 GLOBALISATION AND HIGHER EDUCATION REFORMS 133

Table 3. Number of Japanese students studying abroad at higher education level, by country,
various dates.

Number (Year of statistics)

United States 46,406 (1998)

China 14,684 (1998)

United Kingdom 5,332 (1997)

Korea 1,871 (1999)

Australia 1,796 (1998)

Germany 1,788 (1997)

France 1,314 (1995)

Canada 774 (1993)

New Zealand 378 (1997)

Austria 359 (2000)

Other Countries 884

Total 75,586
..
Source: DQlgaku Shznglkal (Umverslty Council) (2000) Global-ka Jldai III motomerareru Koto KYOIku no
Arikata ni Tshuite (A Vision for Higher Education in the Global Society), 76.

Table 4 shows that at present about 60,000 foreign students, five percent of the
world population of those studying abroad, are studying in Japan. Of them, about 80
percent are from elsewhere in Asia, notably China, Korea and Taiwan. Japan has an
official policy of expanding its foreign student population to 100,000, an effort
which has been planned in order to significantly promote its intemationalisation.

Table 4. Number of students from overseas studying in Japan, by home country, 1999.

Number Percent (%)

China 25,907 46
Korea 11,897 21
Taiwan 4,085 7
Malaysia 2,005 4
Indonesia 1,220 2
Thailand 1,107 2
United States 1,073 2
134 AKIRA ARIMOTO

Table 4. continued

Bangladesh 806
Vietnam 558
Philippines 497
Other Countries 6,600 12

Total 55,755 99
Source: Daigaku Singikai (University Council) (2000) Global-ka Jidai ni motomerareru Koto Kyoiku no
Arikata ni tsuite (A Vision for Higher Education in the Global Society), 77.

As these exchanges of scholars and students suggest, KBS 1 formed its own in-
ternational society, the scholarly world, which pioneered internationalisation and
globalisation. Looking more closely, however, we can see that globalisation is on
the rise in the domain of academic research, and has proceeded further in the sci-
ences than in the humanities. Globalisation is growing in science and engineering,
fields that demand global commonality, communicability, and contemporaneity. In
the humanities and social sciences, on the other hand, which stress the analysis of
diverse and unique cultures, it is mainly internationalisation that is under way. In
both research and teaching, there can be no doubt that government policies of proac-
tive investment in schools and universities and in training personnel have succeeded
in achieving high educational levels in Japan - and by global standards, very rap-
idly. Nonetheless, the teaching functions of the university have been slower than the
research functions to globalise or internationalise.
Since the 1990s, globalisation has begun to affect not only the scholarly world
but also society at large in the realms of the economy, politics, and culture. Its ef-
fects are driving the development of international simultaneity and contemporaneity,
and promoting international exchanges and co-operation, transmitting new tech-
nologies, aiding in economic growth, and enhancing the economic and cultural en-
dowment of citizens. In the domain of higher education too, the phenomena of
global contemporaneity and commonality are accelerating. Increasingly, global
standards are being asserted, and local standards and cultures of teaching are being
called into question.
The emergence of this sort of globalisation clearly reveals that internationalisa-
tion and globalisation are not necessarily identical, whether conceptually or in con-
tent, and indeed that they harbour conflicting values: individualisation versus
standardisation, creativity versus uniformity, particularity versus universality. In the
medieval university, Latin was the lingua franca; in today's university, it is English.
Until now, Japan has mainly conducted education in the Japanese language, but now
English-language-based education is becoming more common, especially in gradu-
ate education. Other changes are also occurring which indicate a greater commonal-
ity: for example, universities' increasing recognition of credits awarded by other
universities, the active use of the TOEFL examination, the use of shared educational
materials, and the formation of university consortia. These are all concrete manifes-
 GLOBALISATION AND HIGHER EDUCATION REFORMS 135

tations of the influence of globalisation, and they force us to reconsider yet again the
characteristics of higher education in Japan, a system formed in the context of the
earlier quest for internationalisation.
Accompanying the advance of globalisation, we find commentators calling for
commonality, communicability, and contemporaneity with the world at large, and
drawing attention to the darker side of the Japanese university's research-oriented
success story. Increasingly, critics are attacking the content of higher education, es-
pecially in universities. With almost 50 percent of high school graduates in Japan
entering junior college or university, university-level training is of ever greater so-
cial significance. Now, however, we are discovering that higher education in Japan
cannot compete internationally. Councils and committees have raised these issues,
the national government is showing concern, and dissatisfaction and criticism of
higher education, especially at undergraduate level, are erupting on all sides. Japa-
nese higher education has a huge task before it if we are to bring its curricula, educa-
tional methods, credit system, degrees, quality levels, and methods of evaluation
into line with those of the rest of the developed world.

2.3. Introducing Market Principles

The development of markets is inextricably linked to the spread of globalisation.

The first form of globalisation to occur was in the economic sphere, and its impact
began to be felt throughout the world in the 1980s. Market principles became in-
creasingly central to economic theory, and the pressure of market mechanisms grew.
Fluctuations in the stock and money markets have now become a mirror reflecting
the state of the world economy. The development of global markets heralds the arri-
val of an age in which market value has great importance, and the fundamental eco-
nomic value and economic effects of education are called into question. The
question whether productivity is being improved at a rate commensurate with the
investment in education has become a central issue for the accountability of the edu-
cation system. Some critics advocate performance-based funding, in which re-
sources are allocated according to performance, and increases and decreases in
education budgets are debated in terms of the logic of supply and demand.
The Report of the University Council (1998) was a response to the globalisation
of higher education which reflected its close relationship to economic globalisation.
The key points of the Council's proposals - fostering students' problem-solving
abilities, revitalising research in education, making university administration more
efficient and developing a multidimensional system of evaluation - concerned the
content of education and of educational research; but they strongly reflected the lan-
guage of economic rationalisation. Its recommendations have led in turn to the pol-
icy measures of the "COE Plan for the 21 st Century" which was launched in 2001:
to turn the national universities into independent entities, to introduce private-sector
management techniques, to adopt the concept of 30 universities at the top interna-
tional level, to restructure the university and to reconsider the regional distribution
of universities.
136 AKIRA ARIMOTO

Turning the national universities into autonomous entities, for example, would
not only encourage reassessment of the management of each of those universities
but also promote their differentiation. The University Council Report (1998) pro-
posed the slogan "Universities with shining individual strengths in a competitive
environment." It was expected, in other words, that universities would move towards
competing on the basis of their individual characteristics in a marketised environ-
ment. Other core themes included more efficient management structures and greater
accountability, with a call for a shift in governance from the rector-led system im-
ported from Europe to an American-style president-led system (Arimoto, 2001).
Such a reassessment of university administration and management implies that not
only the national universities but also the other public and private universities will
experience tougher competition as they develop and implement new strategies for
their survival. Although increasingly heated disputes are unavoidable over resources
and student recruitment, the key problems are how to improve how the university is
run, and how to provide an attractive educational experience for students. Guaran-
teeing a high-quality education will be the make-or-break condition for institutional
survival.
In the supply and demand mechanisms of the market, the consumer plays the
leading role. The slogan "Consumers first" is gaining ground. The preferences of
students, who are the consumers in this case, control the market; and thus a dynamic
is operating in which universities must make themselves attractive to students by
developing their capacity to enhance academic performance and provide added
value.

3. ISSUES AND TASKS IN THE REFORM OF HIGHER EDUCATION

A number of issues and tasks are the focal points of efforts to reform higher educa-
tion in Japan.

3.1. The University Council Report

The most vital point in the statements on educational reform in the University Coun-
cil Report was its stress on assuring the quality of education and research in order to
enhance students' academic attainments. In general, it called for a shift of emphasis
in undergraduate education: from screening at entrance to screening at graduation.
Specific proposals included: instituting a grade point average (GPA) system; devel-
oping measures to dismiss students with poor overall performance; and introducing
an upper limit on the number of credits to be earned (the CAP system) so that, as-
suming 124 credits are required for graduation, students would earn about 30 each
year. These reforms would open up the issue of what takes place between entrance
to higher education and graduation from it. The entrance examinations for Japan's
elite universities are notoriously so difficult that they have earned the name "exami-
nation hell", and they give rise to the phenomenon of shrinking choices. The univer-
sities that play the gatekeeper role in Japan's famously "degree-ocratic society"
actually work on a conveyor belt system: once you get in, you automatically gradu-
 GLOB ALIS ATION AND HIGHER EDUCATION REFORMS 137

ate. The report's proposals address the need to attend also to the content of what
occurs between entrance and graduation, the processes of throughput, as it were. In
other words, the report emphasises the need to ensure a high level of academic
achievement throughout, and to ensure the quality of education at the point of exit,
namely graduation from undergraduate education.

3.2. The Realities and Methods of Reforms

The reform of higher education, and particularly of undergraduate education, is in-
dispensable for ensuring higher quality. The question of reforming undergraduate
education is of course closely tied to reforms of the teaching aspects of the univer-
sity. Any enquiry into reforming university structures and the organisation of teach-
ing must focus on three aspects: the inputs to undergraduate education, the process,
and the outputs. The inputs include students, faculty members, resources, equipment
and other facilities. The process includes academic research, teaching, and other
services. The outputs include the productivity of research, the productivity of teach-
ing and the productivity of other services provided. Reforming the organisation of
teaching requires rethinking all three.
First, the students themselves, as the actors engaged in study, are among the re-
sources input to the system. A successful university must be assured of a supply of
high quality students. The current trend among Japanese universities to introduce
admissions offices (the AO system) is addressing this point. It is essential to adopt
entrance policies consistent with the ideals and objectives of the four-year educa-
tional experience. Furthermore, universities must pay full attention to how their stu-
dents develop after they matriculate; if the teaching structures do not provide
appropriate instruction based on an understanding of students' development, they
will have lost their raison d'etre.
At present, universities in Japan are experiencing a gradual change from the tra-
ditional student to a variety of new types. There are a number of reasons for this:
changes in how students develop and mature; changes in the social environment; and
the massification of higher education. If the university is to remain the seat of learn-
ing, its mission must be, first, to attract students who are interested in scholarship,
who have curiosity and both the desire and the ability to learn; and second, to equip
these students by the time they graduate with university-level academic and other
attainments. But in reality, the growth in new types of students is being accompa-
nied by an increase in the numbers of reluctant students and of 'general' students
without a strong subject commitment; more students lack the requisite basic aca-
demic ability; and remedial education is increasingly needed, as the experience of
American universities and colleges has already shown (Clark & Trow, 1969; Levine,
1997). Few people would deny that we are now seeing in higher education the
pathological phenomena that first appeared at the primary and secondary level,
where the massification of education occurred earlier: refusal to attend school, reclu-
sive behaviour, bullying and failures in classroom discipline. In an age when educa-
tion is universal and life-long, reforms that take these pathological phenomena into
account will have a critical role to play in the university.
138 AKIRA ARIMOTO

If we look at a second point, the curriculum, the biggest problem is that the prin-
ciples underlying the structuring of the undergraduate curriculum lack clarity; the
curriculum is chaotic. Universities need to clarify their conception of an under-
graduate education. What is to be taught during the four years a student is at the uni-
versity? How do we imagine our students? These matters must be defined clearly,
shared by all members of the instructional staff, reflected in the curriculum and em-
bodied in the development of students' academic ability through the processes of
teaching and learning. Today it is clear that the collapse of the old ideal has placed
the university in a state of anomie (Arimoto, 2001). There is no doubt that this ano-
mie has many causes: failure to smoothly articulate the connections between the
general education curriculum and the curriculum in the student's major subject,
scant awareness of the general education curriculum, students' and faculty members'
strong orientation to their specialisms, faculty members' strong orientation to re-
search rather than teaching, the undeveloped state of systematic research on curric-
ula, the lack of interest in university education in society at large, and so on.
A third point is the need to develop educational methods appropriate for the post-
massification stage. It is important to start from the point of view of the student in
developing educational methods. We are seeing increased use of IT, but not to a
sufficient degree. For example, according to a report of a nation-wide survey of IT
utilisation at institutions of higher education in Japan (Yoshida, 200 I), the following
tendencies were discernible. Only 0.5 percent of all institutions of higher education
(universities, junior colleges, and technical colleges) stated that they make video-
taped classes available on the Web. Internet usage, however, doubled in the same
population between 1999 and 2000, and almost 30 percent of institutions of higher
education were using the Internet in teaching. The problem is that faculty members
do not feel the need to acquire multimedia skills: traditional blackboard-and-chalk
instruction is still dominant. The consequence is that the focus is still on teaching,
and the perspective of those studying and learning is missing. At a time when the
student body is becoming more diverse as higher education becomes universal, it is
clear that Japan's institutions of higher education have seriously lagged behind in
anticipating the need to utilise IT and to adopt a learner-centred point of view (Yo-
shida, 2001).
A fourth observation concerns the teaching staff. As we have already empha-
sised, the faculty members of Japanese universities have traditionally espoused a
strong research orientation above all else, and this is a habit that they are finding
hard to break. In the post-massification phase, by contrast, the university must place
at least as much emphasis on teaching as on research. The University Council pro-
posed that every institution should be required to introduce faculty development
(FD) programmes. Furthermore, the task remains of extending the proposed reforms
to tighten the links between research, teaching and studying.
A fifth point is that in planning and implementing improvements it is important
to consider the relationships between curriculum, students and faculty. While sepa-
rate reforms must be carried out with respect to each of these components, it is also
necessary to enhance the effectiveness of class work through reforms in the relation-
ships between these three elements. We need to develop a clear concept of what the
goals of education are, and to establish clear links between that concept and the cur-
 GLOBALISATION AND HIGHER EDUCATION REFORMS 139

riculum, students and faculty members. Keeping on target with these tasks is essen-
tial for developing a new system of undergraduate education, and for laying thor-
ough plans for implementing it.

4. CONCLUSION
The university has long been a knowledge-based society, in the sense we described
earlier as KBSl. The dominance of the research paradigm since the nineteenth cen-
tury has meant that although the ideal has been that the university should link re-
search, teaching and learning, in practice the research orientation has overwhelmed
the university's other functions. It goes without saying that research will continue to
be an important role of the university; indeed, it is likely that the relative weight of
the research university will continue to grow, and competition between centres of
excellence and research centres will become more intense on a global scale. But we
must also note with concern that we are approaching an age in which teaching and
learning are becoming increasingly important. We face an urgent need to look again
at ways to integrate research, teaching and learning.
Today, society at large has itself become a knowledge-based society. The role of
knowledge in society has grown substantially, and the creation, transmission and
application of knowledge are social issues. In this context, the boundaries that sepa-
rate the university and the wider society are becoming increasingly blurred, the im-
portance of the university in society is growing, and the social expectations and
consequent pressures on the university are rising.
Advancing globalisation means that knowledge-based society is becoming the
norm, not only in individual countries but also at a global level. The IT revolution is
fuelling this trend.
In this context, the role of higher education must be reconsidered - in the light of
expectations and pressures both within and outside the university. In particular, in
KBS2 the advance of post-massification, universal access and life-long learning
makes it increasingly necessary for the university to emphasise not only research but
also the task of developing students' creativity and their capacity to think. From this
point of view, the reform of higher education is becoming even more essential as
globalisation intensifies. The tasks of rethinking the content of higher education in
Japan and of achieving world-class quality make it an urgent issue to resolve the
contradictions between quantity and quality that the massification of higher educa-
tion has revealed. Thorough reforms are essential for an age in which education is
being evaluated in global terms.
Given that undergraduate education in Japan must be reformed, a renaissance is
needed. We must, then, look forward to efforts to rethink the concept of the univer-
sity, to review both the internal and the external factors affecting it, and to promote
the integration of research, teaching and learning.
140 AKIRA ARIMOTO

NOTES

This essay is based on a paper presented to the International Symposium 2001: How Can IT Help
Universities to Globalize? held at NIME (National Institute of Multimedia Education), Japan, October
31 - November 1,2001.

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sei to sono loken (Research at the heart of academe: academic productivity and conditions for it, in
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Arimoto, A. (ed.)(2001). University Reforms and Academic Governance (RIHE International Publication
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Henyo to Koka ni kansuru Sogoteki Kenkyu (Comprehensive Research on the Transformation of the
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Policy Measures in Japan: Research on Educational Methods for the Future).
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ni tsuite (Toshin) (Image of the University in the Twenty-first Century and Reform Policies for the
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Yoshida, A. (2001). "IT wa Wagakuni no Kotokyoiku Kikan de dono you ni Riyou sareteiru no kaT'
(How is IT used in Japan's Institutions of Higher Education?). NIME Newsletter 25,4-7.
 ROLLIN KENT

INTERNATIONALISATION IN MEXICAN
HIGHER EDUCATION

1. INTRODUCTION

The multifarious issues associated with globalisation are variously seen as threats or
opportunities by different actors in contemporary systems of higher education. In
Mexico the government's push for policy reform in higher education in the context
of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFfA) in the mid 1990s came at a
particularly complex moment for Mexican higher education institutions. Public uni-
versities and technical institutes were wrestling with the challenge of overcoming a
wide ranging set of problems derived from the crisis of the so-called "populist para-
digm" that had prevailed throughout the previous two decades and had been charac-
terized by unregulated expansion, politicised and uneven funding, and an absence of
quality control (Kent, 1993); and the private sector was expanding at a very rapid
rate in an almost free market environment devoid of governmental regulation. When
federal policy makers introduced evaluation, competitive funding, and management
reform, and continued to allow unfettered private sector expansion after 1989 - thus
discarding in one fell swoop the ingrained norms and habits of the old paradigm -
public institutions of higher education were faced with a deep shift in priorities
which in some cases called into question their very identity. Although institutional
actors perceived this policy shift as a threat, it eventually became clear that they
were merely being asked to develop basic capacities in teaching and research in an
attempt to follow international standards of quality and efficiency. Developing an
elementary operational platform that might allow them to be seriously referred to as
"universities" by any contemporary standard might seem like a rather obvious re-
quirement to international observers. But for Mexican higher education, given its
longstanding tendency to look inward, dwelling on its own institutional, political
and intellectual problems, it turned out to be a major challenge. It was in this context
that NAFTA was signed in 1993 (and ratified by the U.S. Congress in November
1994), posing new issues of international cooperation, student exchange and mobil-
ity, and setting of standards.
In this chapter, I will examine the introduction of internationalisation to the
higher education reform agenda, with reference to the changing context of contem-
porary Mexican society, and will inquire to what degree the higher education system
has been equal to the task of shifting its focus from introspection to an outward-
looking, innovative perspective. I will use the term internationalisation in a broad
sense, referring not only to specific policies aimed at opening up teaching, learning

141
1. Enders and O. Fulton (eds.), Higher Education in a Globalising World. 141-158.
© 2002 Kluwer Aradem;(' Puhli,hPr<
142 ROLLIN KENT

and the curriculum to international trends but, rather, referring to wide-ranging

changes in public discourse on higher education that shifted in a fundamental fash-
ion away from a localist perspective to a cosmopolitan outlook. Internationalisation
will refer therefore to specific policy issues but also to the general cultural horizon
that has come to frame public discourse on higher education in the rapidly changing
context of globalisation. This paper is an appraisal of the positions that come to-
gether in controversy over the extent and implications of this process l and an estima-
tion of the uneven responses emerging in higher education institutions to the
challenges of internationalisation.

2. THE CONTEXT: RESTRUCTURING THE MEXICAN ECONOMY

Reference to the economic context is unavoidable when thinking about internation-

alisation of Mexican higher education, because policies for the latter were a side
effect of the profound economic changes of the 1980s and 1990s. In a succinct over-
view of the main economic and political transformations in Mexico over the past
decade and a half, The Economist (Oct. 26, 2000) provides a basic backdrop for our
discussion:
In the past 15 years change has accelerated. The Mexican economy has gone from being
state-dominated and protectionist to being one of the most open in Latin America. Mex-
ico is the world's eighth-largest exporter (counting the European Union as one) and the
United States' second-biggest trading partner after Canada. After a quarter-century of
economic crises it has stabilized, and other Latin American countries look at its eco-
nomic performance with envy. Growth is heading for around 7% this year [2000), infla-
tion will be well below its 10% target (and on course for the longer-term aim of
matching inflation in the United States by 2003), and the current-account deficit will
amount to about 3% of GDP. Earlier this year Moody's, one of the big credit-risk agen-
cies, gave Mexico an investment-grade rating for the first time in history .... Mexico
now has institutions it did not have a decade ago, such as a competition agency and a
human-rights commission. Others, such as the courts, the central bank and the electoral
authorities, have become more independent. The press no longer has to take its cue from
the government, and can be vociferous, if variable in quality. And at the time of the
presidential election in July 2000, opposition governors were already in charge of 11 of
the 32 states, including the capital, and over half the population lived in municipalities
run by non-PRI mayors .... The election of an opposition president may seem to com-
plete Mexico's transition from a one-party state to an open democracy. However, in
many ways that transition is only just beginning. Mexicans may have voted the PRJ out
of government, but getting it out of the country's system after all those years is a differ-
ent matter. [my emphasis: RKJ.

The Mexican economy has grown significantly in the second half of the 1990s
precisely as a result of the very dynamic export sectors. Some basic indicators, from
a recent five-year review of NAFT A (Carrera, 1999) show the following:
Since 1993, the year before NAFTA came into effect, trilateral trade has surged
by more than 70%, from around US$300 billion to US$515 billion; trade with
the United States grew 71 % and with Canada 80%.
The structure of large corporations has undergone profound changes in the wake
of business alliances and the introduction of total quality management and reen-
gineering.
 INTERNATIONALISATION IN MEXICAN HIGHER EDUCATION 143

The financial services sector was liberalized and restructured; by 2001 Spanish,
Canadian and U.S. banks had forged alliances with the principal banks in Mex-
ICO.
The maquiladora industrl along the U.S. border increased exports 135% to US
$51.4 billion and employment by 82% to over 960,000 jobs.
NAFT A has increased the importance of the services sector in the economy as a
whole, providing new types of employment for university graduates in business
and related fields.
In addition to an increased demand for higher education graduates, training pro-
grams for workers expanded considerably (91 % in ten years.)
As a result of macroeconomic adjustment, liberalization and privatisation in the
late 1980s, and then in the 1990s NAFT A and trade agreements with the EU, Israel,
Chile, and the Asia-Pacific rim, the Mexican economy has experienced profound
changes over the past 15 years. Nevertheless, it is a common argument today among
economists and business analysts that by the end of the I 990s, the Mexican econ-
omy has reached the limits of the first push for NAFT A:
Mexico may be reaching its day of reckoning. The country has long suffered from prob-
lems of its own making - poor schools, corruption and outmoded infrastructure, just to
name a few. Multinationals put up with these shortcomings because of the potent com-
bination of free trade, proximity to the U.S. market and low wages. But for some com-
panies, that trade-off is no longer a good deal: wages have increased without a
corresponding increase in productivity, the peso has strengthened against the dollar, and
China is about to enter the World Trade Organization which will confer trade benefits
there [that compete with Mexico's] ... Unskilled Mexican labour is becoming more ex-
pensive compared with Chinese. All analysts agree that educational reform has not kept
pace with economic reforms: Mexico lags behind other similar economies, such as
South Korea, Taiwan, and Poland on basic indicators such as average years of school-
ing, spending on R&D and telephone density as well as the training of engineers. (Busi-
ness Week, 2001).

As noted above by The Economist, there is an intense debate today in Mexico on

whether institutional change has kept up with the deep macroeconomic shifts de-
scribed above. How have firms, schools and universities, political parties and the
state bureaucracy responded to these profound changes in the economic environ-
ment? In Douglass North's (1996) useful definition, "institutions" can be understood
as the underlying rules of the game or framework of incentives that shape the inter-
actions of individuals and organizations in economics and politics. North makes the
relevant point that:
Institutional change is a complicated process because the changes at the margin can be a
consequence of changes in rules, in informal constraints, and in kinds and effecti veness
of enforcement. Moreover, institutions typically change incrementally rather than in
discontinuous fashion ... Although formal rules may change overnight as the result of
political or judicial decisions, informal constraints embodied in customs, traditions, and
codes of conduct are much more impervious to deliberate policies. (North, 1996: 6).

Many informed observers would say that, although the educational system has
experienced significant policy changes throughout the 1990s, the persistence of in-
formal constraints and, on occasion, perverse responses to policy reforms are in evi-
144 ROLLIN KENT

dence throughout the institutional framework in higher education. The educational

deficit is especiall y unrelenting. Between 1991 and 1998 the percentage of the work-
force without schooling only diminished from 12% to 9% whereas workers with
higher education increased from 17% to 23%. Workers with only six years of pri-
mary schooling went from 56% to 49% (Didou et aI., forthcoming).
Approximately 40% of the population subsists in poverty, mostly in the rural ar-
eas, and has very limited access to schooling of any kind. The continuing deficits in
schooling show that Mexico has not solved age-old problems of poverty and increas-
ing polarization into "two Mexicos": the prosperous North linked to NAFf A and the
impoverished South. The Economist states it succinctly:
There is another, more subtle difficulty with NAFT A: most of Mexico was not ready for
it. Its rulers craved adaptability and modernization, but did precious little to make it
happen. Mexicans were left to work it out for themselves. Not all have been able to. Just
look at the farmers .... Just as small farmers struggle to cope in the new world order, so
do small businesses. Again, it is the lack of credit when they most need it that makes
life so difficult. For many the only way to borrow money is to pay their suppliers in in-
stalments, which often means they are stuck with higher interest rates than they could
get from a bank .... Those who want to modernize run up against another barrier. ...
Stiff labour laws, a lack of credit, underdeveloped infrastructure-they all put the
brakes on business. But they hurt some kinds of business more than others. The big, the
technologically advanced and the employers of skilled workers can get round the prob-
lems. The rest find it harder to adapt. And adaptability is the one thing that Mexican
companies need most at the moment, because of another of Mr. Salinas' gung-ho inno-
vations: NAFT A.... The bottleneck is education and training. For the firms that want to
implement high levels of technology, meet ISO standards and so on, the supply of mid-
dle managers and supervisors is short. The government, busy sorting out macroeco-
nomic policy, has done too little to remove barriers at the rrticro level. 'We don't really
have an industrial policy,' admits a senior official, 'apart from promoting nwquilado-
ra.\'.' (The Economist. Oct. 26, 2000).

The general picture, then, is a country that despite profound reforms in its econ-
omy and political institutions over the past 15 years now faces new challenges in the
global economy that it did not prepare for. An important part of this picture is that
although education underwent important policy changes at all levels, the benefits of
these reforms for students and workers seem to be receding in the new competitive
environment. There is a paradox here: on the one hand, the past decade was surely
the most activist period in educational policy in recent Mexican history, and yet not
only have these reforms generated unclear results, but they now face a new set of
challenges that were not envisaged ten years ago. The paradox of Mexico's transi-
tion is that, despite being under way for 15 years, its social institutions offer meagre
results and now arc faced with new and more complex challenges. Notwithstanding
important policy reforms throughout the 1990s, higher education's pcrformance to-
day points to significant unsolved problems on substantive issues of teaching and
research 3 , most especially when measured by the yardstick of internationalisation.
 INTERNATIONALISATION IN MEXICAN HIGHER EDUCATION 145

3. HIGHER EDUCATION REFORM AND ITS USE OF

INTERNATlONALISATlON

Mexican universities were already in crisis when economic policy makers began to
explore internationalisation as a means to reform the ailing Mexican economy.
Throughout the prolonged financial crisis of the 1980s, many voices were raised in
criticism of the failing public sector in higher education (Lorey, 1997; Ortega,
1997). It became increasingly clear that inefficiency and low quality in universities
were part and parcel of the nation's economic woes.
In this context, policymakers in higher education began looking abroad for pol-
icy models to set universities on a new path. In the words of an influential official in
the early 1990s:
Up until the 1980s our experience and our conversation over higher education were ba-
sically introspective. Mexicans discussed higher education issues in a family atmos-
phere. This localized discussion began to evidence limitations, it was no longer enough.
We needed to go beyond national borders to understand what other countries were do-
ing, especially pertaining to evaluation; we had to refresh our conversation with new
ideas brought in from other countries. (Gago, 1992).

Thus, even before NAFTA was signed, an international perspective on higher

education reform took hold in the minds of policy makers. Between 1990 and 1993
numerous conferences were held to understand the recent international experience in
areas such as evaluation, funding, and research policy. Debate over reforms in
higher education increasingly took into consideration the initiatives and results
which other countries were experiencing. Hence, in its initial emergence, interna-
tionalisation was not a program for actually integrating higher education in Mexico
with that of other countries but rather an instrumental perspective used by policy
makers to open up options, and to circulate new ideas in a highly politicised national
context that had run out of them. The first stage, of legitimation of new policy alter-
natives using international experiences, was followed later by the development of
programs whose implementation was guided by internationally recognized perform-
ance standards.
So when critics of modernization say that higher education reform has led to tra-
ditional values being swept aside by internationalisation (especially when that is
understood implicitly to mean "Americanisation"), they have a point. Internationali-
sation has certainly had a cultural impact on the issues, concepts and types of con-
versations that now circulate in higher education. Once the unavoidability of
comparing the state of Mexican universities and technical institutes to institutions in
North America was accepted, even before the signing of NAFT A, basic issues of
systemic operation in higher education became painfully visible.
Among these, the low level of preparation of Mexican academics, most of whom
did not hold postgraduate degrees, rapidly became a central issue for policy makers.
There is a consensus today that upgrading professors has been a constant and princi-
pal policy concern throughout the 1990s. In this respect, it is clear that international
standards for the academic profession, which had previously been of little concern to
policy makers and institutional leaders, now occupied centre stage. The PhD there-
146 ROLUNKENT

fore became the new standard for academics, especially those working in research
and postgraduate institutions. Actually, in the research profession ~ which in Mexi-
can higher education has historically operated in separate structures from professors
~ the push for the PhD as a common standard emerged in the mid 1980s and rapidly
gained widespread legitimacy, an unsurprising development given the highly inter-
nationalised mind-set of research scientists, most of whom were trained abroad. By
the mid 1990s the same standard was being upheld for the teaching profession as
well, although actual progress in upgrading professors has been slow.
The same may be said with respect to the introduction of evaluation. Until a dec-
ade ago the term "evaluation" simply was not part of the lexicon of higher education
in Mexico, and when the issue was raised it usually generated heated responses in
defence of university autonomy against illegitimate government intervention in uni-
versity affairs. By the early 1990s, however, ideological battles over evaluation re-
ceded into the past, as it became clear that internationalisation required higher
education to implement commonly held standards for evaluating institutions and
academic work.
Farther down the line, once NAFTA became a reality, the issues of professional
certification and accreditation to international norms also raised their heads. It came
as a surprise to Canadian and U.S. higher education leaders to discover that in Mex-
ico university graduates could go directly into professional practice without passing
external certifying examinations or meeting standards set by professional boards. By
the mid 1990s Mexican institutions were being asked to establish certification and
accreditation mechanisms, calling into question the long-standing prerogative of
institutions to decide on their own who may practice a profession.
Hence the term internationalisation in the context of Mexican higher education in
the 1990s has a specific meaning, probably quite different from its meaning in the
European context. Although programs designed to promote internationalisation were
put into effect, the broader and perhaps more operational meaning of the term had to
do with comparing higher education in Mexico with that in other countries in an era
of rapid globalisation, and using this comparison to set standards for quality im-
provement ~ the central concern of policy throughout this period. Internationalisa-
tion was a lever for policy change.

4. THE DEBATE ON COMMERCIAL INTEGRA TlON AND ITS

IMPLICATIONS FOR HIGHER EDUCA nON

These shifts did not occur in a vacuum. Controversy over internationalisation be-
came especially heated when NAFT A was signed, as it was perceived by some crit-
ics to represent a profound threat to the identity of higher education in Mexico, just
as it was seen as an opportunity for policy reform by its proponents.
The principal concern of the critics of internationalisation was the asymmetry
among the economies and higher education systems of Canada, the United States
and Mexico (Didriksson, 1997; Latapf, 1994). These analysts pointed out that hy
almost any measure, from per eapita GDP to the number of patents and scientific
papers published in each country, Mexico was very far from competing on an even
 INTERNATIONALISATION IN MEXICAN HIGHER EDUCATION 147

plane with the other two NAFfA countries. They also showed that industrial and
macroeconomic policy in Mexico throughout the 1980s and 1990s actually hindered
the competitiveness and the comparative advantages of the Mexican economy, as
macroeconomic adjustment in the 1980s and unfettered liberalization in the follow-
ing decade destroyed whole sectors of the old industrial economy, while at the same
time providing little support for restructuring. This seemed to be especially critical
given the relative ineffectiveness of programs for re-training unemployed workers.
Additionally, the critics said, research and development policy had not been success-
ful throughout the 1970s and 1980s in strengthening applied research and technol-
ogy transfer to industry. It did not seem possible for a socially inequitable society
with a decidedly low-tech industrial base and a weak system of higher education to
compete successfully with Canada and the United States. For these critics, because
of the profound gaps separating Mexico from the two North American partners,
commercial integration 4 was a recipe for disaster.
However, as mentioned above, the Mexican economy surprised the critics by its
performance in the post-NAFfA years. Almost one decade after the trade agree-
ment, the debate over the economic gaps between Mexico and its North American
partners has been superseded by a discussion on the new challenges of a globalise
economy, such as Mexico's, that has based its competitive advantage principally on
the low wages of a poorly skilled workforce. The Mexican economy demonstrated
its capacity to compete in the fIrst stage of North American integration, but it now
confronts new problems. The fact that Mexico's economic destiny is now deeply
intertwined with that of the United States means that it follows the U.S. in prosper-
ous times but also in its downturns, as has become painfully clear in the 2001 reces-
sion. Additionally, Mexico must now overcome new modes of competition by
countries offering the same competitive advantages that it offered a decade ago but
which are no longer suffIcient for it to succeed. Today's debate therefore is begin-
ning to place greater stress on whether the economic and educational institutions -
especially higher education - have lived up to the expectations of NAFfA, and
whether they will be able to retool in the face of an economic environment that con-
tinues to change at a rapid pace.
A second important issue expressed by critics of North American integration was
concern for loss of historical identity of Mexican higher education as well as eco-
nomic subordination to the United States. In the words of one critic:
The [current] transfonnation of Mexican higher education no longer derives from the
roots that nurtured it throughout the twentieth century.... When in 1993 an amendment
to the constitution allowed public institutions to charge tuition and fees a fundamental
shift took place. Such a drastic change can only be attributed to new forces that are not
rooted in the Mexican educational experience but rather to the 'winds of the North'. If
we are to understand current changes in our higher education system we must under-
stand how the United States educational experience is now interacting with the Mexican
one .... [What is being called into question] are longstanding values of Mexican higher
education, such as institutional autonomy, no obligation to pay fees, mass access, de-
mocratic governance of universities, and full time professorships. The new winds blow-
ing down from the North promise greater intervention by government and business in
university management, higher tuition, restricted access, close association with eco-
nomic production, steeper hierarchies in governance, and the fragmentation of academic
148 ROLLIN KENT

work by incentives .... Privatisation is therefore a crucial theme: commercialisation of

university products, restricted access through fee payments, and economic assessment
of the value of knowledge. (Aboites, 1997: 13-15).

This critique from the left against the use of higher education policy as a mecha-
nism for further subordination to the United States usually falls on welcoming ears
in certain sectors of Mexican society where national identity and nationalism have
historically been powerful cohesive forces. If it had been wielded ten years before,
when politically active public universities and unions in higher education repre-
sented mainstays of left opposition to government, it would surely have carried
much more weight than it actually did in the mid 1990s. But this political and ideo-
logical base had been drastically eroded by the breakdown of the populist paradigm
of the open-access democratic university during the 1980s. As a matter of fact, it
was against this backdrop of institutional collapse in public higher education and the
enormous expansion of the private sector that policy makers in the late 1980s
pushed for a different paradigm. Thus the initial driving force behind reforms in
higher education policy was not NAFfA or any kind of clear-minded scheme to
integrate higher education internationally (Le. with the U.S. and Canada) but the
collapse of the old paradigm. It was the erosion of nationalist-democratic discourse
for higher education that fertilized the ground for internationalisation among some
institutional leaders, academics and most especially public opinion.
Nevertheless, concerns over the risks for cultural identity continue to be voiced
from other perspectives. Mexican universities have, for example, a long history of
diplomatic asylum for political dissidents in Latin America and over the past four
decades Mexican universities have trained many political leaders and professionals
from countries to the South. The message sent to Latin American neighbours by the
signing of NAFfA generated uneasiness and debate about issues of cultural identity.
Why is Mexico suddenly veering to the North, the critics asked?
Another issue that became especially important after the Zapatista uprising in
1995 was the question of language training: why should English be the main focus
when Mexican universities could play an important role in sustaining the numerous
indigenous languages? These topics were central in the early debates on North
American integration (Guevara & Garcia, 1992), but they were soon sidelined by
other more technical issues, such as trans-national accreditation in the professions
and scientific cooperation. Experts in higher education policy have asked why those
cultural issues did not remain on the agenda of North American integration (Didou,
1997; Didou et aI., forthcoming). They indicate that the debate over internationalisa-
tion in Mexico could have been utilized as an opportunity to deepen the role of uni-
versities in strengthening cultural identity in the age of globalisation. They point to
new potential in language training, in the humanities, in innovative associations with
localities and regions as well as in continuing education for underprivileged groups,
more on the model followed by the European Union. As it happened, internationali-
sation produced only a limited version of what some critics say could have been a
more ambitious program.
 INTERNATIONALISATION IN MEXICAN HIGHER EDUCATION 149

5. POLICIES FOR INTERNATIONALISING NORTH AMERICAN HIGHER

EDUCATION
During the North American debate on NAFfA and after its signing, the govern-
ments and higher education leaders of Canada, the United States and Mexico en-
gaged in a series of conferences and discussions to explore the implications of
commercial integration for higher education. These conversations led to the so-
called Wingspread Declaration (1992) and the Vancouver Declaration (1994) among
other statements by the three governments to the effect that internationalisation was
now on the agenda for higher education.
It is interesting to note that initially the most active response came from the non-
governmental sector and from institutional associations. Two organizations in par-
ticular emerged to link institutions and recommend policy: the Consortium for North
American higher education Collaboration (CONAHEC) and the Mexican Associa-
tion for International Education (AMPEI). CONAHEC has become a leading agency
in building a North American academic community with regular meetings and the
development of a series of collaborative projects among institutions in the three
countries. It developed EI-Net, an online network for North American higher educa-
tion collaboration. One of its offshoots, the Border PACT, has been particularly suc-
cessful.
The Border PACT (Border Partners in Action) is an affiliated organization fo-
cused on building a US- Mexico border network of higher education institutions
committed to effecting social change in the borderlands (http://borderpact.org/). The
Border PACT network was developed to foster more effective communication
among border institutions and to strengthen their collaborative efforts with govern-
mental and non-profit agencies in addressing regional challenges. It mobilized foun-
dation funds (the Ford Foundation and the William & Flora Hewlett Foundation) to
support collaborative research on health, the environment, community development,
housing, urban development, small business development, provision of safe drinking
water, and the social effects of the maquiladora industry along the border. At least
35 universities, technical institutes, community colleges and NGOs received these
funds for project development in 2000-2001. The Border PACT is a particularly
active association that has been successful in linking higher education institutions
and community groups along the US-Mexico border.
AMPEI is a non-profit organization composed of institutions of higher education
in the three NAFfA countries whose mission is to "contribute to strengthening the
academic quality of Mexican higher educational institutions through international
cooperation" (http://mailweb.udlap.mxI-ampei/aboutampei.html) by carrying out
activities such as: training professionals in academic exchange by means of special-
ized workshops; promoting academic exchange and collaboration; researching and
analysing the processes involved in preparing academic exchange activities; provid-
ing ongoing information on the association's activities; and recommending policies
and practices that promote the development of educational programs and research
projects in which academics, students and university officials from Mexico and
other countries participate. One of its first initiatives was the WICHE/AMPEI US-
150 ROLLIN KENT

Mexico Educational Interchange Project, with the Western Interstate Commission on

Higher Education in the United States. Their member institutions have agreed to
form a network to promote academic cooperation between Mexico and the United
States.
In 1996 the American Council on Education (ACE) and the National Association
of Universities and Institutions of Higher Education of Mexico (ANDIES - the Rec-
tors' Association) created the US-Mexico Higher Education Network (http://elnet.
org/ace-anuies/mission.htm), with the following goals: to promote collaboration in
teaching, research, and institutional development among institutions of higher edu-
cation in the U.S. and Mexico; to facilitate the exchange of information among insti-
tutions; to enhance the overall quality of teaching, research, and institutional
management and leadership in both countries; to provide opportunities for students,
faculty members, and administrators from the U.S. and Mexico to study in the other
country and/or to participate in educational and scientific activities with partners in
the other country through such mechanisms as joint programs and distance learning.
The network brings together 25 institutions in the U.S. and 48 institutions in Mexico
in promoting seminars and workshops for institutional managers and leaders inter-
ested in promoting international programs at their institutions.
Since the signing ofNAFTA in 1994, cross-border economic activity and profes-
sional mobility increased significantly in North America, creating the need for a
concerted response from the governments of Canada, Mexico, and the United States.
The North American Student Exchange Program was created with concurrent fund-
ing from the three governments, through the Fund for the Improvement of Postsec-
ondary Education (FIPSE) in Washington, Human Resources Development (HRDC)
in Ottawa, and the Secretary of Education (SEP) in Mexico. The Program operates
by supporting voluntary consortia of institutions in the three nations, which are in-
vited to develop three-year student exchange projects and compete for funds. The
first call for projects was issued in 1995, followed by calls in 1996, 1997, 2000 and
2001. Throughout this period 40 consortia have been funded involving the participa-
tion of 265 institutions and non-profit organizations (http://sesic.sep.gob.mxI
movilidad200 1/Antecedentes.htm)5.
In the area of professional certification, it was clear to Mexicans from the begin-
ning that measures had to be taken rather rapidly, given that Mexico had no extra-
institutional means to provide public guarantees of the competence of professionals.
Having decided that direct government sponsorship of measures might be seen by
the universities as encroaching upon institutional autonomy, policy makers moved to
encourage independent professional associations to take the initiative. They did so
by working in conjunction with the National Center for Evaluation (which applies
entrance examinations to middle and higher education) to develop qualifying exami-
nations for engineering, accounting, nursing, computing, architecture, chemical en-
gineering, medicine, veterinary medicine, pharmacy, and dentistry. These
examinations for the most part have been designed with a North American perspec-
tive and in consultation with similar associations north of the border.
In 1998 the Rectors' Association (ANUIES) made a recommendation to its
member institutions that graduates of these fields take the professional qualifying
examinations. Nonetheless, to this day diplomas are issued only by the institutions
 INTERNATIONALISA TION IN MEXICAN HIGHER EDUCATION 151

themselves, and many universities have not taken the additional step of requiring
their graduates to take the professional qualifying exams. Following these develop-
ments, the Rectors' Association came to recognize the need for an accreditation sys-
tem to fill an important void in the Mexican higher education system vis-a-vis the
North American partners. The Commission for Higher Education Accreditation was
established in 2000 and is set to initiate operations in 2002.
The comparison of undergraduate programs with North America inevitably
showed up the rigid curricular organization that prevails in the Mexican system,
which does not allow students to easily transfer credits between programs and insti-
tutions. As an interesting consequence of international comparison and the initial
efforts at student exchange, Mexican policy makers began pressing universities and
technical institutes to convert to a more flexible credit system and to do away with
rigidities in student transfer. Specifically, in 2000 the federal Secretary of Education
ruled that individuals over 30 years of age may earn academic credit for on-the-job
experience by successfully passing accrediting examinations. The programs that are
in the process of developing procedures to give credits to non-traditional students
are engineering (eight fields), psychology, tourism, law, accounting, business, den-
tistry, nursing, computing, veterinary medicine, actuarial studies and pedagogy
(http://www.sep.gob.mxJdgair/).This is undeniably an important step toward a more
highly coordinated system of higher education, although once again it should be
pointed out that in actual fact few institutions have yet started to move in this direc-
tion.
A further area of government activity that has been influenced by internationali-
sation has been science and technology policy. The imperatives to upgrade profes-
sors (especially those teaching in postgraduate programs) and to train young
scientists have been very high on the agenda for at least a decade. One of the princi-
pal programs of the National Science Council (CONACYT) is providing scholar-
ships for graduate studies abroad. The Under Secretary for Higher Education funds
in-service professors who go into local and international PhD programs. The per-
formance indicators used today in peer review of graduate programs and research
projects have been standardized along international criteria by CONACYT.
In addition to these locally funded efforts, the National Science Council has es-
tablished agreements with the National Science Foundation in Washington D.C and
with the Regents of the University of California to promote collaborative research
efforts, sabbatical leaves and postdoctoral studies for Mexican professors. A consor-
tium of universities and research centres in Mexico (Colegio de Mexico, Centro de
Investigaci6n y Docencia Econ6micas, Colegio de la Frontera Norte, Monterrey
Technical Institute) has coordinated a Fund for Research on North America with
special emphasis on the social sciences. The Mexico-US Fund for Scientific Col-
laboration in North America collaborates with the National Academy of Sciences in
the U.S. to fund research in health and the environment. The Fulbright-Garcia
Robles Commission supports Mexican PhD students in the U.S.
With respect to collaboration on university/industry outreach, The Association
Liaison Office for University Cooperation in Development (ALO), which coordi-
nates the efforts of the six major higher education associations in the U.S. under the
152 ROLLIN KENT

sponsorship of the U.S. Agency for International Development (US AID), initiated a
collaborative agreement in 1995 with the Mexican Rectors' Association. Sub-
agreements were signed with six of the participating U.S. institutions (Cal Poly-San
Luis Obispo, Maricopa Community College District, Montana State, Ohio State,
Purdue, and West Virginia Universities), in partnership with six Mexican institu-
tions, to conduct reciprocal visits of teams of senior administrators. The focus was
on how different institutions seek to be relevant to local concerns and to the eco-
nomic development needs of their communities, especially through cooperation with
business and industry. These partnerships have already resulted in collaborative
teaching, research and service activities (http://www.aascu.org/alo/partner.htm#lac
am).
In the diplomatic sphere beyond NAFfA, the office of the Mexican Secretary of
Foreign Relations has been active in promoting collaborative agreements in higher
education and research with the European Union through the collaborative ALFA
projects. Special mention should be made of the growing diplomatic activity be-
tween the Spanish and Mexican governments, leading to several agreements for aca-
demic collaboration. Opportunities for graduate studies in a Spanish speaking
country have thus opened up.
Most recently, in December 2001, the U.S. Government announced a six-year,
$50 million Training, Internship, Education and Scholarship Partnership Initiative
(TIES) aimed at:
reducing the social disparity between the United States and Mexico via education and
training programs for young Mexicans who work (or who plan to work) in areas that
positively impact on Mexico's economic growth and social development (Association
Liaison Office for University Cooperation in Development, 2(02).

The primary objective of the TIES Partnership Initiative is to provide one thou-
sand young Mexicans with the opportunity to pursue undergraduate and especially
Master's level studies in the United States in areas where the U.S. and Mexico have
mutual development and foreign policy interests. A secondary objective is to de-
velop at least 35 strong, sustainable institutional linkages between higher education
or research institutions in Mexico and the United States. The initiative will cover
areas related to economic growth and social development, including Education and
Human Capital Development, Health, Agriculture and Trade, Public Policy and
Administration, Humanitarian Assistance and Conflict Resolution, Transparency
and Decentralization, Information Technology, Micro and Small Business Devel-
opment, Natural Resources Management, and Environmental Science and Interna-
tional Finance (http://www .aascu.org/alo/news/newsbriefslDec200 IlMexico. html).

6. IMPLEMENTING INTERNATIONALISATION:
THE PROCESS AND ITS RESULTS
Now, it must be said that, in spite of all the conferences and agreements, the actual
impact of internationalisation policy on Mexican higher education is not widespread
or highly visible. There is a problem with poor information and the lack of standard
indicators, and as a result it is not easy to establish what has changed and what has
 INTERNATIONALISATION IN MEXICAN HIGHER EDUCATION 153

not. Regardless of the question of insufficient data, there is a consensus that al-
though internationalisation was a hot issue in the early 1990s it was not followed up
with a clear and forceful implementation strategy in the following years. Critics put
this down to the controversies and debates that surrounded NAFfA and its implica-
tions for education, especially among academic specialists who were very critical of
the decision to open up the Mexican economy (Didou et aI., forthcoming). The ar-
gument is that internationalisation proved so controversial that officials decided to
soft pedal the execution of programs previously agreed on. This may be partially the
case, but there is not much evidence that internationalisation was nearly as contro-
versial as other government programs that were in fact implemented; such is the
case with evaluation, which was pushed forward to completion in spite of intense
opposition by rectors and academics when the subject was broached in the late
1980s.
Another argument by Didou and colleagues (forthcoming) seems to be more on
the mark. They contend, and I agree, that the erratic process in policies for interna-
tionalising Mexican higher education is the result of unclear goals. Ambivalence
over the long term or strategic value of internationalisation led to a series of pro-
grams that are positive in themselves but were not part of an integrated strategy to
move higher education to a new plane in substantive issues of teaching and research.
Institutions, thus, responded to this policy in piecemeal fashion, in accordance with
their resources, leadership styles and local histories. As a result, the border institu-
tions and the large public universities (UNAM and the University of Guadalajara)
have participated to a much greater extent than other universities. The same seems to
be true of institutional responses by research centres and institutes where interna-
tionalisation has deep roots and which thrive on international scientific collaboration
as a matter of course.
Several additional factors may explain the unenthusiastic implementation of in-
ternationalisation programs in most state universities. One is surely that federal pol-
icy makers had their hands full with a wide-ranging agenda for reforming higher
education, covering many complex issues from evaluation to management and up-
grading the academic profession. In this context, North American integration may
have taken a back seat to other more burning and complex issues.
The same was probably true at the institutional level, where significant difficul-
ties arose in gearing up management structures and procedures as well as reforming
governance, especially in the larger and more politicised public universities. The
1990s were a period of intense organizational change, and in some cases deep con-
flicts, in Mexican universities (Kent, 1998), as they struggled with the task of up-
grading inefficient management structures faced with a slew of new implementation
demands: setting up evaluation, creating information systems, reforming the curricu-
lum, upgrading professors, and establishing a rational platform for planning in gen-
eral. It was in this complex setting that issues such as student mobility, academic
exchange and professional certification in North America made their appearance,
surely being perceived by managers and rectors as something to be implemented
once other more important matters were resolved. Nevertheless, as I have argued
above, internationalisation - understood in the broad sense of transnational compari-
154 ROLLIN KENT

son and standard setting - was very much in the minds of policy makers as they set
out to reform higher education.
An additional factor to be considered in explaining why specific internationalisa-
tion programs were not strongly implemented has to do with deep structural trends
in Mexican higher education, which have provided a sort of structural obstinacy or
resistance to internationalisation. For one, language training has never been a prior-
ity and although some universities (not so the public technical institutes, by the way)
offer courses in English and other languages, these are usually non-compulsory and
often of low quality. Whereas in 1990 only 23 undergraduate programs reported an
international component in the curriculum, seven years later this number had in-
creased to 152. However, when one counts the number of students actually enrolled
in programs with an international component, the picture changes: in 1990, almost
12,000 students out of 1.08 million (1.1 %) were enrolled in such programs, and in
1997 the figure reached almost 36,000 students out of 1.3 million (2.7%) (Didou,
2000). So even if the absolute figures changed significantly, the fact remains that
only a minuscule percentage of Mexican students enrol in programs with some kind
of international component. These figures do not take into account of the fact that
students recognize the importance of English for their professional future and often
take language classes on their own outside the university.
Yet another aspect of structural obstinacy has to do with curricular organization.
Since higher education in Mexico basically consists of training for the professions,
institutions are actually composed of separate Jacultades (from the French Jacultes),
each one of which is managed discretely and offers a distinct curricular path. Hence,
organizationally universities are collections of Jacultades coordinated by a usually
powerful Rector. This has specific implications for the curriculum. When a student
enrols in a university she really signs up for a specific professional track, and if she
does not change midway she will remain there until graduating. But if the student
does decide to make a change (as many in fact do), it is almost impossible to take
her course credits to another professional track at the same university where she will
surely be told to start over. The same situation holds for students attempting to trans-
fer to a different institution. The rigid and inefficient curricular system has only re-
cently become the object of criticism, as it is increasingly clear that it is a root cause
for many failed attempts at innovating and developing the curriculum. This issue of
curricular rigidity is mentioned as a crucial problem in the education strategy docu-
ment recently published by the Fox government (SEP, 2001). Reforming the profes-
sional curriculum, which occupies a very special place in the hearts and interests of
academics and mid-level managers, will imply meddling with the "private life" of
Mexican higher education.
Furthermore, there has been the issue of setting up management structures within
universities to deal with internationalisation, which very few institutions have taken
to heart. It would seem that internationalisation was perceived by institutional lead-
ers as one more program requiring adaptation by procedures already in place, rather
than an opportunity to rethink the ways in which the university might relate to an
international audience through teaching and research. The fact that internationalisa-
tion has not been considered a general issue pertaining to the substantive educational
role of the university is partly a result of the low level of priority it enjoyed among
 INTERNATIONALISATION IN MEXICAN HIGHER EDUCATION 155

federal policy makers and in part another result of what I have called structural ob-
stinacy within the universities.
Where do Mexican students go abroad to study? From the limited amount of data
available, it would seem that most prefer the United States, and very few have de-
cided to go to Canada even after NAFfA. Most Canadians students abroad prefer
the United States over Mexico. Generally U.S. students prefer Great Britain over
Canada or Mexico. Mexico thus continues to be a "sender" country and the U.S.
continues to be a "receiver" country in matters of student exchange (Didou et ai.,
forthcoming). Hence there has been an increasing North Americanisation of student
exchange, but it certainly remains a lopsided process that has not in fact penetrated
substantively into university management in Mexico.
The implications for the disciplines and professions are an important theme in
the internationalisation process. One interesting fact is that Mexican students abroad
enrol in a different mix of disciplines than they do at home (Didou, 1997: 75). Some
disciplines in the social sciences (economics, public policy, applied sociology) and
natural sciences (biotechnology, environmental studies) have clearly been enhanced
by the growing number of Mexicans returning from the United States with PhDs.
Undoubtedly the US-Mexico border region is an area where internationalisation
has been taken seriously by institutions (Calvo, Ganster et ai., 1994). Universities,
institutes and colleges along the 3,000 mile long border had been cooperating spon-
taneously for some time, when NAFT A came along and gave this cooperation a pol-
icy framework, a public agenda and new sources of funding. The state universities
of Baja California, Sonora, Nuevo Leon and Chihuahua in Mexico and California,
Arizona, New Mexico and Texas in the U.S. seized the moment to develop new ini-
tiatives in trans-border collaboration. One aspect of this collaboration that became
important from the Mexican side was sending professors across the border to obtain
PhDs. Another aspect is technical and scientific collaboration in projects focused on
common border issues, such as environmental problems, migration and economic
development.
Finally, an emergent topic in the process of internationalisation has been the
push for distance education by the private sector. The Monterrey Technical Institute
(ITESM) moved very quickly and decisively in the mid-90s to establish itself as the
first virtual university in Mexico, building on its existing multi-campus network all
over the country. The Virtual University at lTESM now offers complete under-
graduate programs online as well as some postgraduate programs, opening new op-
portunities for Spanish speaking students in other Latin American countries. This
development brings to the fore an interesting contrast with language policy in North
America and (partially) the European Union, where internationalisation has been
accompanied by a strong emphasis on the use of English as a common language.
The vast Spanish speaking market in Latin America is being capitalized by the Vir-
tual University at ITESM, whose programs do use English as a second language but
are mainly taught in Spanish. This fact does not seem to be perceived by policy
makers who see internationalisation as a basically North American phenomenon,
with clear implications for the teaching of English and more broadly for deeper is-
sues of cultural identity.
156 ROLLIN KENT

In the same vein, in October 2000 Sylvan Learning Systems announced that it
was buying a share of a multi-campus private university in Mexico:
Over the past two years, Sylvan has spiced up its corporate mix, moving into the inter-
national higher education market. In 1999, the company's International Universities di-
vision got its start with a $26-million purchase of 54 percent of Universidad Europa, a
private university in Madrid. It now owns 78 percent of the institution. Since then, Syl-
van has spent $106.5-million more in cash and debt to purchase an 80 percent stake in
Universidad del Valle de Mexico; all of Guesthotel SA Management School, in Switzer-
land; and 60 percent of Universidad de las Americas, in Chile. Its postsecondary busi-
ness, Sylvan estimates, will account for $300-million of its projected $475-million to
$490-million in revenue for 2001 (Borrego, 2001).

Without a doubt certain institutions of the growing and very entrepreneurial pri-
vate sector in Mexican higher education perceive internationalisation as an opportu-
nity to expand into new markets. Some private institutions (ITESM, for example)
participate in government programs for student mobility and scientific cooperation,
but other private establishments are merely moving ahead into international alliances
with little heed for government policy.

7. CONCLUDING REMARKS

In view of the multiple but on occasion inconsistent policy initiatives and the in-
creasingly important market dynamics surrounding internationalisation, it would
seem that policy makers should take a new hard look. What has worked and what
can be learned? If internationalisation is defined as a general frame of reference in
which to signify and resolve issues in higher education, the evidence at hand -
which is admittedly spotty - would suggest that Mexican universities in the public
and private sectors have refashioned their self-image away from a localist perspec-
tive toward a more cosmopolitan and outward looking mode. The media and special-
ized discourse in and around higher education consistently make comparisons with
the situation in other countries and justify policy actions in terms of the levels of
funding and quality found abroad. Internationalisation is also a market phenomenon,
as evidenced by the vigorous push in this direction of private institutions, acting on
their own and without regard for objectives set by policy makers in the government.
On the other hand, in terms of changes in the curriculum and teaching, interna-
tionalisation has made headway only at certain institutions - especially those situ-
ated on the U.S. border and the larger universities and research institutes - and in
certain disciplines and departments. As a general rule, however, the teaching of for-
eign languages and the introduction of flexible formats for student exchange and
credit recognition among institutions and countries are still in their infancy.
Should greater efforts be made to press for internationalisation? My answer
would be in the affirmative, especially in the case of institutions that have stood on
the sidelines. It is increasingly clear that students graduating from a course of study
with an international component find greater opportunities for professional and per-
sonal development. In this respect, internationalisation may be interpreted as an in-
tegral part of quality improvement, an idea that has not caught on in the minds of
institutional leaders.
 INTERNATIONALISATION IN MEXICAN HIGHER EDUCATION 157

What are the implications of globalisation today for the cultural role of higher
education in Mexico? The Zapatista uprising in Chiapas in 1994 did more for raising
the general consciousness of Mexico's cultural diversity than all the critiques raised
by academics in the early 1990s. Today any discussion of internationalisation in
higher education clearly must also take into account the challenge of expanding the
role of universities in strengthening local identities and indigenous languages. Inter-
nationalisation in the current context must go hand in hand with internalisation: uni-
versities must learn to look inward as well as outward.

NOTES

Special acknowledgements must go to the work of my colleague Dr. Sylvie Didou (Departamento de
Investigaciones Educativas, CINVEST AV) whose research on internationalization in Mexican higher
education is an indispensable source of data and reflection.
2 Factories that import materials or parts duty free to assemble goods for re-export-a sector that ex-
isted long before NAFTA but has proliferated since the treaty came into effect.
3 This rather trenchant judgment derives from ongoing comparative research on policy change and
institutional performance in higher education in the United States and Mexico: Alliance for Interna-
tional Higher Education Policy Studies, http://www.nyu.eduliesplaiheps.
4 European readers should take note that NAFTA is basically a commercial treaty stressing import and
export tariffs, unlike the much deeper economic integration of the European Union.
5 The official web site for the North American Student Exchange Program gives no figures for the
number of students who have participated; but an educated guess would be 2,000, based on the re-
quirement that each participating institution send at least seven students abroad over the dumtion of
the project.

REFERENCES
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Plaza y VaideslUAM.
Borrego, A.M. (2001). "A Wave of Consolidation Hits For-Profit Higher Education: Small companies
can't compete while larger operations seek new markets". Chronicle of Higher Education, August
10, http:/www.chronic1e.com.
Business Week (2001). "Mexico: Is the magic fading?" Business Week, August 6, 30-32.
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Carrera, O. (1999). "NAFT A: a 5-year review". Business Mexico. Mexico: American Chamber of Com-
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Didou, s. (1997). "Sistemas de educaci6n superior e identidad cultural ante la globalizaci6n". Perfiles
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Didou, S. (2000). Sociedad del conocimiento e intemacionalizaci6n de la educaci6n superior en Mexico.
Mexico: ANUIES.
Didou, S., Mallea, J., & Barrow, C. (forthcoming). Globalization, Trade Liberalization and Higher edu-
cation in North America. Mexico: Departamento de Investigaciones Educativas.
Didriksson, A. (1997). "Educaci6n superior, mercado de trabajo e integmci6n econ6mica del Merconorte:
el caso de Mexico". PerfiLes Educativos. Mexico: CESUIUNAM, XIX(76-77), 61-70.
Economist (2000) "Survey: Mexico. Revolution ends, change begins". The Economist, Oct 26 1h (print
edition).
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Guevara, G. & Garcia, N.G., (eds.)(1992) La educaci6n y la cultura ante el Tratado de Libre Comercio.
Mexico: NEXOS/Nueva Imagen.
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Education Cooperation: Implementing the Agenda, Ottawa, Mexico, & Washington D.C.
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Education 25(1), 73-84.
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teramerican Development Bank (ed.) Three Public Universities. Washington, D.C.:, Technical Re-
port 2/98 EDU, http://www.iadb.orglsds/utility.cfmlI18/ENGLISH/pub/146.
Latapi, P. (1994). "Asimetrias educativas ante e1 TLC". Comercio Exterior 44(3), 199-204.
Lorey, D. (1997). "E1 Contexto de las Polfticas desde 1919". In Ortega & Lorey (eds.) (1997) Crisis :v
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Ortega, S. (1997). "E1 Tratado de Libre Comercio de 1a Zona Norteamericana y el Proceso de Reforma de
la educaci6n superior en Mexico". In Ortega & Lorey (eds.) (1997) Crisis y Cambio de la Educaci6n
Superior en Mexico. Mexico: LIMUSA Eds.IVAM, 5-28.
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1994).
 KALIE STRYDOM

GLOBALISATION, REGIONAL RESPONSIVENESS

AND A DEVELOPING SOUTH AFRICAN HIGHER
EDUCATION SYSTEM

1. INTRODUCTION

This chapter sets out to discuss patterns of national higher education systems and
their internationalisation, as well as the globalisation of higher education in relation
to economic development. I begin by describing how the national planning of South
African higher education is endeavouring to deal with this trend. This is followed by
some practical examples of regional responsiveness and its relationship to globalisa-
tion, drawn from the current South African higher education system, in order to il-
lustrate the necessity of a balanced approach to regional, national, African and
global interests. I then offer some solutions which may succeed in effecting change.
The primary aim of this change should be to improve regional responsiveness in a
coherent national higher education system, while preparing for the inevitable pres-
sure of globalisation.
On 17 February 2000, Ulrich Teichler delivered the opening address and partici-
pated in a workshop entitled "Patterns of the higher education system: changes at
times of accelerating internationalisation", which was held at the Technikon Free
State in Bloemfontein, South Africa. In his opening address, he mentioned certain
critical points (Teichler, 2000).
Firstly, the word "international" is historically and conceptually related to the
word "national". Internationalisation occurred in developed countries with stable
national higher education systems during the late eighties and early nineties. They
are therefore now better prepared to deal with globalisation. He emphasised the fact
that the concept of globalisation of higher education involves much more than inter-
national co-operation; it assumes qualitative change towards a system in which dis-
tinct national higher education systems are taken up and re-articulated into the
global system, by means of international processes and transactions which are com-
parable to the global economic system, with its consolidated global market-place for
production, distribution and consumption. The implications of globalisation for the
very core of higher education are profound, as it involves - among other things - a
redefinition of higher education with its diverse institutions.
John Sizer endorses Teichler's view. In his keynote address at the 22 0d EAIR Fo-
rum, Sizer made the following remarks:
One of the impacts of globalisation and increased competition between countries has
been the growing differentiation between economies in tbe three stages of economic de-

159
J. Enders and O. Fulton (eds.), Higher Education in a Globalising World, 159-172.
© 2002 Kluwer Academic Publishers.
160 KALIE STRYDOM

velopment:
labour intensive industry economies based on low-skill, low-labour-cost industries -
such as agricultural products, footwear and textiles;
capital- and technology-intensive economies, based on comparatively low-Iabour-
cost, technically-skilled manufacturing, assembly and service industries - such as
automobiles, electronic assembly, steel and financial services' call centres (the
global compan[ies'] manufacturing plants and service centres in these economies
may well be mobile and transient); and
high-added-value, research- and innovation-led, knowledge-based economies with
highly-skilled, -educated and -paid labour, focusing on new advanced-technology
industries - such as biotechnology, advanced materials, new energy and conserva-
tion, and information technology and communications.
Multi-skilling, continuous upgrading of skills and competences, and re-skilling through
lifelong learning are at the core of the second- and third-stage economies, and higher
education institutions have a central role to play in their delivery. (Sizer, 2001: 229).

Secondly, according to Ulrich Teichler, the South African higher education sys-
tem not only faces the pressure of globalisation, based on Sizer's second and third
stages of economic development, but has the further pressure that it is now only in
the midst of trying to establish a national higher education system, building on an
even less established further education system and a still very unstable general
(school) education system. South African higher education might decide to ignore
the critical stages of development from a national system to international co-
operation and, finally, global integration. During his address Teichler reflected on
the question whether South Africa had any choice but to deal with the national needs
and interest of the economy first, in the planning of higher education, and only then
find solutions to global competitiveness. Teichler's view was that the choice had
been correctly made in the national policies for higher education in South Africa.
In his foreword to the National Plan for Higher Education (NPHE) (RSA MoE,
2001) the South African Minister of Education endorses Teichler's view:
.. .it is vital that the mission and location of higher education institutions be re-elt'alIlined
with reference to both the strategic plan for the sector, and the educational needs of lo-
cal communities and the nation at large in the 21 st century. The National Plan therefore
provides the strategic framework for re-engineering the higher education system for the
21 st century.

The National Plan recognises the current strengths and weaknesses of the higher
education system, and is based on a developmental approach that is intended to
guide institutions towards meeting the goals for the system as a whole. Its imple-
mentation will demand commitment and hard work from all constituencies. But
most of all, it will demand much creative energy. The plan sets the expectation of a
high-quality higher education system which will also respond to the equity and de-
velopment challenges that are critical to improving the quality of life of all South
Africans.
There can be little doubt that the National Plan provides the country with a
unique opportunity - perhaps one that will not, or cannot, be repeated - to establish
a higher education system that can meet the challenges and grasp the opportunities
presented by the contemporary world. It must be able to produce graduates with
high-quality skills and competencies in all fields. It must be able to produce research
that will build the economy, and make South Africans significant players on the
 A DEVELOPING SOUTH AFRICAN HIGHER EDUCATION SYSTEM 161

global stage. It must furthermore be able to create a learning society that draws in
people of all ages and from all walks of life and gives them the opportunity to ad-
vance, develop and enrich themselves, both intellectually and materially. Most im-
portantly, higher education must make a lasting contribution towards building the
future generations of critical black intellectuals and researchers (RSA MoE, 2001:
Foreword).
The choice that was made in this National Plan was to first build a national
higher education system, so that the whole system can respond to the fierce competi-
tion of globalisation facing South Africa, Southern Africa and Africa as a whole, on
playing fields which are at least fairly level. In the second section of this chapter, I
speculate on the extent to which the Minister of Education's high expectations for
the system can be met. .
Finally, Teichler made the point in his address that hardly any other country in
the world has received as much advice from abroad, regarding how to change higher
education and how to phase in new policies, as has been the case in South Africa
during recent years. Honest, reflective and sensitive discourse has been accompanied
by large numbers of "higher education experts" who have acted as missionaries of
higher education systems of their own countries, aiming to superimpose their own
recognised approaches on other countries. Given the multitude of innovations at
stake, as well as the various political and language ties to the major education-
selling countries, South Africa is vulnerable to this intrusion. Many other countries
are currently engaged in a series of confusing and controversial debates about higher
education, about the functions of teaching-learning, research and community service
and about issues such as equitable access and quality assurance. One can observe a
multitude of surprisingly amateurish ways of measuring success and setting in mo-
tion social mechanisms of rewards and sanctions in higher education, most of them
based on questionable judgements. One could argue that this state of intellectual
confusion and inconsistency in higher education management does not matter so
much in relatively rich and stable countries, as long as the harmful effects of the
existing higher education systems do not clearly outweigh their positive effects. For
South Africa, in contrast, finding the appropriate means of improving the higher
education system may be more crucial than in many other countries. We have to find
ways to strive for the highest possible achievement as well as for the growing par-
ticipation of hitherto disadvantaged groups. This means that a balance must be
achieved between globalisation and regional responsiveness (Teichler, 2000).
Guy Neave also echoes these ideas of Ulrich Teichler. Neave (2001) makes some
profound points on such issues in his reaction to the Association of African Univer-
sities' Declaration on the African University in the Third Millennium - in which he
welcomes the Declaration's clear acknowledgement that it is a crucial time for the
African University. For, alongside and in addition to the long-term issues of rele-
vance, inadequate resources, massive expansion in the demand for places and the
concomitant growth in the overall volume of student numbers, there stand two other
challenges. These are globalisation on the one hand and the rise of the so-called
"knowledge economy" on the other. Neave explains that globalisation tends to tie
the often-embryonic research and advanced-training system into the international
economy, thus weaning it further from local needs. This amplifies the haemorrhage,
162 KALIE STRYDOM

better known as the "brain drain", of those who are already highly trained, and thus
vital for national well-being. The challenge of the "knowledge economy" places
particular weight on the research system, both as a vehicle for training future re-
search cadres and as a means of generating "knowledge-based capital"; and this adds
further urgency to the basic issue of how research itself is to be managed in the fu-
ture, and how it is to be sustained as the keystone to a sustainable economy (Neave,
2001: 99).
Building on these observations, I would like to deal with some typical regional
higher education issues, while also emphasising the necessity of rapid progress with
national transformation, in preparation for global competitiveness.

2. TYPICAL ISSUES OF REGIONAL RESPONSIVENESS, GLOBALISATION

AND THEIR RELATIONSHIP IN SOUTH AFRICA
In the light of research done at our Unit for Research into Higher Education, it often
seems as if there is not enough understanding of relationships and issues like the
following, not only in most higher education institutions but even in the higher edu-
cation branch of the South African Department of National Education.
Identifying the regions' place in a typology to be compared with national and
global contexts, e.g. low incomenow growth or high growthlhigh income, etc.
Identifying the roles which higher education institutions are playing and should
play with regard to regional development and regional co-operation, based on
their responses to globalisation, national legislation, institutional plans and the
needs of the region and its people.
Assessing institutional strategic plans according to the following types of crite-
ria:
Present responsiveness to regional needs (nature and extent).
The impact of the regions on higher education institutions.
The capacity of higher education institutions to engage with the regions.
The establishment of a "regional cluster", i.e. higher education institutions,
business and industry, community-based organisations (CBOs), non-govern-
mental organisations (NGOs), etc., working in co-operative programme
partnerships of quality.
The quality assurance of academic programmes and research projects in re-
lation to the community service of higher education institutions, linked to
efficiency and effectiveness criteria with performance indicators and
benchmarking standards.
Doing economic impact studies of higher education institutions in the region
(OECD, 1999).
Drawing on our research on regional responsiveness, the following comments
might help to explain the complicated relationships and issues in South African
higher education.
There is chaotic and senseless competition, with almost no co-operation in stra-
tegic planning among higher education institutions in each region. There is very
little indication of the creation of a new organisational culture of "co-opetition"
 A DEVELOPING SOUTH AFRICAN HIGHER EDUCATION SYSTEM 163

(a newly coined word intended to signify a combination of co-operation and

competition) among higher education institutions as a "regional cluster", serving
regional and national interests as well as those needs which can be recognised in
the global context.
Higher education institutions in the regions have not accepted the harsh reality
that in the near future no big growth is likely in student numbers in the regions,
due to the proliferation of needs and to resource constraints, and that they should
consolidate and set priorities among themselves instead of competing for stu-
dents (or the subsidy that students bring with them) through unnecessary dupli-
cation in programmes without sufficiently valuing principles like quality, effi-
ciency, cost-effectiveness, equity, etc.
Instead of the constant "academic drift" which is taking place at the moment, the
different niches at present occupied by the higher education institutions should
be valued, and furthered through planning. These institutions should seek ways
to develop synergies between their different niches to the benefit of all "clients"
(students, employers, community, etc.).
The "upward" academic drift of the technikons is increasing competition for the
same students between these institutions and the existing universities, through
unnecessary overlap and duplication of academic programmes and, on the other
hand, leaving a gap between school! further education and university education.
Almost all higher education institution in the regions are being negatively af-
fected by financial stringency. The stringency is due to expectations of econo-
mies of scale, the cost of the expensive information technology (IT) now enter-
ing education, the need for sophisticated support services, and other reasons.
This is impeding the growth which institutions need in order to be competitive
nationally and globally.
In regional reviews of institutional planning and in workshop discussions of
globalisation in relation to national, regional and local interests and needs, glob-
alisation is often not well defined and its implications are inadequately dealt
with. For some institutions it is a promise (although vague) of opportunities,
while others find it threatening and degrading, just widening the gap between
advantaged and disadvantaged institutions. Neither of these institutional views
deals adequately with this issue, even in their mission statements, let alone in in-
stitutional planning and strategies. Often those ideas which are expressed are
linked to only a few international students; a co-operative academic programme
with one or two overseas institutions; and!or fairly small research contracts with
overseas and!or (sometimes) African partners, without problematising globalisa-
tion-responsive contributions against national and regional needs and interests.
Globalisation is part of the "struggle" of most higher education institutions in
the South African regions to find more students and staff from abroad to study
or teach at the institutions and to find more opportunities for their own students
and staff to study or teach abroad.
The language proficiency of students and staff at many institutions is not good
enough for international liaison, and both students and staff often lack awareness of
the world beyond the borders of South Africa. New dimensions and a better under-
standing of pluralism, multi-culturalism and diversity are needed, to function in a
164 KALIE STRYDOM

complicated developed world while realising the struggle of this developing country
to build national pride and a civil society. The line between the local and the global
is increasingly blurry: for example, South African students are citizens of a world in
which industrial pollution in the North and the AIDS pandemic in the South have a
direct impact on individuals' lives. These same students are going out to work in a
different economy and workforce, where the ability to work in multi-cultural teams
and to understand different cultural paradigms are important practical skills.
These complicated relationships and issues might be further illustrated by asking
any of the higher education institutions in the South African regions some typical
questions about the area of programme planning:
To what extent is global understanding and/or competence articulated as a goal
of undergraduate and graduate education at South African institutions? How is it
defined? How is it assessed?
To what extent do South African institutions include global perspectives in gen-
eral-formative education curricula?
How do South African institutions implicitly or explicitly encourage or discour-
age study abroad? What is the role of financial aid in such encouragement or
discouragement? What are the cost barriers? Departmental requirements for their
m~or subjects? Staff attitudes in general?
To what extent do collaborative activities with institutions in other countries
affect the experience of undergraduates and graduates? Do they affect the cur-
ricula of undergraduates and graduates? Do they involve undergraduates and
graduates in international activities such as study abroad, or collaboration in
trans-national research?
To what extent do the international activities of staff have an impact on under-
graduates and graduates?
How many distance learning courses offered by South African institutions are
taken by students outside South Africa? Are these courses tailored for such an
audience in terms of content and/or curriculum design?
How do South African institutions review and assess the global dimension of
undergraduate/graduate education?
To what extent do academic policies and practices such as promotion and tenure
criteria, or staff development opportunities, emphasise and reward teaching and
learning with a global focus? (see Green & Baer, 2000).
Another perspective, the concept of the "African Virtual University" - planned
and driven by the developed world - has been interpreted by many higher education
institutions in the Southern African countries, and in Africa as a whole, as a wonder-
ful solution not only to the problems of massification, but also to other problems
which are being encountered. E-Iearning and distance education ventures offered by
bigger and richer institutions nationally and overseas are often justified as a way of
serving poor and rural people. However, most experts know that they have much
more to do with gaining new markets in the ruthless competition for government
subsidies and grants, and that they often fail to confront crucial counter-arguments.
In an electronic communication about new releases, the Commonwealth of
Learning (COL, 2001) provides particulars of its latest publication entitled The
Changing Faces of Virtual Education, edited by Dr Glen M. Farrell (Farrell, 2001)
 A DEVELOPING SOUTH AFRICAN HIGHER EDUCATION SYSTEM 165

and published by the COL in Vancouver, Canada. The COL makes the following
statement:
As global discussions on closing the 'digital divide' have observed, it is not surprising
that the study notes that a major feature of the current state of virtual education devel-
opment is that it depends on where you live. The growth is largely occurring in coun-
tries with mature economies and established infonnation and communication infrastruc-
ture (lCTs). A lack of such infrastructure, together with the lack of development capital,
means that the developing countries of the world have not been able to, as yet, use vir-
tual education models in their efforts to bring mass education opportunities to their citi-
zens (COL, 2001: I).

Hall (2000) argues that remarkably little work has been done to understand the
teaching-learning implications of virtual education. According to him, Fabos and
Young (1999), in their review of the literature, found that extensive claims for the
efficacy of on-line education have not been matched by a demonstration of results.
Communication exchange projects, for instance, seek to build classroom connec-
tions between schools, with learning projects based on the use of e-mail. This is
claimed to bring skills benefits (writing and keyboard skills), social benefits (multi-
cultural awareness) and economic benefits (preparing students for the global work-
force). More complex forms of telecommunication exchange involve a number of
classrooms and a moderator who co-ordinates collaboration and dialogue between
classrooms, following a particular curricular theme. Examples are the AT&T Learn-
ing Network, Apple's Global Education Network and Global Schoolhouse. But there
is little conclusive evidence that any such uses of information technology have a
substantial educational benefit.
The overall emphasis of most exchanges simplistically remains on unification (e.g.
promoting a collaborative global community and developing a 'sensitivity of humanity'
and teamwork on a world-wide scale) rather than on self-reflection and critical under-
standing of difference (Fabos & Young, 1999: 240; also see Doheny-Farina, 1996).

Michael Harris, a member of the founding editorial team of the journal Internet
in Higher Education, concludes:
I have not been able to uncover any systematic evidence of careful consideration to
questions of the 'effectiveness' of various pedagogical approaches. Neither faculty or
students seem much interested in the questions of the 'quality' of the learning experi-
ence (Harris, 1998: 248).

To Hall (2000) it seems apparent that any correction of these deficiencies will
lead to a re-emphasis on the importance of interaction between groups of learners
and teachers. Effective learning in the virtual classroom - as opposed to the efficient
transmission of information - will depend on small group size. However boundless
education may become, no model for "deep learning" has yet been developed that
allows delivery on a mass scale without a concomitant increase in the number of
teachers.
Castells, Clark, Gibbons, Scott, Barnett, Jacob and Hellstrom, Fehnel, Cloete and
Moja - to cite just a few - have provided us with enough complexities in the aca-
demic environment of South Africa and Africa to last a lifetime. Knowledge is no
longer produced where it once was, distributed as it once was, used as it once was,
nor - most importantly - does it last as long as it once did. The result is that the
166 KALIE STRYDOM

forces of evolution are pressing on higher education as never before. Those institu-
tions that are located in the midst of the economies that are determining the charac-
ter of globalisation seem to be benefiting from their proximity - when their leaders
act adaptively. Institutions redefine their mission, restructure themselves and gener-
ally seek to keep abreast of change, in a way that allows them to maintain their rela-
tive place in the developed world. It is possible that some advantaged and even dis-
advantaged higher education institutions located in the metropolises of countries like
South Africa, that is in economies peripheral to the developed world, may be able to
follow similar strategies; but their strategies need to be more carefully focused on
the local or regional character of the metropolis in which they are situated. These
institutions are also seeking to enlarge their territory by approaching higher educa-
tion institutions in poor regions of South Africa with the offer of more specialised
programmes. And they are creating linkages with institutions in the dominant global
economies, in order to acquire specialised skills or to compete with developed-world
institutions. But what happens to the higher education institutions in very poor re-
gions of South Africa or in other countries in Africa that cannot participate in these
leagues, given their predicament in rural and underdeveloped regions of a develop-
ing country? This question becomes even more critical if we listen to Fehnel (2000)
writing on Globalisation in African Higher Education: The Perils of Being the Runt
of the Litter. Those higher education institutions which are increasingly forced to the
margins of the world economic order are often greatly dependent on the state for
financial support; they lack the resources to become providers of mass higher educa-
tion. By default, they become the legitimisers of an elite social, political and eco-
nomic order in their country. However, they are not the providers of elite education
for their own citizens - this privilege belongs to universities in the "First World". So
what will become of them?
Fehnel continues with more thought-provoking questions. Will universities in the
developed world, i.e. mostly the North, which he describes as "tourists", take pity on
the "runt of the litter" and offer to recolonise these institutions with proposals of
linkages and partnerships? Or will they throw them scraps from their abundant intel-
lectual tables by sending them outdated books, journals and computers? Will the
higher education "tourists" revert to nature and jump at the opportunity to exploit a
market that is under-served and starved for appropriate education and training pro-
grammes - and by such action effectively kill off the runt? Clearly, to the extent that
the tentacles of the global economy are reaching into Africa, it is beyond the capac-
ity of most African institutions and of Africa's human resources to equip themselves
to participate aggressively - even on a regional basis - in the processes of globalisa-
lion. While the pace of change may be slower in Africa than in other parts of the
world, the necessity of lifelong learning in the professions and technologically-
related fields is becoming a reality on this continent too. However, few African in-
stitutions - even those that claim to be "world class" - arc committed to making the
fundamental changes which are needed in order to become viable partners for indus-
tries operating by the new rules of the global economy.
What can be said of public policies for higher education in Africa'? Are govern-
ments providing the incentives to steer institutions into the new knowledge order'?
Who has moved into the space created by governments for greater diversity of insti-
 A DEVELOPING SOUTH AFRICAN HIGHER EDUCATION SYSTEM 167

tutional types? The corporate universities? The virtual universities? The franchise of
a global brand name? Is this space being monitored and regulated in the general pub-
lic interest (Fehnel, 2000: 30)?
These issues of regional (national) responsiveness and globalisation are leading
to great uncertainty in a developing higher education system such as South Africa's.
Is it possible, and wise, to emphasise national restructuring first before responding to
global competitiveness? How does this situation of uncertainty affect the delicate
relationships between advantaged and disadvantaged academics and their higher
education institutions, across the wide span of institutional diversity which is still
prevalent in the South African context? South Africa is making considerable efforts
in its approach to the issues of globalisation, through its world-class constitution and
through its economic visio~ in joining the WorId Trade Organisation and emphasis-
ing privatisation. As one of the leading countries in Africa, it needs to find good
solutions to the need for regional responsiveness, in order to become globally com-
petitive in higher education as soon as possible.

3. POSSIBLE "SOLUTIONS", BASED ON NATIONAL POLICIES, FOR

HIGHER EDUCATION INSTITUTIONS IN THE REGIONS OF
SOUTH AFRICA
The National Plan for South African higher education provides appropriate broad
guidelines for change. However, the implementation agenda does not sufficiently
prioritise clear and specific solutions which emphasise regional responsiveness.
Such solutions are required in order to counter the petty interests of higher education
institutions, and to enhance progress towards national goals that can prepare the
higher education system for global competitiveness.
Here I shall provide examples of possible solutions for only three of the many
partners or stakeholders, namely the government, higher education institutions, and
business/industry.

3.1. Government in Relation to Regional Responsiveness and Globalisation

The following policy developments are now needed.
Provide state funding on a planned basis that will "steer" the higher education
system towards national goals. Maximise investment in support of smart solu-
tions for, and constructive progress towards, national policy implementation in a
global context. This must include incentives for successes and rationalisation in
all regions, to create viable and sustainable higher education in a global market-
place, and to counterbalance institutional self-interest.
Support regional responsive planning, rather than opportunism for short-term
gain, by: recognising the urgent need for institutions to rethink their roles and
missions in the light of contemporary circumstances; enabling institutions'
budget submissions to reflect the priorities of their strategic thinking; and asking
other stakeholders to provide support in partnerships consistent with the strategic
168 KALIE STRYDOM

plans at institutional, regional and national levels, without ignoring globalisation

realities.
Encourage management autonomy and initiative through deregulation, as far as
possible within the national steering framework. Ensure that any cost savings
generated by the regions and institutions are retained, to promote quality, effi-
ciency and effectiveness in the regions; and that any additional revenues gener-
ated by the institutions' and the regions' own efforts are treated as supplements
to government funding. At the same time, through incentives, encourage institu-
tions to set annual performance goals derived from their strategic plans and to
publicly report their achievements and progress.
Support regional initiatives to create an enabling environment, through funding
for the establishment of supportive organisations of external stakeholders (e.g.
businesslindustry and the community) as an integral part of regional initiatives,
including appropriate measures to ensure educational quality, relevance, effec-
tiveness, etc. in the socio-economic developmental goals of the regions and the
country.
Support interinstitutional co-operation and co-operative academic programmes
based on regional initiatives and national interests. This support must be in the
form of providing financial incentives and public acknowledgement of progress
made with co-operation and integration. (A financially viable higher education
system in South Africa, as presently constituted, is not possible. As a conse-
quence of the current fragmented system of unsustainable small institutions,
achieving comprehensive regional provision will require mergers.)
The NPHE addresses some of these solutions, but - as Cloete correctly points
out:
In attempting to implement policy. the drafters of the NPHE had made two key ques-
tionable assumptions: an assumption of stability in an unstable, fast changing system,
and an assumption of sufficient capacity in institutions and in the DoE [Department of
Education]. Roughly a third of institutions, with high capacity, had done better than
ever before since the onset of the planning process in 1997; the middle third were func-
tioning quite well, with reasonable enrolments of students; and the bottom third, with
low capacity, were in serious financial and management trouble. The poor image of
higher education had been over-determined by the bottom third, and the DoE tended to
become over-involved with them. It was not possible for the same policies to address
the crises of the bottom third as well as strengthening the top third. This required a dif-
ferentiated policy approach, which was not part of the NPHE. The challenge therefore
was how to make the system, with its diverse institutional cultures and capacities, and
diverse strengths, work (CHET, 2001: 8-9).

3.2. Higher Education Institutions in the Regions of South Africa

In most of the higher education institutions in regions of South Africa the following
solutions are at least partly needed:
Develop institutional strategic plans, using a consultative and consensus-
building approach involving all stakeholders with an interest in higher education.
The main elements of the strategic (three-year rolling) plans should include the
declarations of institutional mission statements, elaboration of institutional
 A DEVEWPING SOUTH AFRICAN HIGHER EDUCATION SYSTEM 169

strategies, and preparation of clear and "measurable" actions for the implementa-
tion of these strategies. Performance management through in-house training
(learnerships) and staff appraisal (standard setting), with work contracts for all
staff, is absolutely necessary.
Use the strategic plans as the basis for negotiating relationships with the national
and provincial departments and other partners as part of the regional initiatives.
These discussions should include topics such as budget submission processes,
budget allocation processes, management and institutional autonomy, and
mechanisms and procedures whereby the institutions will demonstrate their ac-
countability to the national and provincial governments and to business, indus-
try, the community and other stakeholders.
Build capacity regionally for the quality assurance of teaching and learning, re-
search, community service and other strategic activities (such as in-service train-
ing), based on internationally acceptable criteria, indicators and benchmarking
standards, in all educational areas that are crucial for the country's economic or
social advancement. In many regions no single institution has the expertise and
infrastructure to fulfil this function on its own. (An example is the use of infor-
mation technology.)
Develop an institutional and regional management information system (MIS),
linked to the national MIS with benchmarks that enable access to timely and re-
liable information on institutional performance, to assist managers to make in-
formed decisions, as well as to facilitate monitoring and evaluation.
Devise and initiate co-operative inter-institutional academic programmes and
research projects at all levels and in all areas of higher education, to build quality
capacity in leadership and management, teaching and learning, access, etc. - at
least in the regions.
Bearing the above possible solutions in mind, it would also be critical to negoti-
ate about the educational provision within the regions with the leaders in general
(school) education and especially also in further education, to ensure that the
three sectors serve the educational needs and interest of the regions without un-
necessary overlap and duplication in programmes and projects, while making
maximum use of available human and financial resources and facilities. Access
programmes should be seen as an excellent place to start.
We must be realistic in recognising some impediments to this kind of institu-
tional transformation. In this regard, Kaburise states:
Here we need to begin with the proposition that change is a dialectical process, largely
planned but, like any other human undertaking, more or less tentative, more or less un-
certain, and wisely nervous. This derives from the tentative, experimental and dialecti-
cal nature of human experience. We should expect to encounter a preoccupation from
the conceptual or planning phase with constraints such as limited budgets, lack of skills
or qualified staff, and lack of sufficiently prepared students for certain curricular direc-
tions. However, it could be argued that the thrust, initially, should be prompted by a
sense of national needs, and not of budgetary and human resources constraints. To
merely cite the logistic difficulties of implementation is to avoid dealing with the issues,
and further illustrates the type of tactics often employed by opponents of change that
might dislodge the privileged discourse to which they may have become too accus-
tomed. Such tactics leave one with the impression that the exercise of engaging in the
debate about the real issues is considered cerebrally too demanding.
170 KALIE STRYDOM

Though there is a correlation between resource levels and performance, there is also as
much of a correlation between attitude and achievement. The human imagination, in
this country and elsewhere in the world, has been found to be most productive in mo-
ments of acute loss and deprivation" (Kahurise, 200 1: 13-14).

3.3. Business, Industry and Other Stakeholders

These stakeholders can do more, and they should contribute substantially to the de-
velopment of institutions. They have an important role to play in the processes of
revitalisation and standardisation. Some possible actions are the following:
Recognise the legitimacy of education and training as a development invest-
ment. Educational development has national capacity-building implications that
reach far beyond the means of the education and training sector.
Support strategic planning at all levels by helping to provide the inputs (exper-
tise and finances) required to undertake strategic planning.
Provide assistance for the strategic development of regional learning resource
centres, for the purposes of a co-ordinated technology information development
plan, including electronic networking on the Internet, and professional upgrading
of support staff for these centres.
Support inter-institutional linkages and regional initiatives designed to build
capacity and quality in essential areas which are critical for the future develop-
ment of the country.
Support regional leadership and management training to develop expertise and
financial management skills through local short programmes designed to en-
hance academic efficiency and cost-effectiveness. Provide assistance for sub-
regional and institutional workshops in national-regional-institutional communi-
cations, financial planning and administration.

4. SUMMATIVE PERSPECTIVE

In this chapter I have discussed relationships and issues, and some possible solu-
tions, in the specifiC context of South Africa and its regions. However, both the
analysis and some of the possible solutions can certainly apply to the complex rela-
tionships among higher education institutions across Southern Africa and even Af-
rica as a whole. The difficulty lies mainly in the unique context of every higher edu-
cation system, with its variety of institutions, in different regions of South Africa
and even in Africa. This aspect must be well understood and recognised before in-
formed change and progress can be made.
Globalisation is a fact of life in higher education. But responses to it cannot be
judged, planned and implemented in simplistic ways by a developing higher educa-
tion system and its institutions, without destroying important education and devel-
opment needs and interests at a specific point in time in a specific region and coun-
try, as has been so convincingly argued by Teichler in the analysis quoted earlier. In
this regard, 0 Kaya adds the following:
It is important to realise that South African higher education cannot escape the realities
of socio-economic development often described as needing a paradigm shift, emphasis-
 A DEVELOPING SOUTH AFRICAN HIGHER EDUCATION SYSTEM 171

ing that the socio-economic transfonnation process in Africa cannot be advanced effec-
tively unless those involved in this process take seriously the realities of African socie-
ties as they are, not as they ought to be. This implies that sustainable socio-economic
development can only be realised if it is based on the indigenous. The indigenous is not
necessarily what is traditional, but whatever the African masses regard to be an authen-
tic expression of themselves (0 Kaya, 2001: 19).

The developing systems of higher education in South Africa undoubtedly need

not only time but also protective measures to guard against unfair competition, even
if it comes disguised as necessary healthy competition on level playing fields. I am
afraid that many champions of globalisation both in and outside South Africa tend to
forget this. Therefore South Africans must find their own solutions, nationally and
regionally, to protect their own higher education interests and needs. At least another
five year period is needed to develop the national higher education system with its
variety of institutions, before globalisation can become the priority external influ-
ence that must be dealt with.

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COL (The Commonwealth of Learning)(2001). "Electronic communication about its new study release".
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Doheny-Farina, S. (1996). The Wired Neighborhood. New Haven: Yale University Press.
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Farrell, G.M. (ed.)(2001). The Changing Faces of Virtual Education. Vancouver: The Commonwealth of
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Hall, M. (2000). "The New Imperialism of Borderless Education". In CHET, Transfonnation Debates:
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Kaburise, J.B.K. (2001). "The Transformation of Historically Black Universities in South Africa: prob-
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versities (Selected Proceedings from the "Capacity Building of Law Schools of Historically Black
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Leatt, J.V. & Martin, D.H. (n.d.). "Reflections on collaboration within SA Higher Education by two
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Sizer, J. (2001). "Research and the Knowledge Age". Tertiary Education and Management, 7, 227-242.
Teichler, U. (2000). "Patterns of the Higher Education system, changes at times of accelerating interna-
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tein, on 17 February.
UDW Working Group (2000). HDI's: Development Institutions of the Future. (Paper presented at the
ASAHDI Conference on Higher Education: "Imperatives of Equity and Redress" held at the Sandton
Convention Centre in Johannesburg on 19 and 20 October.) University of Durban Westville, Durban.
 PART 3

IMPLICATIONS FOR STUDENTS, STAFF

AND LABOUR MARKETS
 CRAIG MCINNIS

SIGNS OF DISENGAGEMENT?
Responding to the Changing Work and Study Patterns of Full- Time
Undergraduates in Australian Universitie/

1. NEW CONTEXT: NEW ISSUES

Anecdotal reports of students working more (in paid employment) and studying less
have been coming from academics in Australia with particular intensity and frustra-
tion in recent times. OECD (2001) data suggests that Australian students are more
likely than in the past to work while studying, but the trend to increasing hours of
part-time work is mirrored in other systems, especially the United States (Astin,
1998; Marchese, 1998), and also in the United Kingdom (Little, 2001). As in Aus-
tralia, recent interest in the financial conditions of undergraduate students in the UK
(Metcalf, 2001) and France (Grignon, 2000) has been stimulated by a broader con-
cern with the condition of student life, largely prompted by issues of equity and stu-
dents' social backgrounds: the underlying concern is that the academic performance
of students from poor backgrounds is being jeopardised by part-time work during
term time.
These concerns about the social and economic conditions of students have
tended to overlook some more fundamental shifts in the relationship between stu-
dents and universities that are only partially explained by the amount of part-time
work students are now undertaking. What we are seeing now are patterns of student
disengagement, and new forms of engagement, to which many institutions, and the
system at large, have still not adjusted in much more than an ad hoc way. This may
be due to an underlying view that the issue of part-time work has always been, and
always will be, problematic. However, the difference now is a fairly recent change
in the motives and outlooks of students. As a study of first year students in Australia
predicted some five years ago (McInnis & James, 1995), students increasingly ex-
pect the university to fit in with their lives rather than vice versa.
In this chapter I explore the nature of the shift in forms of student engagement,
and what that means for universities. The focus is on "mainstream" students - those
who have enrolled full-time and come straight from school to university. The new
challenges are not confined to dealing with new markets of part-time and distance
education students, and they demand more than immediate institutional responses:
they go to the core of assumptions about the role of universities in defining and con-
trolIing the nature of the undergraduate student experience, and about the distinct-
iveness of universities in shaping that experience. This is especially critical for those
systems and institutions which are still primarily enrolling "traditional" full-time

175
1. Enders and O. Fulton (eds.), Higher Education in a Globalising World, 175-189.
© 2002 Kluwer Academic Publishers.
176 CRAIG McINNIS

campus-based students, where it is assumed that a process of maturation in a co-

coon-like environment will be conceived, produced and directed by the university.
In reality, students are in an increasingly powerful position to shape the design and
delivery of the curriculum. Conceptual frameworks devised a generation ago for
analysing the nature of the student experience are thus found wanting. Policy is still
being developed in the belief that students' career pathways can be developed and
managed by government: meanwhile, student!> are choosing and creating their own
pathways, and to a large extent the universities are following.
Talk of students being less involved with university, or performing poorly com-
pared with previous generations, is, of course, nothing new. However, the "turned-
off' undergraduates of the 1970s to whom Little (1975) referred - a large number
"going though the motions", "hard to interest and consistently and increasingly late
with their work" - are not the same species as the current generation. In 1972, for
example, the number of students who dropped out was equivalent to nearly half of
the first year intake of an Arts Faculty in one Australian university. The main reason
given was "personal and intellectual confusion giving rise to general dissatisfac-
tion". In contrast, recent research (McInnis, James & Hartley, 2000) suggests that
young undergraduates these days are on the whole not confused, and they are mostly
quite satisfied with the quality of their experience. They generally know what they
want from university, are reasonably certain about the nature of their commitment,
and fairly clear about what they expect university to do for them.
Students' disengagement and their apparent lack of commitment present them-
selves as a problem on a daily basis for academics. A national survey of academics
found that the activities that had the most impact on their changing work hours in-
cluded providing academic and pastoral support for students (McInnis, 2000: 125).
Disengagement is manifested in, for example, declining numbers in classrooms, or
requests for special arrangements for assignments and examinations to meet the de-
mands of paid work. From the students' perspective, this behaviour is essentially an
extension of the process of negotiating their level of engagement with the university,
in the context of the choices available to them. The range of institutions, courses and
subjects now available, combined with increasingly sophisticated access to flexible
modes of knowledge delivery and electronically generated communities of learners,
enables students to shape the undergraduate experience to suit their own timetables
and priorities. Indeed, the term "disengagement" is probably misleading since it im-
plies a deficit in attitudes and values on the part of students, somewhat misjudges
their intentions, and devalues the nature of their experience. Taking a deficit view
makes it inevitable that governments' and institutions' responses to the new realities
of student expectations and aspirations will be inadequate. Such a view certainly
does not help universities to respond to the current generation of highly mobile and
technologically connected students, primed with demands and assumptions that
many academics may find difficult to understand, let alone accept.
There are three main concerns underlying this discussion. First, the rather poor
understanding of the changing forms of student engagement makes universities vul-
nerable to ad hoc solutions, from curriculum design to the provision of student sup-
port services. Second, universities' ambivalence, in defining their role in the face of
these changes, puts them at risk of being overly responsive to what students want
 SIGNS OF DISENGAGEMENT? 177

rather than what might benefit students as individuals and what might also benefit
society. Finally, it appears that, in Australia and perhaps the United States too at this
time, the undergraduate experience is changing by default, at a time when universi-
ties should be demonstrating leadership in structuring the experience, particularly
with respect to the design of the curriculum and the management of learning experi-
ences.
Policies and practice to meet the demands of negotiated engagement at both sys-
tem and institutional level are in the early stages of formation, and there is consider-
able uncertainty as to how universities should proceed. At least part of the problem
in responding to these changes is the deeply embedded notion of the "ideal under-
graduate student". A somewhat romantic notion of the student experience simply
ignores the new realities of student choices in mass higher education, flexible modes
of delivery, pressure to respond to student markets in the face of the decline in gov-
ernment funding, and the emergence of competition from diverse, well-resourced
and highly creative alternative providers. There is, as yet, no adequate conceptual
framework for analysing the nature of the emerging forms of negotiated engage-
ment, but there are clearly serious problems for policies and research which are built
on traditional notions of the student identity, with implications for their relative
power and authority over student life.

1.1. Patterns a/Disengagement

The nature and extent of student engagement can be measured and monitored with
some precision with respect to the ways students use their time, their priorities, and
their levels of commitment. As indicated above, the focus of the discussion here is
primarily on young undergraduates who go directly from school to university, since
these tend to be the students of most concern with respect to motivation, application,
retention and success.
In a national trend study of the first year undergraduate experience in Australian
universities, McInnis, James and Hartley (2000) noted that students are spending
less time on campus and more time working in paid employment. In 1994, 47 per
cent of first-year students spent five days a week on campus. By 1999, this had de-
creased to 36 per cent. In contrast, the proportion who spent just three days per week
on campus increased from 12 to 21 per cent over the same period. A related trend
concerns crucial aspects of study habits and social learning opportunities. For exam-
ple, the proportion of students who study on weekends declined significantly from
60 per cent in 1994 to 53 per cent in 1999, and the proportion who frequently bor-
row course materials from friends increased, again quite significantly, from 8 per
cent in 1994 to 19 per cent in 1999.
Of particular interest is the increase in the number of younger students (those
under 25 years) in paid employment, and the number who regard part-time work as
their major or sole source of income. As shown in Table I, the proportion of first
year students for whom part-time work is not a source of income dropped by 12 per
cent over the period 1994-99. That is, by 1999 36 per cent of commencing students
relied on part-time paid work as their only or main source of income.
178 CRAIG McINNIS

Table 1. Full-time first year students: paid work as a source ojincome, 1994 and 1999(%)
(1994, N=4 028; 1999, N=2 609).

Only Main Minor Not a

source source source source
1994 3 2 0 94
Full-time work
1999 2 2 I 95
1994 4 22 22 52
Part-time/Casual work
1999 9 27 23 40*
* significant difference at 0.0] level
(Source: McInnis, James & Hanley, 2000)

For many full-time students in Australia, the amount of part-time work under-
taken now quite closely resembles the typical pattern of students enrolled part-time.
From 1994-1999 there was a nine per cent increase in the proportion of full-time
students engaged in paid employment, and a 14 per cent increase in the mean num-
ber of hours they work. The average working time in 1999 - on a conservative esti-
mate - was 12.6 hours per week, and the proportion who said they worked between
11 and 20 hours increased over the five years from 32 to 42 per cent. It is notewor-
thy that 27 per cent of students now work more than 16 hours per week, as against
20 per cent in 1994.

Table 2. Full-time first year students: hours spent in paid work in a typical university week,
1994 and 1999 (% oj all full-time first year students who indicated they were in paid employ-
mentjorone or more hours per week) (1994 n=l 572; 1999 n=1 253).

1-5 hrs 6-10 hrs 11-15 16-20 21-25 26-30 31 hrs or

hrs hrs hrs hrs more
1994 22 38 20 12 4 2 2
1999 16 32 25 17 5 2 3
(Source: McInnis, James & Hartley, 2000)

While the data above refer only to first year undergraduates, a national study of
students across all years shows that approximately 70 per cent are working in paid
employment (Long & Hayden, 2001), and a study focused specifically on the habits
of part-time working students concludes that the average is around 15 hours per
week (McInnis & Hartley, in press).
Recent reports from the American Council on Education confirm the significant
impact of paid work on study in the United States: in one national survey of under-
graduates, approximately four-fifths were found to be working while taking classes.
Of the students enrolled full-time who had some paid employment, about one in five
were actually working full-time. Twenty-seven per cent of full-time students worked
between 21 and 34 hours per week during term. In another study, of high school
seniors planning to attend college, the majority were planning to seek employment
to pay college expenses and for what the report describes as "social reasons" - to
buy clothes and pay for entertainment and holiday travel. Data from Europe reported
by Little (2001) suggest considerably lower levels of paid work hours compared
 SIGNS OF DISENGAGEMENT? 179

with Australia and the United States. Nevertheless, closer attention is being given to
the issues in, for example, France, where a recent survey indicated that one in three
younger students are involved in paid work not connected with their study, although
it should be said that traditional summer jobs still represent half of the paid work (Le
Monde 18 July 2001).
In summary, a large number of full-time enrolled students have become de facto
part-time students. They either seek or find, in their lives, an increasing number of
activities and priorities that compete with the demands of university. Leaving aside
the growing impact of part-time work on their everyday commitment to their stud-
ies, students have in any case less need to spend time on campus in order to study, or
to have access to teaching and learning resources. At the same time, it should be
understood that most students working part-time recognise, and worry about, the
competing demands of study and work. This is especially true of the growing num-
ber who find it difficult to say no to their employers, when they are asked to work
more hours at the expense oftheir academic activities (McInnis & Hartley, in press).

i.2. The impact of Part-time Paid Work

What does working part-time mean for the experience of university life and
study? In broad terms, the findings of the Australian studies suggest that, compared
with those who do not work, younger first year students who work substantial hours
part-time are likely to spend fewer days on campus, are less likely to work with
other students on areas of their course, and more likely to have studied inconsis-
tently through the semester. They also tend to anticipate getting lower marks, and
are more likely to seriously consider deferring at an early point of their student ex-
perience. Of course, this relative lack of engagement washes back on their percep-
tions of the quality of their student experience: for example, these students are less
likely to agree that "teaching staff are good at explaining things". The more hours
students work, the more these negative factors are amplified, and they feel seriously
burdened by over commitment. This is even more pronounced for the 36 per cent
who say that worrying about money interferes with their study. A significant in-
crease in the proportion distracted from study by money worries means more stu-
dents are scoring poorly on almost every dimension of what might be regarded as a
successful first year experience. Declining levels of application and motivation are
the most obvious by-products of financial stress.
As with paid part-time work, Australia is not alone in these trends. The Austra-
lian results mirror those of substantial research from the United States that shows a
decline in the percentage of students who say that university has had an impact on
their personal values. On average, US students in the 1990s seem to benefit less
from university than previous cohorts, and there is clear evidence that student effort
has decreased in the past decade. Students appear to be getting higher grades for
doing less, and a culture of entitlement is widely reported (Kuh, 1999).
From 30 years of surveying first year students in the United States, Astin (1998)
and his colleagues recently observed that a major trend in student values has been a
notable shift in the relative significance of two contrasting values: "developing a
]80 CRAIG McINNIS

meaningful philosophy of life" and "being well-off financially". These two values
have reversed places since the late 1960s, with "being well-off financially" now the
top value for 74% of students. Astin also reports that academic engagement is de-
clining. There has been a marked drop in students spending at least six hours per
week studying, an increase in the numbers who report "oversleeping" and missing
class, and fewer students spend time asking teachers for advice about their work.
Alongside this has been an increasing concern about finance and their ability to pay
for college. US students are now more materialistic and more of them expect univer-
sity to help achieve their instrumental goals. They are also feeling more over-
whelmed by everything they have to do. However, recent unpublished data (Sax &
Gilmartin, 2001) shows a plateau in this trend with some indication that the level of
intrinsic interest in learning is improving.
A new and significant development to monitor these trends is the National Sur-
vey of Student Engagement (NSSE) from Indiana University, which aims to estab-
lish benchmarks for effective practice in universities. It has shown that while most
students report experience with collaborative and active learning, and see their uni-
versities as providing a supportive environment, they have only occasional contact
with their teachers and spend about half of the time expected by the university in
preparing for class (Kuh, 200 I: 13).

1.3. Changing Outlooks and Priorities of Young People

The increase in student part-time work is by no means the sole cause of disengage-
ment, and its impact should not be exaggerated. As is implied by the data from Astin
(1998) and colleagues reported above, there is evidence of a declining level of stu-
dent commitment to university study that is not entirely explained by financial pres-
sure on individuals, or the availability of information technology. There has been,
for example, an increase in the proportion of students who say, regardless of the
amount of part-time work, that they find it difficult to get themselves motivated to
study, and an increase also in the number of students finding their study workload
difficult to manage.
Changes in the undergraduate experience of young people have to be understood
in the context of broader shifts in their outlooks and priorities. What both the pat-
terns of work and the changing priorities indicate is a far more fundamental shift in
the ways many young people now see the university experience. They have a quite
different perspective on their futures and on the place of the university experience in
the scheme of things than those of a generation ago. Many are heading towards "thin
relationships between footloose workers in the global market place" (Edgar, 1999:
43). A study named the Young Adults' Aspirations Survey (Kilmartin, 2000) in
Australia showed distinct patterns of change in the values, lifestyles and aspirations
of the respondents compared with those of previous generations in their twenties.
The largest group in the sample (42 per cent) had done none of the things considered
to be major rites of passage towards family formation: they had not married, lived in
a de facto relationship, had children, or a mortgage. Leaving home early and then
 SIGNS OF DISENGAGEMENT? 181

returning for substantial periods is now a common pattern. Of those who had left
home, 53 per cent had returned at some stage.
Similar trends have been observed in the United States where 56 per cent of cur-
rent college students plan to live with their parents for some time after their gradua-
tion (paul, 2001). Interestingly, attitudes towards graduates living at home are
changing in the US where they are no longer seen as lacking independence but
rather, making rational financial decisions. At home, money that they would other-
wise have spent on survival becomes discretionary income for lifestyle maintenance,
as well as enhancing their capacity to pay back student loans, save or invest. Paul
(2001: 48) makes the point that traditional views about life after college are chang-
ing and that "major life decisions are (now) delayed and jumbled into entirely dif-
ferent patterns ... "
Some insightful observations on the broader trends underlying student disen-
gagement come from a Life Patterns project (Wyn and Dwyer, 2000), which has
followed around 2000 young people in Australia over ten years: they are now in
their late twenties. This study suggests that by the end of the 1990s there was a shift
towards "more complex life patterns and a blending or balancing of a range of per-
sonal priorities and interests" (2000: 149). The young people they followed are
aware of their foreclosed options and are "already moving beyond the narrow career
investments to which they had been led to aspire while at school" (2000: 152). Fur-
thermore:
Young people's identities can no longer be based to the same extent around the
achievement of careers, and nor can they be based on the postponement of "life" while
they invest in study. The certainty that a previous generation derived from this process
is gone. (Wyn and Dwyer, 2000: 158).

Likewise, notions of certainty of career paths are less relevant to an increasing

number of students. If so, efforts to improve or change levels of student commitment
to university should not be based on the assumption that the value of student identity
that comes from engagement with the university experience is a self-evident good.
This is especially critical if Mackay's assessment of the rising generation is accu-
rate. He argues that this highly educated and "over-stimulated" group has been
taught "to keep their options open; to keep an open mind; to wait and see; to hang
loose; to postpone commitment" (Mackay, 1999: 52). Negotiated engagement with
the under-graduate experience is part and parcel of this broader picture.

2. RESPONDING TO THE NEW REALITIES OF NEGOTIATED

ENGAGEMENT
Perhaps the most useful response to the trends identified in this paper is for higher
education policy researchers to revise their assumptions about the student experi-
ence, and to rethink the conceptual models on which their research is based. The
models of the student experience that have dominated research and policy thinking
have put governmental and institutional control at the centre. They assume that the
pre-entry attributes, goals and commitments of students are best shaped by a process
of personal and normative integration that transforms student perspectives and out-
182 CRAIG McINNIS

looks. Moreover, they assume that the universities are the primary agents responsi-
ble for this process. The amount of effort students put into their academic studies
and their involvement in the life of the university were identified over a decade ago
as the key to success (Pascarella & Terenzini 1991). By comparison, initial group
differences in student backgrounds were found to be largely indirect in their effect
on learning outcomes, and their impact relatively slight. Pascarella and Terenzini
concluded that most of the changes in student behaviours and outlooks are the prod-
uct of a range of "interrelated and mutually supporting experiences" provided both
in and out of the classroom and accumulated over time. Nearly every outcome area -
for example, intellectual flexibility - appears to be embedded within an intercon-
nected and mutually reinforcing network of cognitive, value, attitudinal and psycho-
social changes.
In contrast to this large body of research from the 1980s, there is precious little
research available right now to guide policy and practice related to the student ex-
perience. Pascarella and Terenzini (1998) have reviewed their work in the light of
changes in higher education and have concluded that the indicator of "instructional
effectiveness" used in impact studies has been too narrowly defined. They point to a
lack of knowledge of the effectiveness of technology-based courses on other learn-
ing outcomes such as learning-related attitudes and values. The interaction between
the instructional medium, the method, the task, and student is poorly understood.
Moreover, they question the assumption that face-to-face student-staff interaction is
critical to teaching and learning in a cyberspace environment.
It has to be asked if the nature and extent of student engagement are being
judged by standards and measures that are no longer appropriate. Trying to recreate
the campus-based experience from a distance may be a serious distraction, under-
mining the potential of new technologies. While there may be far more to the effec-
tive undergraduate experience than instruction, to achieve successful outcomes in
the face of negotiated engagement means that the social dimensions of the campus-
based experience will have to be managed with considerably more skill and re-
sources than in the past. These experiences will not happen without institutional
intervention, even if this might have been possible when a select few students went
to university and studied, worked, and played their way together as a cohort through
their undergraduate years.

2.1. Institutional Responses: Responsibility and Control

The question then is, just how much responsibility should universities assume for
managing the nature and level of student engagement, and how much can they really
achieve in their current form? Given that engagement is negotiable, and that univer-
sities wish to maintain that there is a richness in the integrated campus-based experi-
ence that sets them apart as providers of higher education, what sorts of responses to
student expectations are appropriate? The difficulty is that universities are likely to
put themselves at risk in terms of public credibility if their response to disengage-
ment is to adapt course design and delivery to the demands of the market without
 SIGNS OF DISENGAGEMENT? 183

consideration of the value of the broader student experience and the larger purposes
ofthe university.
An integrated student experience whereby social interaction on campus adds
value to academic outcomes will not occur by itself in an environment of negotiated
engagement. Universities will have to work at making it happen. Ironically, in the
introduction to Little's (1975) psycho-social study of students, David Reissman,
pointed to the way in which student activism in the early 1970s had
moved indoors, into the classroom, so that teachers are asked to negotiate with students
about how the class should be run, are criticised for holding back, and have demands
made on them for emotional as well as cognitive enlargement... (Iittle,1975: ix).

The issues of "the relation of authority to legitimacy and the effort to reduce the
traditional duality between the cognitive and the affective life" to which Reissman
refers (Little, 1975: ix), have taken on a different meaning and significance for insti-
tutions. Ultimately, the power and authority of the university and the teacher is now
seriously challenged by the capacity and preference of students to choose not to at-
tend. If the classrooms and libraries become empty spaces, adding a Starbucks cof-
fee shop to boost the critical mass of students using the library seems a reasonable
and realistic response if the goal is to create a social learning environment valued by
the university and students (Carlson, 2001).
The section that follows summarises some aspects of university structure and or-
ganisation that are central to any strategic response to the patterns of student en-
gagement: in particular, the need for renewed efforts to create a sense of learning
community, and issues of infrastructure and support for the total student experience.
It also provides some examples of responses currently being developed where insti-
tutions need to assert their social responsibility to provide learning environments
that foster foundational academic experiences for students, in social contexts that
enrich the experience for all. This requires a reassessment of the extent to which the
institutions can control the process and structure of the undergraduate experience,
since negotiated engagement means the preferences of students are to be taken seri-
ously.

2.2. Constructing and Valuing Learning Communities

Promoting managed learning communities has been an increasingly common institu-
tional response in the United States and Australia to the loss of opportunities in the
undergraduate years for interaction, integration and sense of student identity. Learn-
ing communities take many forms, but primarily aim to provide the advantages of
traditionally small cohesive groups of students, moving together through their
courses as a cohort. They are often grouped around particular subject themes. Repli-
cating the climate and activities of courses with small, tightly knit cohorts can apply
to individual classrooms, on-line communities, or even university-wide pro-
grammes. Whatever form they take requires skilful design and management, espe-
cially with the extremely large classes and complex timetables of comprehensive
uni versities.
184 CRAIG McINNIS

The major focus in curriculum and course organisation is to increase the amount
of time students can interact with their peers and with academics. This involves de-
signing and managing an array of learning experiences in the classroom, as well as
creating opportunities for incidental informal social experiences. Collaborative as-
sessment tasks and variations on the theme of problem-based learning have become
the norm in some institutions. These developments are by no means new or startling
innovations. What is new is the imperative to design and manage what once usually
occurred naturally, when students in small classes spent most of their time together.
The mark of success for such learning environments is the seamless ness of in-class
and out-of-class learning.
This has implications for the extent to which universities can manage student
identity as well as for the relationships between students, universities and employers
with respect to their relative power and authority over student life. In Australia, ef-
forts to provide students with a rich campus-based experience are under scrutiny
from government as part of a broader interest in changing student expectations. The
onus is on the universities to assert the meaning and value of the on-campus experi-
ence. This has a particular edge now, given the scale of government's and institu-
tions' investment in flexible course delivery. While universities are increasingly
adapting class contact timetables to suit the work-induced pressures on students,
some are also engineering ways of enabling students to connect with one another
socially - through collaborative assessment tasks, for example - as well as providing
course structures that offer opportunities for better quality face-to-face contact be-
tween staff and students.

2.3. Engagement and the Development a/Work-related Generic Skills

The link between study and work has been the subject of considerable research for
some time, but in recent years it has taken on a particular urgency as universities and
particular fields of study find themselves under threat from funding agencies, em-
ployers and alternative providers. Teichler (2001) has placed these developments in
a conceptual framework that points to the growing interest and significance of the
transition from higher education to employment. The results of the European
CHEERS study indicate that
about one-sixth of the graduates (surveyed) do not see a reasonable link between their
field of study and the work tasks ... and half do not see their area of work related at all
to higher education studies (Teichler, 2001: 10).

Similar research on science graduates in Australia (McInnis, Hartley & Ander-

son, 2001) suggests that perceptions of the mismatch between study and work are
also influenced by the everyday reality of gaps between the attributes developed by
university and those required in the work place. For example, only 54 per cent of
science graduates believed they gained "the ability to work with others" in their
course, whereas 90 per cent regarded this as important in their current employment.
Gaps are also evident for "oral communications skills", "understanding other points
of view" and a "sense of confidence and competence for working in an international
environment" (McInnis, Hartley & Anderson, 2001: 69). These skills are precisely
 SIGNS OF DISENGAGEMENT? 185

those that are best fostered in a cultivating climate where a high level of student en-
gagement and social interaction is the norm. The counter-trend of disengagement
makes such programmes more problematic.
The response to these issues at the institutional level has been reasonably direct,
although limited to resolving the more immediate challenges. Little (200 I) points to
a significant trend towards a more integrated relationship between students' paid
work and their future employment. She identifies two typical responses in the UK,
the establishment of university "job-shops" and the establishment of curriculum
frameworks that try to "capture" learning derived from experiences of work. The
Australian response (also common in the UK) has been to focus attention on specific
generic skills derived from the views of employer organisations as to the employ-
ability skills they require of graduates. These are already part of a national survey of
graduate satisfaction, the Course Experience Questionnaire (CEQ), conducted by the
Graduate Careers Council of Australia. All universities are required by government
to participate in the survey and the data are used widely as a performance measure.
The CEQ asks graduates in their first year of employment to rate their courses on
their satisfaction with the extent to which the course enabled them to develop,
amongst other things, their problem-solving skills, their analytic skills and their abil-
ity to work as a team member. In addition, all universities are now required by the
government to prepare their own statements of graduate attributes. These typically
include attributes that require structured and incidental opportunities for improving
interpersonal skills. The irony is that as more students disengage from the social
experience of learning, the less likely they are to credit the university experience
with a role in developing those attributes.

2.4. Issues for University Organisation and Infrastructure

Reduced time on campus does not necessarily mean a reduction in the need for sup-
port infrastructure and support services: in fact the opposite is true. However, it
comes as no surprise that policy makers are asking how much these support pro-
grammes cost, and what, if any, additional services can be purchased and by whom?
While significant groups of undergraduates will continue to use campus-based facili-
ties, it is highly unlikely that the majority will reduce their part-time work and in-
crease their commitment to university life without substantial incentives, or the
imposition of disincentives. Many universities are currently rethinking what they
need to provide on site with respect to facilities, and how they will fund and manage
the use of them. They risk exacerbating the problems of disengagement if they go
down the path of convenience shopping, encouraging students to put academic
commitments even further down the list of priorities. Academic and support strate-
gies must be seamlessly managed and complementary if they are to be effective.
There are outstanding examples of best practice in rethinking support systems and
infrastructure right across the system. However, as students withdraw from the day-
to-day campus life it becomes more difficult to justify the expensive infrastructure.
Providing support structures and resources that exacerbate the problem without any
186 CRAIG McINNIS

regard to the purposes of the undergraduate experience is doing no more than keep-
ing the customer satisfied.
There is little doubt that universities will need to reorganise the academic year to
accommodate the increasingly diverse demands from undergraduate students to ac-
commodate paid work along with study. Many universities are making considerable
efforts on this front. Summer schools appear to be back in favour in the United
States as students adapt to shifts in the economy and the growth of paid work oppor-
tunities that no longer coincide with summer breaks (Baldwin and McInnis, 2001).
The evidence from earlier efforts to promote summer schools is not all that favour-
able, but again it must be said that universities are dealing with a new set of student
motives and expectations.
Re-organising the academic year may actually be one of the most effective ways
for universities to promote more effective engagement, if students can be encour-
aged to spend at least some period of intense effort alongside other students at key
points of their course. However, it is a two-edged sword. The worst outcome would
be providing even greater opportunity for students to minimise their engagement,
leading to a further decline in the sense of a learning community, and fragmentation
of the curriculum content. This will occur unless there is strategic management
based on clearly articulated principles of effective undergraduate teaching.
As a counter to the trend towards a narrow focus on instruction in the quality as-
sessment of Australian universities, new measures of the student experience havc
been developed for use as part of national and institutional performance indicators
(McInnis, Griffin, James & Coates, 2001). The measures attempt to capture the total
student experience, including the quality of student support available to students, the
learning resources appropriate to their needs and a series of items related to student
perceptions of the social experience of learning at university that indicate their sense
of belonging to a community, where learning with other people is a priority. This
development, commissioned by the Department of Education, Trainirfg and Youth
Affairs, provides an indication of the seriousness that government and universities
are attaching to the broader dimensions of the student experience.
The changes in patterns of engagement are by no means directly student-driven;
they also reflect to a considerable extent the responses of universities to market
pressures. For example, Australian universities have promoted a wide array of op-
tions for students to obtain combined degrees which might give a competitive edge
in the job market. An unintended consequence has been fragmentation, and loss of a
critical mass in the learning community of the campus-based universities. The Aus-
tralian data suggest a significant increase from 1994 to 1999 in the proportion of
students enrolled in combined degrees and cross-discipline studies who largely keep
to themselves at university. They are too busy juggling complex personal timetables
to engage academically with their fellow students, let alone socially. Systematic
trend data on the use of web-based resources by students in Australian universities
are not yet available, but it is clear to even the casual observer that most students
now use material on-line from their courses, or from outside their university, on a
regular basis, and that this is influencing their choices and priorities with respect to
study, paid work and other activities.
 SIGNS OF DISENGAGEMENT? 187

3. CONCLUSION

Not enough is yet known about the changing motives, values and expectations of
undergraduate students in relation to their level of engagement in campus-based
universities. While government and institutional policy-makers consider issues of
market competition, flexible learning and the efficiency or otherwise of the campus-
based experience, the ground is shifting under their feet. The trends may be more
obvious in some countries than others, but they are nevertheless readily recognisable
at this juncture, even without systematic research. To focus just on those students
who are working and at risk of failing or discontinuing is to miss the point. Like-
wise, it is a serious error to be concerned only if disengagement has an impact on
academic performance as measured by grades. If students are able to miss a large
proportion of the material they are supposed to learn, or to avoid developing and
practising skills considered foundational, in whatever field, then they, the universi-
ties and society are all the poorer. As an Australian senate inquiry recently com-
mented:
It would be unfortunate if, to boost the levels of participation in higher education, we
moved too far down the path of commodification of the tertiary education "package" so
that it fits in with the working commitments of students, rather than vice-versa. (Senate
Ernpioyment..., 2001: 287).

Universities are then quite rightly exposed to the charge that much of what stu-
dents do on campus that was once considered core business is actually marginal, and
quite possibly an extravagance. If academics are not supported in their efforts to set
limits on student absence because university sits low on the personal priorities of
students, then academics become part of the problem. And, as suggested earlier, this
certainly does not add up to negotiated engagement but disengagement by default.
The studies of first year students suggest that most students still want to be chal-
lenged by what university has to offer - unless, of course, academics conspire with
them to make the experience undemanding. The right mix of strong demands and
effective support is needed to create a cultivating learning climate, and it is this that
marks out the territory of the distinctive campus-based experience (Little 1975).
However, it no longer occurs by accident and it is going to take a considerably more
strategic approach to create this environment than might have been the case thirty
years ago.
It is more accurate, and more useful for policy and practice, to re-conceptualise
the undergraduate experience as a process of negotiated engagement rather than as-
suming that disengagement is an intractable problem and that only students are to
blame. If universities continue in the direction they are now heading, the confluence
of student negotiated engagement, markets and technologies will only serve to de-
fine the undergraduate experience in ways that create more opportunities for alterna-
tive providers. These will "primarily attend to the quality of curriculum design and
the professionalisation of teaching" (Gallagher, 2000: 40). All this adds up to the
need for a much more sophisticated approach to structuring and delivering the cur-
riculum. It is unrealistic and quite perverse to expect academics to do this without
the support of a substantial group of highly professional specialists. While students'
responsibility for their learning and development cannot be overlooked, universities
188 CRAIG McINNIS

also have a duty to ensure that students are obliged to engage, and understand the
significance of the need to commit.
There is clearly an emerging need for creative ideas to address the changing na-
ture of student engagement, while holding fast to the notion of the cultivating cli-
mate of the university as a defining feature of the undergraduate experience.
Universities have to work with the new realities of student lives and priorities with-
out necessarily yielding to them. It is a serious error, and quite naIve, to assume that
the nature and level of student engagement can be changed, for example, by regulat-
ing the hours students work. It is equally foolish to eschew the leadership role that
universities should be playing in ensuring that the undergraduate years provide an
experience that is more than the narrow acquisition of vocational knowledge and
technical skills.

NOTES
This paper is based on an inaugural professorial lecture delivered at the University of Melbourne in
August 2001.

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 OSMOKNINEN

HIGHER LEARNING IN AN AGE OF

UNCERTAINTY
From Postmodem Critique to Appropriate University Practices

Comparing higher education in the 12th century with that of today, we can find some
interesting analogies. Contrary to what certain stories justifying the academic com-
munity lead us to understand, the university has never been based on a purely hu-
manistic ideal of cultivating knowledge; rather it has been based on utilitarian values
from its birth. As Cobban (1975: 8) writes, universities "evolved as institutional re-
sponses to the pressures to harness educational forces to the professional, ecclesias-
tical and governmental requirements of the society." For the majority of students the
aim was to study a few selected disciplines that would prepare them for their chosen
career. In the beginning, universities were also very much like schools with fixed
curricula and degree procedures. In this respect, the university is now returning to its
roots with graduate schools, Masters programmes, study modules and credits, limits
to the duration of studies and other school-like elements (Kivinen & Kaipainen,
2002).
In recent years the increasing demand for higher education, combined with a
growing labour market drift, has reinforced vocationalism within universities, and
stressed non-academic higher education with a clearly professional focus. But this is
not a new or unparalleled phenomenon either. Drawing again on Cobban (1975: 19),
we can say that from the start universities were service institutions, and adapted their
curricula to meet the needs of the surrounding community. Hence, the idea of a
"service" university, launched as a new concept in the 1990's, is by no means origi-
nal or novel.
Compared with developments after the Reformation, when religious authorities
were forced to give way to secular ones, universities are now faced with a regression
of sorts. Both governmental steering by the nation-state and the self-determination
of autonomous universities are threatened by market forces and by the global econ-
omy. In a way, the authoritative powers have once again moved outside the univer-
sity's control. In the late 1990s the European Union took steps towards achieving a
European higher education area and a more harmonised higher education system, by
aiming, among other things, to establish compatible, trans-national quality stan-
dards, comparable degrees and free student mobility. These attempts at harmonisa-
tion, under the banner of a "Europe of knowledge", . also have clear utilitarian
motives: to foster Europe's economic competitiveness at the global level by creating
an open labour market within the European Union countries, and to increase the

191
J. Enders and O. Fulton (eds.), Higher Education in a Globalising World, 191-206.
© 2002 Kluwer Academic Publishers.
192 OSMO KIVINEN

competitiveness and attractiveness of the European higher education area (Kivinen

& Kaipainen, 2002).
According to Readings' (1999) critical conclusion, the idea of the university has
evolved from a Kantian concept of reason via the Humboldtian idea of culture to
today's techno-bureaucratic notion of excellence. Readings' point is that, under the
conditions of globalisation (or, one could add, European integration), nation-states
are becoming increasingly managerial, cherishing national cultures much less than
before. Consequently, national culture does not serve the ideological justification of
the university in the same way as before, when the university was much like an ideo-
logical arm of the nation-state. Today's universities resemble bureaucratically or-
ganised corporations that seek to serve their own aims without strong nationally
coloured interests: their leitmotif now is the pursuit of excellence. However the con-
cept of excellence lacks any deeper cultural referent; the sole concern now is with
measurement and performance indicators. In Readings' (1999: 166-167) postmod-
ernistically coloured terminology, de-referentialisation is characteristic of today's
"post-historical" "University of Excellence", where bureaucratic administration
rules, and the very emptiness of the idea of excellence makes the integration of ac-
tivities a purely administrative function.
The globalisation of the market economy means that most nation-states are
nowadays more or less interdependent, and forced to compete in the same markets
for the same resources, including human capital such as higher education students
and graduates. In a way, the world has become smaller, since the development of
information technology has revolutionised communication, with the result that all
kinds of information flows are now available globally, in every corner of the world
at the same time - and this in turn further intensifies competition in all fields. One
implication of global market competition for universities is the commodification of
knowledge. Scientific knowledge is no longer seen merely as human capital to be
shared with the academic community, but as a circulating commodity '(Slaughter &
Leslie, 1997; Buchbinder & Rajagopal, 1996).
This chapter will proceed in the following way. First, I critically introduce the
most noteworthy points concerning postmodernists' critique of contemplative
knowledge. After that, I will outline in a nutshell the pragmatist version of knowl-
edge as a matter of doing, which I wish to support. In a section entitled "The rational
fallacy in understanding human action and inquiry" I shall discuss how expertise and
the acquisition of professional skills are often falsely intellectualised. From a prag-
matist viewpoint, there is no need to make a fundamental distinction between every-
day learning, inquiry and scientific research: in our "knowledge-based society" we
are all both experts and laymen. A central thesis is that the logic of accounting
which has now permeated the higher education system is incompatible with true
learning. Contrary to postmodernist critique, I shall defend both the disciplinary
division of science and a strong academic community. Without them the best tradi-
tions of academic science would be endangered. For pragmatists, it is justifiable to
claim that alongside traditional, contemplative, "knowing that" knowledge, we
should make room for "knowing how" and "learning by doing" in the university
curriculum. In the same vein, and in the best traditions of Deweyan pragmatism, we
must do justice to the idea of learning as the cultivation of the human personality.
 HIGHER LEARNING IN AN AGE OF UNCERTAINTY 193

The article proceeds throughout as a form of dialogue between a critique of prevail-

ing conceptions and the pragmatist viewpoint which I will present as an alternative.

1. FROM CONTEMPLATIVE KNOWLEDGE TO KNOWLEDGES

The modern university, as it fully blossomed in the twentieth century, has character-
istically been a site for prizing contemplative knowledge, which is supposed to mir-
ror the world and to represent the reality to which it corresponds. Postmodern and
other critics have voiced the challenge that contemplative and propositional Knowl-
edge should be replaced by various know ledges. Knowledge produced by "modern"
science is no longer considered self-evident truth (e.g. Barnett, 2000).
During the past decade or so there has been much discussion about what knowl-
edge is, how it is produced and by whom. One landmark in the critique of the tradi-
tional conception of science was the title The new production of knowledge
(Gibbons et aI., 1994), in which the authors emphasise that specialisation within
disciplinary boundaries is not the exclusive form of research, nor is the university
the privileged site of knowledge; both have been challenged by a range of heteroge-
neous knowledge producers. The new mode of knowledge production has chal-
lenged traditional dichotomies between theory and practice, basic and applied
research. Conventional conceptions of "reliable" and "valid" knowledge in the con-
text of "pure" knowledge are also questioned.
Whereas Gibbons and his colleagues in 1994 emphasised the value of the new
mode of expertise-based knowledge increasingly being produced outside the univer-
sity, in 2001 the same group went on to argue in Re-Thinking Science: Knowledge
and the Public in an Age of Uncertainty (Nowotny et aI., 2001: 16) that, although the
hegemony of "traditional" knowledge institutions such as universities has not neces-
sarily weakened, the universities have been forced to radically modify their values
and practices by closer encounters with other knowledge-producing organisations.
The boundary line between science and non-science is no longer watertight. Science
has become fuzzy, and its success has driven it into ever more contextualised arenas.
It is no longer possible to guarantee an autonomous space for science, since the
boundaries of such domains as the state, the market, the economy and culture are
blurred and not clearly distinguishable (Nowotny et aI., 2001: 28-29,49).
Critics of the contemporary university are saying that the boundaries between
disciplines are becoming increasingly blurred and the traditional criteria of science
need to be redefined, because the traditional model of academic science divided into
disciplines is outdated. In this context I am unable to go into the question any
deeper, but wish to express my own position (Kivinen & Kaipainen, 2002), which is
that a disciplinary division still provides a viable basis for the division of labour in
science within academia. Disciplines serve a function: they discipline minds and
channel scholarly energy generated by science-in-the-making. Disciplines constitute
a system of control in the production of discourse. They fix its limits by continu-
ously reactivating the rules that determine the adoption of disciplinary identities (cf.
Foucault, 1972). None of this is to deny that entire disciplines may become irrele-
194 OSMO KIVINEN

vant and disappear, that new disciplines may be born, that disciplines may merge
and become further differentiated. Science, in all its forms, is in constant flux, like
everything in life.
In a dynamic society - so the liturgy goes - "skills" have to be highly adaptable
so that individuals can move flexibly from one situation to another. One of the chal-
lenges is how to find room within university curricula (nowadays overloaded with
contemplative knowledge) for forms of student action that would promote their ac-
tual skills (cf. Barnett, 2000). In this article, my intention is to open up new perspec-
tives on more functional university practices, expressly on the basis of pragmatist
thinking. By abandoning the traditional conception of contemplative knowledge as
the common strand running through university education, we can make more room
within the higher education curriculum for experimental inquiry and investigative
learning-by-doing.

2. THE PRAGMATIST ALTERNATIVE: KNOWLEDGE AS A

MATTER OF DOING

Postmodern wntIng has all too often concentrated only on attacking modernity
without offering any constructive input that would enhance practical action. The
pragmatist alternative we have developed (Kivinen & Ristelli, 2001) - leaning heav-
ily on John Dewey's "classical pragmatism" and Richard Rorty's neopragmatism -
takes the postmodern critique into account in many ways, while consistently keeping
in mind the importance of developing practical measures. An exploration of the his-
tory of pragmatism immediately convinces one of the arbitrary and artificial nature
of distinctions between different stages of modernity. John Dewey (1859-1952) who
lived in the pre-modern and modern era, in the 19th and the 20th century, is just as
critical - in a postmodern fashion - of the illusion of the uniqueness of scientific
knowledge as is Richard Rorty (1936-), who is still a prolific writer in the 21 sl cen-
tury, and who, let us add, no longer even wants to confess to being a postmodernist.
John Dewey (1983; 1984; 1986) provides us with the tools we need to conceptu-
alise human action and inquiry in a manner that allows us to concentrate on the ac-
tual processes of learning. Gilbert Ryle (1984) provides the useful concept of
knowing how, which is in part close to Michael Polanyi' s (1967) tacit knowledge.
Richard Rorty (1998,1999), on the other hand, has developed an elegant anti-
representational viewpoint to consider, for instance, questions concerning language,
science and truth. 1
From the very beginning pragmatists have broken the Cartesian-Lockean image
of the mind aiming to make contact with external reality, recommending that we
give up metaphors of sight as the way we understand knowing. The human mind is
not an internal eye, mirror or receiver reflecting reality. Knowing (learning) always
takes place experimentally by doing (Kivinen & Ristelli, 2001). In this chapter I will
argue for Rylean knowing-how and Deweyan learning-by-doing: in a modified form
these are highly feasible alternatives for renewing the higher education curriculum.
From the pragmatist point of view, to speak of knowledge as an abstraction uncon-
nected with action is futile. Knowledge is first and foremost a matter of doing, liter-
 HIGHER LEARNING IN AN AGE OF UNCERTAINTY 195

ally speaking knowing; scientific knowledge is not about how to describe reality
correctly, but about how to acquire ways of action that enable us to cope with our
environment, ourselves and other people.
People are able to do many things, such as speaking their mother tongue, without
being able to explain the rules and principles, such as grammar, upon which this
action is based. This is not (only) the result of lacking communication skills - the
inability to "explicate" the rules that govern implicit action - but it is based on the
fact that knowing how cannot be reduced to knowing that. I do not by any means
want to deny or negate the value of action that is referred to as intelligent, but in line
with Gilbert Ryle (1949), I wish to challenge the idea that the achievement of ra-
tional acts requires the involvement of some additional specifically intellectual
means (Kivinen & Ristela, 2001).
Contrary to one of the founding fathers of sociology, August Comte, who argued
that knowing must come before acting, I am arguing as a pragmatist that the action
always comes first - and consequently much of our action, not to mention our learn-
ing, is not conscious. Everyone, even researchers, knows more than he or she can
tell (Michael Polanyi, 1967). From an anti-representationalist point of view, con-
cepts are not conceived of as representations but as habits of action, and words not
as representations but as tools. In the Rortyan vein, there is no point in asking
whether we are describing something as it really is. Since all descriptions are related
to the action and purposes of the describing agent (the researcher as well as the lay
person) all descriptions are made from a certain point of view. From the Deweyan
standpoint I want to emphasise that the actor's point of view is the only one that we
humans can have. We have no other conceptual system in our use except our own,
and no means of knowing independently of our conceptions and action. Even scien-
tific inquiry always includes the actor's point of view, since it is the only one any-
one, even a researcher, can have.
I am therefore analysing university practices from the point of view of a learning
actor, who can equally well be an undergraduate or postgraduate student, a post-
doctoral or senior researcher. From a pragmatist viewpoint, the basic functional
mechanisms of learning, inquiry and knowing how are all alike for so-called lay
people, higher education students and top-level researchers. What makes the differ-
ence is the actors' different experiences and habits, as well as the available tools and
vocabularies for thought and action. Experimental everyday inquiry and scientific
research are no different from each other in the sense that both entail learning by
doing; experience accumulated through appropriate action shapes the actor's habits
and knowing how. All our action, be it physical, linguistic, intellectual, conscious or
tacit, is based on our own habits. This explains why the best that a university educa-
tion can do is to promote human growth by enabling each of us to develop a versa-
tile and rich range of habits (Kivinen & Ristela, 2002).
Unlike many postmodernists, I am neither offering a new idea of the university
nor proposing any new functions for the university in this chapter. Rather, I am sim-
ply seeking ways to conceptualise more adequate practices that will help us to util-
ise the "unique university milieu" so that all the diversity of talents can find room to
flourish. The university is a crucial rite de passage in the development of citizens,
196 OSMO KrVINEN

providing a transformative experience in people's lives, during which identities may

be decisively shaped and lasting human relations contracted. For those who have
passed through the whole preceding selection system, the university provides a
unique site for the cultivation of personality (Smith & Webster, 1997: 8).

3. THE RATIONAL FALLACY IN UNDERSTANDING HUMAN

ACTION AND LEARNING

The experience accumulating in action reinforces existing habits and creates new
ones. From a Deweyan point of view, the formation of habits is the basis for learn-
ing of all kinds, whether this involves the reinforcement of certain forms of conduct,
the weakening of others, or the emergence of whole new ways of acting. It is self-
evident that habits will emerge. As long as a person lives, they act; one cannot live
without acting, nor act without learning. The question is how and what we learn
(Dewey, 1983: 15-16,54,84; 1986: 21, 38-39.)
We learn by trying out, on the one hand, the possibilities opened up by various
situations, and on the other, the various ways and contexts of using tools. By testing
how different people react, we learn how others are likely to react to our acts. We
learn how things we encounter can affect us, how they can prevent our actions, or
how we can use them to promote our interests. We learn by doing, by experiment-
ing, by trial and error, to manage the connections between various things and hence
also to influence the consequences of our own action (Dewey, 1980: 280-281).
Reasonable and unreasonable operations cannot be separated from each other on
the grounds of any assumed original cause, but only by their consequences in action.
Knowing how equals doing something skilfully: when necessary, skills can be
measured by performance. In this pragmatist sense, there is nothing suspect about
discussing unconscious action. People mainly do whatever they do without describ-
ing their acts to themselves by articulated thinking. Conduct can be intelligent even
if it is not accompanied all the time by clearly articulated inner comments.
The rational fallacy in understanding human action (Dreyfus & Dreyfus, 1988;
also Flyvbjerg, 2001) means that when rationality and rational action have been ele-
vated to the dominant form of human action, other forms of action have been left
without the attention they deserve. According to Dreyfus & Dreyfus (1988: 19-51),
the acquisition of professional skills (or learning to know how) can be outlined via
five stages, which are called those of the novice, advanced beginner, competent,
proficient and expert. In the Dreyfus' model, the context-independent rules and
guidelines cherished by rationalists are necessary only at the novice level of compe-
tency, and the more developed the learning, the more intuitive - beyond linguistic
description - it becomes.
1. The novice has first to learn "context-independent" elements and rules, and then
try to act on the basis of them.
2. An advanced beginner can, on the basis of herlhis initial experience, also iden-
tify and interpret situational elements when (s)he faces familiar situational fac-
tors in the course of action.
 HIGHER LEARNING IN AN AGE OF UNCERTAINTY 197

3. Clearly more experienced than the previous one, a competent actor already mas-
ters situations in an integrated way that enables him/her to make choices and
prioritise different elements related to action and situations.
4. Proficient performers do not rely so much on external rules, but they can, seem-
ingly intuitively, organise and understand their actions each time in an appropri-
ate way. However, they can also in some measure specify their choices
analytically prior to action.
5. "An expert generally knows what to do, based on mature and practised under-
standing" (Dreyfus & Dreyfus, 1988: 30).
With the certainty gained by experience, an expert acts in the way the situation
requires. An expert's action is characteristically flowing and effortless, unhindered
by any quasi-analytical deliberation. Dreyfus and Dreyfus show how the action of an
expert of the highest level is thoroughly experience-based, intuitive and (as if)
automatically competent, that is, anything else but rationalist rule-based deliberation
resembling formal decision-making.
Drawing on Dreyfus and Dreyfus, it is possible to agree with Flyvbjerg (2001:
34), who says that the acquisition of a researcher's basic skills in no way differs
from the acquisition of other skills. There is nothing to indicate that those research-
ers who have genuine mastery of their field use mainly context-independent "ration-
alist" rules in their best scientific performances, even though they can very skilfully
depict such a process when they come to write their scholarly articles. Even the most
professional researchers operate on knowing how and tacit knowledge when they are
doing their curiosity-driven research.
Human activity cannot be reduced to a set of rules, and without rules there can
be no theory. Because human skills are context-dependent and cannot be reduced to
rules, and because a theory must be free of context and have rules, so Flyvbjerg
(2001: 46-47) concludes, the theory of human skills (of knowing how) is impossible.
But this does not imply, as one might easily suppose, that the social sciences are
thoroughly relativistic and nihilistic. Instead, it means that the logic of action, which
is the research object of the social sciences, is in a special way practical; it has its
own logic of practice, which Pierre Bourdieu (1990), among others, also discusses.
From a pragmatist point of view, there is no need to make a fundamental distinc-
tion between everyday learning, inquiry and scientific research: they are all matters
of acquiring new ways of action and controlling new kinds of connections. Scientific
research may be more disciplined, controlled and target-oriented than everyday in-
quiry, but both are, nevertheless, experimental action in the course of which one
gains experience, and thus learns (Dewey, 1980: 281; 1984: 70).
Even in research training (i.e. in the postgraduate and post-doctoral phases),
learning by doing is an indispensable element. The key point that needs to be recog-
nised in the socialisation of doctoral students into everyday research work is that
experiments and other forms of inquiry do not automatically produce useful or even
usable results. In this context, Delamont and Atkinson (2001) speak about reality
shock. By this they mean that during their studies, when they are attending methods
courses and doing seminar work, students encounter, virtually without exception,
only those kinds of research problems that result in expected outcomes. Even by
198 OSMO KIVINEN

reading the scientific literature, articles and research reports, doctoral students do not
get hands-on experience of tacit skills and knowing how, since most papers report
on successful research and achieved results; published texts do not tell about failure
and false trails. However, when they write their dissertations, and especially when
they are conducting post-doctoral research, young researchers will discover that re-
search is utterly complicated and that dead ends and failure are annoyingly frequent,
even if they have closely adhered to the methodological rule book. Learning how to
face and overcome failure is an indispensable skill on the way to becoming a more
competent researcher. Gradually, young researchers will learn by doing those tacit
skills and knowing how that will also yield more usable results (Kivinen & Ristela,
2002).
If students are trained solely in context-independent knowledge and rules, in the
way they are presented typically in textbooks and in the formal routines of methods
courses, they will never advance from the lowest level of learning. In saying this, I
do not mean that novices should not be trained in the facts and rule-based knowl-
edge of their field, but that facts, rules and algorithms should not be considered the
highest form of knowing how. To improve, students must take action through ex-
perimental inquiry (FJyvbjerg, 2001: 71-72).
According to Dewey, conscious thinking is triggered when action is prevented or
disrupted and the "direction" of action has to be altered. Reflection that really brings
results means shaping one's habits in situations in which all has not gone according
to expectations. It thus entails the creation of new habits, although these cannot be
independent of existing ones. Without habits there would only be confusion and
doubt: no mind, no consciousness. The idea of pure reason, of a mind or will uncon-
nected with habits, is merely a myth. Habits stimulate, prevent, strengthen, select
and concentrate acts without anyone or anything actually employing them. The self
and the will equal all the person's habits (Dewey, 1983: 15,21-22,45,54,88.)
Highlighting the distinction between his own thinking and the "intellectualistic"
conception of action and education that he has criticised, Dewey likes to emphasise
that habits are not ways of acting that can be used by the "will" or "reason", but that
reason and will, as well as our habitual ways of acting and sources of pleasure, are
all embedded in our habits. Character is an inter-penetration of habits; a "self' that is
independent of habits does not exist. When habits change, human action changes
accordingly, which leads others to think that the whole person has changed (Dewey,
1983: 29).
With the belief in disinterestedness as a guarantee of objectivity, the social sci-
ences, with their reductionist framework, have fallen into the "objectivity trap"; the
gap between the image of science and its pursuit of truth and actual research practice
-- not to mention life itself - has been too wide. Actually science is much more het-
erogeneous, diverse, local and disunited than its still-dominant image suggests (e.g.
Nowotny et aI., 2001: 233).
Research can be seen as a way of learning. Researchers are supposed to learn to
understand and gain increasing mastery of the field that they study. Research in the
social sciences is far too often undertaken for its own sake in isolation from the sur-
rounding communities and societies, on which it has little effect and from which it
receives little appreciation. As FJyvbjerg (2001: 166) suggests, "We may transform
 HIGHER LEARNING IN AN AGE OF UNCERTAINTY 199

social science to an activity done in public for the public, sometimes to clarify,
sometimes to intervene, sometimes to generate new perspectives, and always to
serve as eyes and ears in our ongoing efforts at understanding the present and delib-
erating about the future." To illustrate the point, Flyvbjerg (2001) has entitled his
book "Making Social Science Matter".

4. THE LOGIC OF ACCOUNTING IS INCOMPATIBLE WITH

TRUE LEARNING
The logic of accounting runs the 21 st century university. According to Readings
(1999: 151-152), various activities take on a strongly administrative function, as
when, for instance, it is necessary to decide what knowledge is to be managed by
teachers and administered to students. In order to be administered to students,
knowledge has to be portioned into manageable doses. Teaching linked to quantified
study modules is one way to manage the growing numbers of students. Pedagogy
has a specific pace of its own that is radically alien to the notion of accountable
time. Teaching trains students in the handling of information. Universities are be-
coming more and more school-like, but they are also bureaucratic organisations imi-
tating consumer-oriented corporations under the banners of all-round excellence.
The problems of higher education cannot be solved by a programme of reform that
either produces knowledge more efficiently or produces more efficient knowledge.
Rather, as Readings (1999: 163) puts it, the analogy of production itself must be
brought into question: the analogy that makes the university into a bureaucratic ap-
paratus for the production, distribution, and consumption of knowledge.
There are some well known pitfalls attending the pedagogical relation of the uni-
versity. One is connected with the authoritarian hierarchy that makes students into
receptacles for the transmission of a pre-constituted and unquestionable knowledge;
another is the reduction of education to the development and training of technocrats.
Teaching is not primarily a matter of communication, nor of questioning. Thought is
sacrificed rather than questioned. Education as replication provides a kind of mi-
metic identity for students. In this context, Readings (1999: 156-158) wants to insist
on pedagogy as a relation, a network of obligation, a teacher acting as rhetor rather
than magister, one who speaks in a rhetorical context rather than one whose dis-
course is self-authorising. The rhetor is a speaker who takes account of the audi-
ence, while the magister is allowed to be indifferent to the specificity she addresses.
In Rorty's (1999: 114-130) view, the role of the higher education provided at
universities, unlike that provided in schools, is no longer to incorporate given truths,
but to stimulate the imagination and the critical mind, to fuel doubts about unques-
tioned truths and the consensus of predominant prejudices. If the task of the lower
levels of education is to prepare literate citizens, the task of the universities is to
produce creative individuals who can also critically evaluate the socialisation they
themselves have gone through, and who understand, among other things, that the
national history in which they have become socialised, is an unfolding, open-ended
200 OSMoKWINEN

narrative. Whereas schools are characterised by a certain consensus over basic mat-
ters, universities are expected to foster a working dissensus.
According to Nowotny et al. (2001: 37,46), in today's new kind of society, that
is in "Mode 2" society, the religion of the era is the demand for innovation, rooted in
a continuous drive to bring forth the new. Society has accepted - albeit as an inevi-
table side-effect - a certain measure of Schumpeterian "creative destruction", and
has also acknowledged in a profound sense the necessity of living with uncertainties.
The accumulation of uncertainties - affecting social choices, individual life-styles
and identities - is unending. None of these uncertainties can be limited from the
start, or factored out, because of the relentless pursuit of the novel through innova-
tion. In a de-regulated and de-centralised world, the self becomes his or her own
entrepreneur, free to choose the means for accomplishing goals, but less free to de-
fine the goals him- or herself. Nowotny et al (2001: 220) also speak of the rise of the
individual as the decision-maker, now faced with a bewildering and proliferating
array of options. Decision-making has become part of his or her existence. The indi-
vidual today is defined through the sequence of decisions that, in their contingency,
make up his or her identity.
When Barnett's text (2000: 153-158) is stripped of excessive postmodern tones,
he has interesting ideas about what it is to educate at the highest level under condi-
tions of uncertainty. First, Barnett says, the minds and beings of students need to be
shocked, to drive them into a state of creative uncertainty. Students must come to
feel the insecurity of the world. But, of course, higher education must also enable
students to live at ease with the unsettling environment, and first of all it has to en-
able them to make their own positive contribution to the world by being sensitive to
the consequences of what they do and say. When both cognitive and experiential
disturbance are called for, the necessary task is to enable students to live with this
unsettling situation. One of the goals of higher education is that of enabling students,
as graduates, to act purposively in the world. Higher education must attend to action.
Genuine higher learning takes place when students are enabled to understand the
contestability of all the frameworks that they encounter and comprehend, and to
confront that contestability in all its forms. Higher education reveals the contesta-
bility of the higher-order frameworks within which we seek to understand the world
(Barnett, 2000: 158).
Students will not gain an awareness of uncertainty from any pedagogical situa-
tion that is itself entirely predictable. The formal lecture is a refuge for the faint-
hearted. It keeps channels of communication closed, freezes hierarchies between
lecturers and students, and removes from the student any responsibility to respond.
The students remain voyeurs. The disjunction that the lecture can offer is muted. In
the pedagogical environment of the lecture hall the student watches a performance
and is not obliged to engage with it. "It is like watching a horror film," Barnett says
(2000: 159): "one knows that, however disturbing it is at the time, soon the lights
will go on and its fictionality can be embraced, with nothing much dislodged."
Pedagogy must exhibit the characteristics of uncertainty, unpredictability and chal-
lengeability. The pedagogical environment of the lecture hall is a safe environment,
where students watch a performance but are not obliged or allowed to engage with
it. The challenge is to place students in situations in which they are required to han-
 HIGHER LEARNING IN AN AGE OF UNCERTAINTY 201

dIe conflicting ideas and perspectives and uncertain situations. "There must be no
escape," Barnett stresses (2000: 160).
Enabling students to handle their own disturbance calls for a pedagogical trans-
action in which students have the space to develop their own voices and manifold
habits, which implies that lecturers and professors have to step aside to some extent.
According to Barnett (2000), the main pedagogical task in a university setting is not
that of transmission of knowledge but of promoting forms of human being appropri-
ate to the surrounding world. Teaching becomes the discomforting of minds and
actions (doubt), but also the comforting of minds and actions (doubt overcome).
Barnett (2000) predicts that one of the new roles for the university could be the
evaluation of the knowledge generated by other knowledge producers who lack for-
mal means of scrutiny. Even if the university takes up this critic's role, it has to ac-
knowledge that it is no longer the only instance determining the categories of "right
knowing". Nevertheless, universities should encourage critical thinking in the out-
side world as well, with academics taking stands in the media on policy and ethical
issues, social and economic issues etc. They should not relinquish their roles as in-
tellectuals, and they should take advantage of the enormous opportunities for com-
munication and interaction that their predecessors lacked - and despite this,
performed the critic's role better (Kivinen & Kaipainen, 2002).
From a pragmatist point of view, all education should encourage and train learn-
ers to act in doubtful situations. Higher learning, at the university in particular,
should be experimental and free of prejudice; it should question what is taken for
granted, and not concentrate only on the "application" of given means of acting. In
order for it to lead to the emergence of appropriate habits, experimentation has to be
connected with constant deliberation on the consequences of action. Courageous and
creative experimentation should at the same time be responsible, which means mak-
ing continuous assessments of the likely consequences and acknowledging them in
action. By "intellectual responsibility" Dewey means a clear understanding of, and
commitment to, the results in action, or so to speak in real life, of believing in some-
thing (Dewey, 1980: 185-186).

5. WE ARE ALL EXPERTS AND LAYPERSONS

The continuing flow of uncertainties is intrinsically connected with the innovative

capacities of science. As Nowotny et al. (2001: 262) write, '''Believing' and know-
ing whom to believe, when and to what extent, and in what sense, becomes part of
'knowing'." In a sense "we are all experts now", but this expertise, widely distrib-
uted, is continuously being tested, and also contested, before it can be trusted. Mem-
bership of either an expert or a lay community is no longer self-evident.
According to Nowotny et al (2001: 74), in a "knowledge society" many institu-
tions become "learning organisations" - not to mention "researching organisations"
- in the sense that in order to survive (not only commercially, but politically) they
must be able to capture, and to exploit, knowledge. The same writers also argue that
the distinction between research and teaching tends to break down. This happens not
202 OSMO KIVINEN

only because the definition of who now qualifies as a research actor must be ex-
tended far beyond the primary producers of research, but also because the reflexivity
of new knowledge production transforms relatively closed communities of scientists
into open communities of "knowledgeable" people. It is possible to argue (Nowotny
et aI., 2001: 90) that these "knowledgeable" communities comprise all the graduates
of mass higher education systems, not just the minority in elite universities who
have specifically been trained as researchers.
One of the highly significant roles of the university in the future may be con-
nected with the possibility that it will be the most important site of interconnectivity
in the so-called knowledge society. There might be a proliferation of so many differ-
ent kinds of knowledge that no particular one can unify all the others. Nor yet can
the university re-establish the broken unity of knowledge, as Delanty (2001: 6-7)
says, but it can open up avenues of communication between these different kinds of
knowledge, in particular between knowledge as science and knowledge as culture.
The university should open up sites of communication in society rather than, as it is
currently in danger of doing, becoming a self-referential bureaucratic organisation.
The point is to institutionalise dissensus and to make the university a site of public
debate, thus reversing the decline of the public sphere.
Like many others, Delanty (2001: 152) also argues that universities are losing
their role as the sole site of knowledge production, for knowledge is now being pro-
duced, or at least shaped, by many other social actors. But this does not mean the
demise of the university if its communicative function is taken care of. Fuller (2000:
113) suggests that "teachability" will need to be made a criterion of good research.
As Fuller (2000: 135) reminds us, nowadays scientists themselves constitute part
of the lay public for every branch of knowledge that goes beyond their specialism.
And if it is true that each scientist knows "more and more about less and less", the
situation will not get any better by itself in this respect. Profound differences in sub-
ject matter between the sciences result from the absence of open communication
channels across the corresponding disciplinary communities (cf. Fuller, 2000: 142).
Even in mass higher education systems, the university remains the most impor-
tant incubator of the next generation of researchers. This is a task that no other insti-
tution is equally well equipped to undertake. Arguably - as Nowotny et al (2001: 9)
state - it is even more of a core activity than research itself, although it is difficult to
envisage how researchers could be trained except in an active research environment.
This function receives an even greater boost through the value attached to innova-
tion. Well-trained and talented people become its most precious, intangible assets.
Increasingly, assuring their long-term supply becomes one of the most essential, and
indispensable, contributions that universities are expected to make.
Uncertainty is not only inherent in today's society but one of its constitutive fea-
tures, which means that there is greater variation and increased competition; more
risks are taken; and many more actors become involved - all of whom seek to at-
tribute a reasonably definite probability to the expected outcome of their choices.
This greater uncertainty has positive as well as negative aspects. On ihe negative
side, it generates anxieties, promotes retrenchment and paralyses action. On the
positive side, it encourages greater risk-taking and experimentation. According to
 HIGHER LEARNING IN AN AGE OF UNCERTAINTY 203

Nowotny et al. (2001: 112), innovation can be regarded as an experimental process

for reducing uncertainty to calculable risk.

6. CONCLUDING REMARKS

A human being acts, experiences, forms habits and learns to use language in interac-
tion with others. But as Dewey states, not only is social action communication, but
all communication is also educative. To receive communication entails the expan-
sion and alteration of one's sphere of experience; one becomes part of what the other
one has thought and felt. However, the transmitting party in the communicative act
will not be unaffected, either. Experiences have to be formulated in order to be
communicated. (Dewey, 1980: 8-9; 1983: 15-16,43-44.)
The position that I want to advocate is that universities could maintain their vital-
ity and their particular role by tying research and study together and by making
teaching support study - study understood as equivalent to inquiry, if not to learning
how to do research. We should also bear in mind that research can be seen as a way
of learning.
Universities are unique concentrations of a diversity of talents with different eth-
nic, social and cultural backgrounds, and they provide a milieu where students learn
from one another by exploring the world and themselves with others (Kumar, 1997).
Students learn many essential "wisdoms" simply from one another.
As mentioned above, a substantial part of the learning of research practices en-
tails tacit knowledge and skills, which are something that cannot be articulated, put
into words or verbally transferred, something that is caught but not taught. In scien-
tific work, tacit knowledge is achieved by learning by doing, and by cumulative ex-
periences of knowing how. In most cases it can best be achieved by participating in
the practical work of a research group: there one can, gradually, learn the right hab-
its. On the other hand, one important skill is to learn to avoid the mistakes one is
likely to make in practical work. The knowing how, or tacit knowledge, of research
means "knowledge and skills" that are acquired in practical research activities
through experience (trial and error), and by becoming gradually socialised into the
practices of the research group. The acquisition of knowing how and tacit knowl-
edge is not essentially a matter of verbal learning and instruction (cf. Collins, 2001);
rather we can speak about the growth and cultivation of personality in this connec-
tion, too.
More specialised education is often called for, in the name of preparing for the
future. However, the uncertainty that lies ahead actually calls for an entirely differ-
ent reaction: one should obtain as many different skills and as many alternative ways
of acting as possible. Since no one knows for certain what kind of knowledge and
skills will be needed in the future, higher education, too, should provide students
with as many skills as possible. The versatility of higher education should not only
be perceived as studying textbooks representing various disciplines and topics. Since
a considerable amount of knowing how is tacit and hence cannot be reached by lin-
guistic consciousness, the action that is needed to promote it cannot be simply coded
204 OSMO KIVINEN

into textbooks and curricula. For instance, simulations should be developed in a

network environment for the use of social and human sciences students: these appli-
cations would allow for experimental learning, and social scientists could construct
and plan an enormous variety of operations and operative models that we might en-
counter in the future. We have every reason to believe that people's ways of life,
activity and participation will inevitably be entwined with technology, using a pleth-
ora of devices and networks for information and communication (Kivinen & Ristela,
2002).
In an age of uncertainty, the best site for the production of scientific knowledge
remains without doubt the scientific community, where knowledge is continuously
tested and contested by peers. Boundaries between disciplines are meaningful to the
extent that researchers in the field can reach reasonable consensus about the dividing
lines. It is not at all inconceivable that responsible, working social scientists will
themselves take a hard look at the division of labour within their field, and then try
to bring their revised intellectual perceptions of a useful division of labour into line
with the organisational framework they necessarily construct (Wallerstein et aI.,
1995: 107-109). For instance, Bourdieu suggests that social scientists should them-
selves define their own social relevance and their functions. Social scientists could
best contribute to the advancement of their disciplines by building and reinforcing
institutional mechanisms that will keep communication open, rejuvenate discussion
and abolish all kinds of scientific intolerance (Bourdieu & Wacquant, 1992). If
working social scientists do not do this themselves, other besserwissers such as ad-
ministrators will do it for them. That, in the worst case, would leave us faced with
the caricature ofthe "University of Excellence" drawn by Readings.
Referring to Adam Smith's epoch-making insight that the wealth of nations
could be measured by using alternative indicators concerning the organisation of
labour and a range of living standards, instead of by the amount of accumulated bul-
lion in their treasuries, Fuller (2000: 93) urges us
... to take the 'Smithian tum' in our understanding of science, whereby progress would
be judged more by the quality of its people than by the quantity of its papers".

When we take into consideration the enormous recent growth in the number of
scientific publications, and all the problems concerning the moral responsibility for
the practical consequences of seemingly neutral scientific insights, Fuller's appar-
ently simple suggestion may itself soon prove to be rather wise, not to say epoch-
making.
Where Readings (1999: 154) says that teaching should be answerable to the
question of justice rather than to the criteria of truth, and that we must seek to do
justice to teaching, I would add that as Deweyan pragmatists we have to do justice to
learning as the cultivation of personality (Bildung), by remembering that the only
aim of education is growth. The right to personal growth should not be limited as the
privilege of few.
It may be that a substantial increase in enrolment in universities, or the ongoing
"massification of higher education" as it is also called, is breaking the elitist concep-
tion of university education as a scarce good, and making it instead a prerequisite for
 HIGHER LEARNING IN AN AGE OF UNCERTAINTY 205

the majority. This is also the vision of the European Commission on the learning
society, or using Teichler's (1998) term, the vision of a highly educated society.
Let us give the final words to illrich Teichler, who in 1995 presented as his own
assessment that
... there still seems a long way to go towards a highly educated society in which the
value of middle-level jobs is more highly appreciated, in which prevailing concepts
about a desirable division of labour are no longer shaped by the assumption that compe-
tences tend to be scarce, and in which activities in favour of improving the quality of
teaching and learning do not merely strive for the preservation of traditional academic
and professional standards, but also care about a diversity of qualities (Teichler 1995:
30).

NOTES

1 am well aware of the conflicts between Dewey's and Rorty's thinking. Elsewhere (Kivinen & Ris-
tela 2001) we have also shown that methodological relationalism is a principle that allows us to com-
bine what is best in both Dewey's and Rorty's thinking into a set of conceptions on inquiry and
action. Maybe it is worth mentioning here that the Europeans Gilbert Ryle and Michael Polanyi are
not known as pragmatists even though their thoughts often come close to pragmatistic thinking.

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 JEAN-JACQUES PAUL

ARE UNIVERSITIES READY TO FACE THE

KNOWLEDGE-BASED ECONOMY?

1. INTRODUCTION

It is generally agreed that the two main functions of universities are to transmit high
level knowledge and to produce new knowledge. For centuries, these two functions
were performed in a context in which only a small share of the relevant age cohort
attended higher education institutions. After the Second World War, this context
changed radically and higher education began to face more or less continuous
growth. This has led to the situation that, in the developed economies, more than 40
per cent of the younger generation now attend third-level institutions (cf. Teichler,
2000).
This development ran in parallel with the need to train young people for the new
diversity of careers and professions which arose with the development of the indus-
trial economies during the 20th century. Even so, for most of the century permanent
and stable economic growth enabled the well-established experience of work to con-
tinue as before. The traditional assembly-line organisation of work relied both on
subordinate workers with narrow, predefined tasks and on managers using well-
established frameworks which they had learned at school. Professionals were pre-
pared for their careers in a structured and planned environment, based on a predict-
able level of demand.
The present knowledge-based economy imposes new challenges on higher edu-
cation, which we can make explicit if we analyse the characteristics of this new en-
vironment. The main purpose of this paper is to assess how ready universities are to
face the new challenges of the knowledge-based economy. This issue will be ad-
dressed by examining just one of the functions of the university, the initial training
of highly qualified manpower.
How can we define briefly the main features of the knowledge-based economy?
According to Foray (2000), knowledge-based economies are at the meeting-point
between a continuous growth in investment and in other activities devoted to en-
hancing "knowledge" on the one hand, and a revolution in production techniques
and in the transmission of knowledge on the other. This mutual consolidation be-
tween the development of knowledge-intensive activities and the production and
diffusion of information technologies may well give rise to new models of work
organisation. The emphasis on new organisational models is also being reinforced
by economic globalisation, which is encouraging their diffusion.

207
J. Enders and O. Fulton (eds.), Higher Education in a Globalising World, 207-220.
© 2002 Kluwer Academic Publishers.
208 JEAN-JACQUES PAUL

A knowledge-based economy requires a larger proportion of its workers to be

involved in highly qualified jobs. In countries such as France or the United King-
dom, the proportion of these jobs doubled between 1970 and 2000 (approximately
from 15 per cent to 30 per cent). Highly qualified occupations need their workers to
participate more fully in decision-making within the organization in which they
work. And of course, these occupations rely intensively on information technology,
including computers and Web-based resources.
All of these developments imply that higher education must develop new compe-
tencies, linked to information technology but, above all, enabling graduates to adapt
to a changing world. These competencies in turn depend on behavioural features,
such as adaptability, problem-solving ability, leadership and so on.
As a consequence of this development, initial training is no longer conceived as
preparation for specific occupational slots, but rather as providing workers with the
basic tools which will enable them to adapt themselves to varying occupational
needs. This development is not a recent one: Thurow pointed out in 1975 that work-
ers had to learn how to perform their occupation on the job rather than at school, and
this was the reason why employers looked for educated individuals, who had learned
to learn and who were thus able to pick up rapidly the content of their job. Neverthe-
less, the consequence of this vision was that training became defined with respect to
competencies rather than with respect to occupations. This is the first step towards a
radical change, in education systems in general and in universities in particular.
However, in the world we now live in, the new kinds of competencies demanded by
the organisation of work are defined not only in terms of the capacity to learn but
also in terms of the capacity to perform within collective units. In the latter respect,
work requirements are understood as being based on cooperation and mutual under-
standing rather than on authoritarian ascription.
This new conception of education has also led to a new vision of the traditional
models of human capital. Many early papers in the economics of education tried to
determine the rate of return to investment in education (see for instance Becker,
1964). In these pioneering developments, education, training and experience were
supposed to increase human capital and hence individual productivity. Nevertheless,
human capital was measured using the rather crude indicators of the number of years
of education and training and the number of years of experience. The new stress on
competencies should lead us to define education and human capital, no longer by a
variable describing a process lasting a number of years, nor even by the possession
of a degree, but by a set of variables which describe the results of the educational
process, i.e. the different competencies which have been acquired by educated
workers.
One of the objectives of this chapter is to use an original data base to take a step
towards such a new approach to human capital, grounded on the concept of compe-
tencies. However, the main objective is to derive from these investigations some
useful elements for the assessment of modes of teaching and learning and of the ex-
perience of study in higher education institutions. These elements should help us to
imagine the directions that institutions will have to follow if they are to keep pace
with contemporary society. The first section of the chapter presents the general
framework, i.e. the data base from which the information is drawn, and the typolo-
 UNIVERSITIES AND THE KNOWLEDGE-BASED ECONOMY 209

gies of competencies and modes of teaching and learning which were used in the
survey. The second section compares the competencies actually acquired by students
with those that should be required, whilst the third section provides the opportunity
to relate the different kinds of competencies acquired to modes of teaching and
learning. The chapter ends with a reflection on the evolution of higher education
institutions.

2. GENERAL FRAMEWORK

2.1. The Study

Between autumn 1998 and spring 2000, about 36,000 graduates from nine countries
in the European Union (Austria, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands,
Spain, Sweden, United Kingdom), one EFTA country (Norway), one of the Central
and Eastern European countries in transition (the Czech Republic) and one eco-
nomically advanced country outside Europe (Japan) provided information through a
written questionnaire on the relationship between higher education and employment
four years after graduation. Thirteen research institutions were involved in this pro-
ject, which was initiated and led by Ulrich Teichler.
By comparing labour market prospects for graduates across the twelve countries,
the project aimed to provide some answers to questions about the quality of study
provision, about the competencies which graduates had acquired and those which
their present jobs required, and hence about the appropriateness of the higher educa-
tion they had experienced.

2.2. The Typology o/Competencies

Graduates were given a list of 36 competencies, and were asked to state, in respect
of each, the extent to which they were required in their current work as well as the
extent to which they had acquired these competencies at the time of their graduation.
The question was: "Please state the extent to which you had the following compe-
tencies at the time of graduation and to what extent they are required in your current
work." [Scale of answers from I = 'To a very high extent" to 5 = "Not at all".] The
36 competencies can be split into three main sets (the complete list is given in the
Appendix to this chapter): theoretical knowledge, practical knowledge and behav-
ioural knowledge.
Theoretical knowledge involves four competencies such as "broad general knowl-
edge" and "field-specific theoretical knowledge". Practical knowledge was based on
a group of seven competencies, among them "written communication skills", "for-
eign language proficiency" and "computer skills". For behavioural knowledge, two
levels were taken into consideration: the individual level, which refers to the direct
link between the worker and the tasks slhe has to perform, and the collective level,
which considers the worker as a member of a working organisation. At the individ-
ual level, seventeen competencies were listed, such as "problem-solving ability",
210 JEAN-JACQUES PAUL

"working under pressure", "time management", "fitness for work" and "power of
concentration". At the collective level there were eight competencies such as "taking
responsibilities and decisions", "working in a team", "planning, co-ordinating and
organising" and "leadership".
This simple classification can be compared with the typology proposed by Lund-
vall and Johnston (1994), which distinguishes four main types of knowledge:
Know-what: substantive knowledge and knowledge about facts
Know-why: understanding of basic principles and laws of nature
Know-how: human skills and competencies necessary to act intelligently in a
complex and changing environment
Know-who: social capability to cooperate, to communicate and to establish trust
relationships.
Since our typology of competencies is not specific to any single occupational
area, it does not refer to precise competencies describing "know-what". In general,
our category of theoretical knowledge corresponds to "know-why", while our prac-
tical knowledge shares some features of "know-why" and "know-how". The stress
on behavioural competencies allows us to assess to what extent universities are able
to cope with dimensions which do not correspond to the traditional dimensions of
knowledge. Our individual behavioural competencies correspond to part of Lundvall
and Johnston's "know-how", whereas collective behavioural competencies can be
understood as their "know-who".

2.3. The Typologies of Modes of Teaching and Learning and Study Experience
Modes of teaching and learning were described by answers to the question "If you
look back to the course of study you graduated from in 1994 or 1995, to what extent
were the following modes of teaching and learning emphasised by your institution of
higher education and its teachers?" [Scale of answers from 1 = "To a very high ex-
tent" to 5 = "Not at all".] Twelve items were offered for rating, for instance "inde-
pendent learning", "regular class attendance", "project and problem-based learning"
and "direct acquisition of work experience" (see detailed list in Appendix).
For study experience, graduates were asked the question "How do you rate the
study provision and study conditions you experienced in the course of study?"
[Scale of answers from 1 = "Very good" to 5 = "Very bad".] Eighteen items were
listed, such as "course content of major", "variety of courses offered", "design of
degree programmes", "practical emphasis of teaching and learning", "provision of
work placements and other work experiences" and "quality of technical equipment
(e.g. PC, measuring instruments etc.)" (see Appendix for a complete list).

3. COMPETENCIES ACQUIRED AND COMPETENCIES REQUIRED

We now use the answers given by the graduates in the survey to consider to what
extent these different competencies were indeed acquired during the study period,
and how much they are required by the occupational context.
 UNIVERSITIES AND THE KNOWLEDGE-BASED ECONOMY 211

3.1. 1s there a Gap Between Acquired and Required Competencies?

Altogether, the responses to this question show that graduates are aware of high job
requirements in a broad range of tasks. On average, 24 of the competencies (out of
the 36 proposed in the questionnaire) were considered to be required in their job to a
high extent (responses 1 and 2, "To a very high extent" or "To a high extent") by at
least two thirds of the graduates. On the other hand, the same cut-off points (very
high or high; two thirds of graduates) reveal that graduates consider themselves
qualified in only five areas of competence.
This analysis aggregates the answers of all respondents to the survey. An alterna-
tive might have been to focus attention only on those individuals who occupy jobs
which are directly linked to the production and transmission of knowledge. This
approach would have been helpful in identifying the competencies that are probably
most closely linked to the emergence of knowledge-based economies. But for our
purposes it seemed too restrictive, since every worker and every citizen, whether
willingly or not, has to live and work in this new context.

3.2. What are the Most Frequently Required and the Most Frequently Acquired
Competencies?
The most frequently required competencies all relate to broad skills rather than to
items of field-specific knowledge. Broad generic skills such as problem-solving
ability, oral communication skills, working independently, working under pressure,
taking responsibilities and decisions, working in a team and adaptability (cf. Appen-
dix) were considered to be highly required by at least 80 per cent of the graduates,
well above the proportion of 60 per cent for field-specific knowledge.
According to our criteria, graduates consider themselves qualified in only five
areas: learning abilities, power of concentration, working independently, loyalty-
integrity and field-specific theoretical knowledge (see Table 1).

Table 1. Competencies acquired at time of graduation in 1994195, Europe and Japan: five
most frequently acquired competencies (per cent "high ", i.e. responses 1 & 2).

Europe Japan Mean

Learning abilities 83 55 80
Power of concentration 72 62 71
Working independently 72 31 68
Loyalty, integrity 68 70 68
Field-specific theoretical knowledge 67 53 66

The highest rated competency, learning abilities, was also highly rated amongst
the most required competencies - but only in 17th place in rank order. There was a
large difference between Europe and Japan for two competencies, learning abilities
and working independently. Whereas 72 per cent of European students believe they
have been trained to work independently, only 31 per cent of Japanese graduates
212 JEAN-JACQUES PAUL

express the same feeling (and correspondingly, 83 per cent and 55 per cent in the
case of learning abilities). This may indicate that Japanese students are not being
properly prepared to develop in organisations where workers need to adapt them-
selves to new knowledge requirements. If so, Japanese organisations may be unable
to build fully on the potential of new modes of production. As Carnoy states,
... the highest payoff to human capital comes when labour participates in making deci-
sions' and the advent of flexible production rewards endogenous innovation and leam-
ing-by-doing (Camoy, 1995: 3).

3.3. What are the Most Under-supplied Competencies?

In order to discover which competencies can be said to be most under-supplied by

higher education, we can consider the difference between the proportion of gradu-
ates who declare a given competency to be required (to a high or a very high extent),
and the proportion who report that they themselves had acquired the same compe-
tency (to a high or a very high extent) by the time they graduated. It turns out that
the mean of this difference is 20 per cent, with a standard deviation of 10 per cent.
We will therefore include those competencies with a difference between the two
proportions that is higher than 30 per cent.
Six competencies can thus be considered as particularly under-supplied by
higher education (Table 2). Four of them are related to the skills used by individual
workers in implementing their own tasks. Three of these are behavioural - problem-
solving ability, working under pressure and time management; and one is practical-
computer skills. The other two areas of under-supply are also behavioural, but con-
cern the collective management of tasks: taking responsibilities and decisions, and
planning, co-ordinating and organising.

Table 2. Competencies acquired at time of graduation in 1994195, European Union and Ja-
pan: six most under-supplied competencies (per cent "high ", i.e. responses 1 & 2).

Europe Japan Mean

Problem-solving ability 58 39 56
Working under pressure 55 36 53
Taking responsibilities, decisions 48 29 47
Time management 45 33 44
Planning, co-ordinating and organising 39 18 37
Computer skills 31 29 31

We can also distinguish two kinds of competencies which are under-supplied ac-
cording to the graduates' accounts: first, competencies which are fairly well devel-
oped, such as problem-solving ability and working under pressure, but not
sufficiently in terms of the requirements - which are particularly high; and second,
competencies which are clearly under-produced such as planning, co-ordinating and
 UNIVERSITIES AND THE KNOWLEDGE-BASED ECONOMY 213

organising on the one hand, and computer skills on the other. Except for computer
skills where there is little difference between Japan and the European average, Japa-
nese higher education appears particularly prone to under-produce the competencies
considered in this table.
This interpretation is confirmed if we consider the differences between each
country in the survey for the same six under-supplied competencies (Table 3).

Table 3. Competencies acquired at time of graduation in 1994195, by country: six most under-
supplied competencies (per cent "high ", i.e. responses 1 & 2).

Under-supplied compe-
Under-supplied competencies (individual tasks) tencies (collective tasks)
Problem- Working Time man- Computer- Taking Planning,
solving under pres- agement Skills responsibili- co-
ability sure ties, deci- ordinating
sions and organ-
ising
Sweden 75 68 32 29 62 54
UX 65 67 55 41 61 37
Netherlands 64 56 49 39 53 33
Norway 64 62 44 33 51 31
Germany 59 56 38 32 51 46
Finland 59 54 43 37 49 51
Austria 58 59 44 36 47 38
France 52 48 45 24 46 41
Spain 51 37 54 21 39 39
Italy 47 51 50 20 39 18
Czech Rep. 41 46 36 30 38 35
Europe mean 58 55 45 31 48 39
Japan 39 36 33 29 29 18

In seven or so countries, higher education clearly appears to be succeeding in

producing two very highly required but generally under-supplied competencies,
problem-solving ability and working under pressure. This group of countries is
mainly drawn from the northern part of Europe, including Sweden, Norway,
Finland, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, Germany and Austria. At the oppo-
site extreme, such competencies are obviously under-developed in Japan. British,
Spanish, Italian and Dutch universities also appear to be relatively successful in
training students in time management. There is a general lack of computer skills,
especially in southern European countries such as Italy, Spain and France. This gap
is smaller in the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Finland and Austria. If we look
at competencies related to the collective organisation of work, Sweden and the
United Kingdom appear to train their students to take responsibilities and decisions
214 JEAN-JACQUES PAUL

and Sweden and Finland do better in training them to plan, co-ordinate and organise
tasks. Japanese graduates feel notably ill-prepared in these dimensions.

4. THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN MODES OF TEACHING AND

LEARNING, THE EXPERIENCE OF STUDY AND THE COMPETENCIES
ACQUIRED

Is there any relationship between the modes of teaching and learning, and the oppor-
tunities for and conditions of study, that students experience on the one hand, and
the competencies produced in them by higher education on the other? In other
words, are those countries which appear better at producing the competencies re-
quired by knowledge-based economies more likely to offer a certain kind of experi-
ence of learning and teaching?
In order to investigate such a relationship, the correlations between variables on
two dimensions, one of modes of teaching and experience and the other of compe-
tencies, have been systematically computed amongst the 35,000 graduate respon-
dents available for analysis on all relevant variables.
In this discussion we focus solely on the behavioural competencies that were
considered to be under-supplied compared to the requirements which graduates face
in their jobs. These competencies are grouped in Table 4 into individual-level tasks,
made up of the three areas of problem-solving ability, working under pressure and
time management; and collective-level tasks, made up of the two areas of taking
responsibilities and decisions, and planning, co-ordinating and organising.
It is clear from Table 4 that some modes of teaching and learning and experi-
ences of study are more effective in the development of the competencies required
by knowledge-based economies. Thus, project and problem-based learning, inde-
pendent learning, a practical emphasis in teaching and learning and teaching quality
are all features which support the development of behavioural competencies, both at
the individual and at the collective level.
Good course content in the major subject seems to be influential in developing
individual-level competencies, whereas an emphasis on attitudes and socio-
communicative skills and on the direct acquisition of work experience evidently
stimulates competencies which graduates would find useful in working collectively.
The same table illustrates how higher education institutions in some countries are
able to provide students with the required competencies more systematically, be-
cause they use appropriate modes of teaching and learning and study experiences.
This is the case in the Nordic countries (Norway, Sweden, Finland), the Netherlands
and the United Kingdom. Graduates from other European countries and from Japan
do not seem to have been so well prepared by the conditions in which they studied
for the challenges imposed by knowledge-based economies. One can reasonably
conclude that universities and other higher education institutions should undertake a
review of their teaching practices, and should assess to what extent they are appro-
priate for developing the competencies required by contemporary societies.
 UNIVERSITIES AND THE KNOWLEDGE-BASED ECONOMY 215

Table 4. Modes of teaching and learning and types of study experience which have a major
impact on under-supplied competencies (correlations*); and related countries.

Significant influence
on under-supplied
Modes of teaching and Countries which emphasise learning
competencies
earning/types of study experience experiences/develop competencies
Individual Collective
level! levee
Attitudes and socio- Netherlands, United Kingdom,
X
communicative skills" Norway
Project and problem-based
X X United Kingdom, Norway
learning"
Italy, Netherlands, United
Independent learning" X X
Kingdom, Finland, Norway
Direct acquisition of work
experience" X Sweden, Netherlands, Norway
Practical emphasis of teaching
X X Netherlands, United Kingdom
and learning"
Teaching qUalitl X X United Kingdom
Course content of majorb X United Kingdom

J "Problem-solving ability", "working under pressure" and "time management"

2 "Taking responsibilities, decisions" and "planning, co-ordinating and organising"
a (High)
b (Good)
* X indicates significant « 0.01, N=35,349) positive correlations between modes/experiences of teaching
and acquisition of competencies.

5. CONCLUSIONS

One cannot ignore the fact that universities are not changing sufficiently. In all de-
veloped countries, there have been numerous reforms in systems of resource alloca-
tion, in internal government, in the way universities enrol new students and in
relationships with companies and other external stakeholders. These changes had to
be undertaken in order to cope with the increasing demand for higher education.
However, most of these developments have been conceived in order to respond to
quantitative pressures which not only demanded more resources, but also required
more efficiency in the use of these resources. The contemporary challenges are dif-
ferent. In these countries, because of stabilisation or even a decrease in the size of
youth cohorts in the population, more attention can now be given to qualitative
rather than merely quantitative adaptation. Contemporary economies now require
competencies which presuppose new modes of teaching and learning.
Nevertheless, it may be somewhat more difficult for universities to promote
qualitative rather than quantitative change. Qualitative development means change
in ways of teaching and learning, in other words in the way in which most academ-
ics work. Are they ready for change? Since academic work relies on autonomy and
216 JEAN-JACQUES PAUL

self-management, what incentives can be deployed in a world where professional

academic careers depend more on research results than on the performance of stu-
dents?
Our discovery that, on the one hand, there appears to be a general shortfall in the
production of those skills which are most sought after by today's companies, but on
the other hand the situation in certain countries seems much better, invites us to con-
sider how higher education institutions should change.
In the first instance, the learning system should no longer be based on the trans-
fer of tacit knowledge through classes, teachers and libraries, with a free choice of
courses (as in the German model); nor should it be based on codified knowledge;
instead, it should be explicitly guided by the competencies to be acquired. Tradi-
tional models (such as the Humboldtian, for instance) assume that students will im-
plicitly absorb the competencies they require through independent research and
learning. The hidden curriculum which prevailed for such a long time could operate
effectively as long as most students belonged to "/es heritiers", who grew up in a
milieu where they were used to being autonomous, where taking the initiative was
part of their education. During this period, the occupational world was directly
linked to the academic world; universities provided training for the self-reproduction
of academia and for high administration, and had few contacts with companies and
business world.
The world has changed, however. Many students have parents who have never
been acquainted with higher education, and most students have studied during the
period of mass education, with its more industrialised approach to teaching and
learning based on prescribed tasks. The opening up of higher education also took
place during a period of change in the social relations of production. As far as both
students and employers are concerned, universities need to change from their tradi-
tionally opaque definition of learning to a more explicit definition, couched in terms
of competencies. It is now time to move away from curricula based on tacit knowl-
edge, and to adopt the explicit presentation of the competencies required to obtain
different degrees (first degree, master's degree or doctorate); in the same way, the
contents of different subjects need to be specified in terms of the competencies to be
developed. Such a practice is not so original for vocational training, but it still seems
rather new for traditional universities.
Another issue concerns the training of academic staff. Generally, and unlike pri-
mary and secondary school teachers, academic staff are not trained for teaching be-
fore facing students in the classroom. New staff have to improvise, and the easiest
route is to rely on lectures which are designed around academic content, rather than
around competencies to be developed. This problem calls for the development and
promotion of university teaching and learning centres, whose functions are to de-
velop new teaching and learning methods. to train teaching staff and to develop the
use of teachi ng assessment.
The assessment of teaching IS itself a third dimension for concern. Regular as-
sessments of teaching should enable both course content and teaching methods to be
properly examined. Certain institutions and countries have taken this requirement OIl
board. under pressure from market forces - and not only in the private sector. The
 UNIVERSITIES AND THE KNOWLEDGE-BASED ECONOMY 217

Netherlands provide a good example of the dynamic use of such procedures within a
public system.
However, in order to succeed in making university teaching effective it would
also be necessary for university teachers' pay and compensation to change. If we
accept that university staff are genuine teachers in their own right, this means that
those who make real efforts in their teaching must be properly rewarded for doing
so, and all other teachers must be encouraged to keep up with the latest teaching
techniques.
As to putting these recommendations into practice, it seems first of all, judging
by the results of our study, that certain modes of practical teaching and learning
could be reinforced, for instance through more student involvement in research pro-
jects and more placements. The survey results demonstrate that some countries have
been more innovative than others. Moreover, some kinds of institutions have proba-
bly been more responsive than others to the demand for change. New universities in
the United Kingdom, Fachhochschulen in Germany, Ecoles d'ingenieurs in France,
have all tried to adapt their modes of teaching and learning more rapidly to the needs
of the knowledge-based economy. Is this because they have more resources, is it
because of competition between institutions, is it that they are younger institutions
or is it because they all have a vocational emphasis? The answer is probably a mix
of all these factors.
In many countries, traditional universities are now facing many problems, due
for example to a decrease in enrolments, the disaffection of students with the sci-
ences and the mismatch between acquired and required competencies. Given that
some institutions and some countries have reacted to these problems more quickly,
their experiences could now be disseminated more widely. Certain countries, such as
the Netherlands, have a head start in using teaching assessment to improve course
content and methods. It would probably be worthwhile to copy these practices.
Northern European countries are more likely to use problem-based learning, and to
have developed university learning and teaching centres. These are also practices
worth sharing across countries.
Students need to be more fluent in IT, and academic staff need to know how to
use IT adequately in their lectures. That means more resources for higher education
institutions, as new IT-based learning and teaching techniques are more costly than
the traditional chalk-and-blackboard methods. Resources are needed both for the
acquisition of new equipment and for the recruitment of new support staff to main-
tain it. In this respect all fields of study, and not only the traditional natural sciences,
will need to use more capital-intensive teaching techniques.
Nevertheless, it is not only a question of equipment, it is also a matter of the
willingness of academics to adapt themselves to new students, to new ways of teach-
ing and to new perspectives for their students. It is probable that student migration,
both within and beyond Europe, will help to expand these new models of teaching
and learning. Universities are institutions which find it difficult to change. Neverthe-
less, they must reform themselves to meet the new requirements, or they will share
the fate of the dinosaurs.
Another area illustrates how cautious universities can be when external change
takes place. A recent European research project has examined how universities have
218 JEAN-JACQUES PAUL

been addressing lifelong learning in the "information society". The study covered
seven European countries, from north to south, and its main conclusion was that
lifelong learning is still at the margin of European universities' activities: universi-
ties have not adopted any explicit strategy for lifelong learning (Kokosalakis, 2000).
However, the universities did appeared to be recognising the need to develop em-
ployment-relevant courses. We should emphasise again that relevance to employ-
ment does not imply a strict match between specific forms of training and specific
occupations: as we have argued in this paper, such courses should be defined pri-
marily in terms of competencies rather than in terms of field-specific content.
At the same time, it would be dangerous to try to provoke too radical and rapid
changes in universities. Universities have been built upon different layers of sedi-
mented knowledge, upon partial adaptations to successive environmental changes. It
is important that they should preserve functions such as promoting general and theo-
retical knowledge, and encouraging reflective and critical thinking. On the other
hand, new modes and experiences of learning and teaching need to be spread much
more widely. Nevertheless, new teaching tools need more resources, since they de-
pend on lower student-teacher ratios or on expensive IT equipment. Must these re-
sources be found only from public sources, or do universities need to diversify their
incomes, and if so, to what extent? Finding the right answer to these questions is
another precondition for enabling change in university teaching.

REFERENCES
Becker G. (1964). Human Capital: A Theoretical and Empirical Analysis. with Special Reference to Edu-
cation. New York: Columbia University Press.
Carnoy M. (1995). "Economics of Education, Then and Now". In Carnoy, M. (ed.) International Ency·
clopedia of Economics of Education. Oxford: Elsevier 1-7
Foray D. (2000). L'economie de la connaissance. Paris: La Decouverte.
Kokosalakis (2000). "Lifelong Learning in European Universities: a preliminary assessment". European
Journal of Education, 35(3), 253-255.
Lundvall, B.A. & Johnson B. (1994). "The learning economy". Journal of Industry Studies 1(2),23-42.
Teichler U. (2000). "Graduate Employment and Work in Selected European Countries". European Jour-
nal of Education, 35(2), 141-156.
Thurow L. (1975) Generating Inequality: Mechanics of Distribution in the US. Economy. New York:
Basic Books.

APPENDIX

1. Competencies
Question: "Please state the extent to which you had the following competencies at
the time of graduation in 1994 or 1995, and to what extent they are required in your
current work." [Scale of answers from 1 = "To a very high extent" to 5 = "Not at
all".]
For theoretical knowledge, five specific competencies were listed: "broad gen-
eral knowledge", "cross-disciplinary thinking knowledge", "field-specific theoretical
knowledge" and "field-specific knowledge of methods".
 UNIVERSITIES AND THE KNOWLEDGE-BASED ECONOMY 219

Practical knowledge was characterised by seven competencies: "written communi-

cation skills", "manual skills", "oral communication skills", "economic reasoning",
"documenting ideas and information", "foreign-language proficiency" and "computer
skills".
Behavioural knowledge was included at two levels: the individual level, which re-
fers to the direct link between the worker and the tasks slhe has to perform, and the
collective level, which considers the worker as a member of a work _otencies_on.
At individual level, seventeen competencies were listed: "understanding complex
systems", "applying rules and regulations", "problem-solving ability", "analytical
com_otencies", "learning abilities", "reflective thinking, assessing one's own work",
"creativity", "working independently", "working under pressure", "adaptability", "ac-
curacy and attention to detail", "time management", "fitness for work", "power of
concentration", "getting personally involved", "loyalty, integrity" and "critical think-
ing".
At collective level, eight competencies were listed: "negotiating", "taking respon-
sibilities and decisions", "working in a team", "initiative", "assertiveness, decisive-
ness, persistence", "planning, co-ordinating and organizing", "leadership" and
"tolerance, appreciation of different points of view".
Table Al summarises graduates' responses to the questions on the competencies
required for work.

Table AI. Competencies required/or work: 24 highest-ranked competencies in rank order,

Europe and Japan (per cent "high": responses 1 & 2).

EuroEe JaEan Mean

Problem-solving ability 86 87 86
Oral communication skills 84 83 84
Working independently 86 67 84
Working under pressure 83 81 83
Taking responsibilities, decisions 82 66 81
Working in a team 81 81 81
Adaptability 79 83 80
Accuracy, attention to detail 79 83 79
Assertiveness, decisiveness, persistence 80 71 79
Initiative 79 80 79
Time management 79 80 79
Planning, co-ordinating and organising 78 67 77
Power of concentration 76 80 77
Getting personally involved 76 66 75
Loyalty, integrity 75 75 75
Written communication skills 76 68 75
220 JEAN-JACQUES PAUL

Table Ai. continued

Learning abilities 74 76 74
Tolerance, appreciating of different points of view 73 75 73
Reflective thinking, assessing one's own work 72 65 72
Analytical competencies 71 77 71
Fitness for work 70 86 71
Critical thinking 70 60 69
Documenting ideas and information 67 77 68
Coml2uter skills 65 77 66
Count (N) 32,752 3,398 36,150

2. Modes of Teaching and Learning

Question: "If you look back to the course of study you graduated from in 1994 or
1995, to what extent were the following modes of teaching and learning emphasised
by your institution of higher education and its teachers?" [Scale of answers from 1
= "To a very high extent" to 5 = "Not at all".]
Twelve characteristics of teaching and learning in higher education were listed:
"facts and instrumental knowledge", "theories, concepts and paradigms", "attitudes
and socio-communicative skills", "independent learning", "regular class atten-
dance", "teacher as the main source of information and understanding", "freedom to
choose courses and areas of specialisation", "project and problem-based learning",
"direct acquisition of work experience", "out-of-class communication between stu-
dents and staff', "writing a thesis" and "detailed regular assessment of academic
progress".

3. Study Conditions and Experience

Question: "How do you rate the study provision and study conditions you experi-
enced in the course of study?" [Scale of answers from I ="Very good" to 5 ="Very
bad".]
Eighteen items were listed: "academic advice offered in general", "assis-
tance/advice for your final examination", "course content of major", "variety of
courses offered", "design of degree programs", "testing/grading system", "opportu-
nity to choose courses and areas of specialisation", "practical emphasis of teaching
and learning", "teaching quality", "chances to participate in research projects", "re-
search emphasis of teaching and learning", "provision of work placements and other
work experiences", "opportunity of out-of-class contacts with teaching staff', "con-
tacts with fellow students", "chance for students to have an impact on university
policies", "equipment and stocking of libraries", "supply of teaching material" and
"quality of technical equipment (e.g. PC, measuring instruments, etc.)".
 KEIICHIYOSHIMOTO

HIGHER EDUCATION AND THE TRANSITION TO

WORK IN JAPAN COMPARED WITH EUROPE l

1. INTRODUCTION

This paper uses data from a survey of university graduates, conducted in eleven
European countries and Japan, to analyse the relationship between higher education
and graduates' transition to work, comparing Japan with Germany and other Euro-
pean counties. Although data from all eleven European countries are used, the
analysis is particularly focused on comparison with Germany: German higher educa-
tion has provided an influential model of the relationship between higher education
and employment ever since the 19th century, and it offers illuminating contrasts with
the Japanese system.
In many developed countries, including Europe and Japan, higher education has
experienced a remarkable expansion in enrolments during the last decade, and it is
now exposed to a range of pressures for reform and restructuring. Moreover, the two
regions are experiencing similar changes in the labour market, prompted by the de-
velopment of the knowledge-based economy and by globalisation.
On the other hand, the institutional backgrounds are different. According to well-
established conceptions of the differences between Japan and Europe, Japan has a
labour market which is segmented hierarchically by "degree-ocracy" (OECD 1971)
or the "Diploma Disease" (Dore 1976), while the European countries, and particu-
larly Germany, have an occupational labour market which is horizontally linked to
specialised education and qualifications (Teichler 1996, Demes & Georg 1994).
Teichler (1996) has reviewed the research literature in Germany and Japan up to the
mid-1990s: he points out that great importance has been attached to the relationship
between social origin, educational background and occupational career in Japan. The
term "degree-ocracy" is very commonly used and popularly understood, and the
question of how the knowledge and skills acquired during study are used during
graduates' occupational careers is regarded as a secondary consideration. Japanese
companies say that they recruit graduates as "material". In Germany, on the other
hand, it is assumed that employees' future capabilities will already have been ori-
ented through their study in a vocationally specialised course, whether or not this is
taken at a university. This is not to say that the correlation between the status of
graduates' educational careers and their future occupations is uninteresting in Ger-
many, but it is generally concluded that the more important correlation is between
the knowledge and skills acquired during education and the content of their jobs.

221
1. Enders and O. Fulton (eds.), Higher Education in a Globalising World, 221-240.
© 2002 Kluwer Academic Publishe".
222 KEliCHI YOSHIMOTO

In other words, "trainability" (Thurow 1975) and general knowledge have been
assumed to be the key criteria of graduate employment in Japan, in contrast with
professional and specialised knowledge and skill in Germany. Although this dichot-
omy has served for a long time as a good basis for understanding both societies, both
Germany and Japan may now be moving closer together from their respective ex-
tremes. It should at least be acknowledged that, as we have already suggested, there
are now many common social and economic pressures which are moving all socie-
ties towards convergence. Japan in particular has been experiencing change in em-
ployment practices since the early 1990s, accompanied by drastic changes - both
quantitative and qualitative - in graduate recruitment.
There are many studies which have attempted to clarify the differences and simi-
larities in the transition from education to work in various sets of countries and so-
cieties (OEeD 2000, Yoshimoto 1998). However, as OEeD (2000) indicates, on the
one hand comparisons of national survey data carried out separately in each country,
such as the review by Shavit and Mueller (1998), are weakened by the lack of con-
sistency of definitions. On the other hand, as Paul et al (2000) have argued, secon-
dary analysis of official international statistics (e.g. van der Velden and Wolbers
2001) has been forced to work with a restricted range of theoretical frameworks,
because of the limited number of indicators which are available internationally.
With regard to the specific comparison between Germany and Japan, credential-
based "selection" does not represent all the characteristics of Japan, nor "Beruflich-
keit" (occupationalism) of Germany (Yoshimoto 1994, 1997). We need both a frame-
work and a data set which are more amenable to comparison between the countries
in order to make bilateral analysis possible. This paper attempts to understand the
fundamental differences and similarities between Germany and Japan by analysing
international survey data derived from a common framework and methodology.
The focus of the analysis in this paper covers three issues.

1.1. Transition to Working Life and Utilisation of University Know/edge

First, it is important to make sense of several different dimensions of the transition
from higher education to working life in Japan and Europe, including economic in-
dicators of employment, occupation and income, as well as more sociological as-
pects such as the relevance of university knowledge in working life.
In the early 1990s a great deal of research on the economics of education focused
on the expansion of higher education and graduate unemployment (OEeD 1993,
Kaneko 1992). More recently, a new interest in knowledge and competency in the
field of human resource development emerged in the late 1990s (OEeD 1998, Ogata
2001), influenced by higher education reforms and the development of the knowl-
edge-based economy.
Furthermore, although the prevailing concern with the "transition from school to
work" in the 1990s was at first directed mainly towards secondary education, with
an emphasis on vocational and technical education, it later expanded to examine the
transition for young people as a whole. This concern has thus broadened to include
higher education, and also to address questions of the social integration of young
 HIGHER EDUCATION AND TRANSITION IN JAPAN AND EUROPE 223

people as well as labour market issues. In Japan there has recently been a deepening
policy concern regarding the growing dependency of young people on their families,
which is due not only to the prolonging of educational careers but also to an emerg-
ing indifference and even aversion to working life. Young people who have been
called "parasite-singles" (Yamada 1999) are said to be taking a stand against the
older generation who have worked hard both for their personal well-being and for
the benefit of their company (Yoshimoto et al. 1998). The issue of integration into
society in Japan can also be linked with arguments surrounding a revision of juve-
nile law in 2000.
There are similar concerns with respect to youth dependency in many developed
countries (see Jones and Wallace 1992), and in my view it is helpful to integrate
these with the other concerns regarding the transition to work, as OECD (2000) has
done in its approach to the transition to "working life". In this paper, therefore, the
knowledge and skills acquired during the university experience will be examined to
see how these relate both to the transition to employment and to the formation of
competencies required in working life.
Moreover, it is also important to consider whether it is really the case that the
higher education systems in Germany and other European countries do not have the
hierarchically selective and credentialist nature of those in Japan.

1.2. University Reform and Work Experience

Secondly, there is the issue of reforms in university education and the evaluation of
their impact on transition in Japan.
In the late 1990s the deterioration of the youth labour market resulted in serious
graduate unemployment and the problem of ''free-te'''', a Japanese neologism refer-
ring to young, single and casual part-time workers with freedom from control by an
organisation. Yoshimoto (2000) argues that a quarter of the current age group is not
covered by the so-called "Japanese employment practices for new graduates", which
allocate new graduates with all levels of educational qualifications directly to stable,
full-time employment immediately after their graduation day. There is therefore an
emerging issue of social integration in the face of graduate unemployment.
The encouragement of internship and work experience is now seen as one of the
key reform measures to support and improve transition. The Ministry of Labour, the
Ministry of Education, Science, Sports and Culture, and the Ministry of International
Trade and Industry set basic guidelines for promoting internships in 1997. In its
1997 report, "Behavioural Planning for the Creation and Reform of Economic Struc-
tures", the Government examined the problems of internships in terms of the links
among these three Ministries. This paper devotes some attention to guidance and
preparation for work, including personal work experience prior to and during study,
and internships and work placements integrated with the university curriculum.
224 KEIICHI YOSHIMOTO

1.3. Comparison of Similarities and Differences Between Europe and Japan Us-
ing Multilevel Analysis

Thirdly, and for theoretical reasons, this paper attempts a multi-level analysis that
considers the social and economic contexts of the factors influencing the outcomes
of transition.
As Van der Velden and Wolbers (2000) point out, the advantage of multi-level
analysis is to make it possible to determine the relative influences of different levels,
in contrast with bilateral comparison analysis, which often tends to focus on ob-
served differences and to come to simple conclusions based on first impressions. A
variety of multi-level factors affect the transition to employment, so that, in theory,
not only should individual graduates be considered, but also actors at the level of the
employing organisation and at the national level, in order to create an integrated
explanatory model. This paper, therefore, aims to develop a methodology for explor-
ing a universal explanatory framework for transition.

2. METHOD

2.1. Outline of the Study

This paper is based on an international survey carried out in 1998-1999 among

graduates awarded their first degree at higher education institutions in 12 countries.
The project, Higher Education and Graduate Employment in Europe, is also known
by the acronym CHEERS (Teichler 2000b)2. An outline of the survey design, with
details for Japan, is given in Table 1.

Table 1. Outline of the international CHEERS survey, with details of the Japanese survey.

i----r' Austria (AT), Czech Republic

(CZ), Finland (Fl), France (FR),
I
Germany (DE), Italy (ID, Nor-
I Country(*) Japan (JP)
way (NO), Spain (ES), Sweden
!
(SE), the Netherlands (NL) and
U.K. (UK)
Graduates awarded Graduates -1
a BA between 1988 awarded a BA in Ii : -
1995 from 106 Gradua~es awarded a hrst
I Respondents and 1990 from 63
degree III 1995
departments, 33 departments, 4'1.
universities universities ---------------

Mail survey (at least two mail-

Mail survey (two mailings plus reminder
Method ings), except in Italy (interview
post card)
 HIGHER EDUCATION AND TRANSITION IN JAPAN AND EUROPE 225

Table 1. continued

Number of
questionnaires 8,297 11,407 74,679
sent out
Usable re-
2,585 3,421 33,276
sponses
Effective
31.2% 30.0% 44.6%
response rate
* (Country abbreviations used in later tables and figures are given in parentheses)
The implementation of this survey involved three stages: a master questionnaire
was constructed in English; this was then translated into versions for each country;
and finally, a third party verified the accuracy of the translation. Mailing contact was
carried out several times for sampled individuals in each country and the response
rates of all twelve countries were judged to be reasonably high.

2.2. Analytical Framework

The analytical framework of this paper is as follows.

First, the paper presents simple comparisons of transition outcomes for each
country across the following three aspects:
1. the smoothness of the transition process, measured by indicators such as in-
volvement in job search, use of university and other employment services, and
employment status three years after graduation;
2. the appropriateness of employment and conditions of work, including occupation
and income, for university graduates; and
3. the utilisation of university knowledge in working life.
We next describe, again on a comparative basis, a number of attributes and ex-
periences of the graduates in our sample. These include:
1. personal attributes including gender, age of entry to higher education and subject
specialisation;
2. internship/work experience, including exposure to work experience both prior to
and during higher education study and the relationship between work experience
and subject specialisation; and
3. the degree of selectivity of the institution which graduates attended.
In the final section of the paper we return to the analysis of the utilisation of uni-
versity knowledge in working life, this time using a multi-level, multivariate ap-
proach including explanatory factors at the national, organisational and individual
levels which may affect knowledge utilisation. As outlined earlier, the explanatory
factors which are introduced cover the individual (micro), organisational (meso) and
national (macro) levels, and our model uses the selectivity of graduates' institution
of study as its organisation-level variable, and the average graduation age of each
country as an indicator at the national level. From a theoretical perspective, many
different macro-level variables, covering a range of dimensions, could be relevant.
226 KEIICHI YOSHIMOTO

However, in practice at the macro level the possible variables and indicators may be
closely related to each other, and therefore our ability to include different dimen-
sions in the analysis is heavily constrained. 3

3. TRANSITION PROCESSES AND OUTCOMES

3.1. Employment and Job Search

Graduate transition differs substantially and in many respects between Europe and
Japan.
More Japanese than European graduates experience a smooth transition to work.
In Japan in 1995, 77.0 percent of male graduates and 82.8 percent of female gradu-
ates looked for a job on graduation, and more than 95 percent of these began their
job search before their graduation. The proportion of graduates who looked for ajob
is lower in most European countries than in Japan, and the proportion of graduates
who began their job search before graduation in Europe is less than 40 percent. Of
course, there are also great differences between countries within Europe; in the case
of Germany, the percentage looking for jobs was 63.0 percent for males and 59.1
percent for females, with half of them starting their job search before graduation but
the other half starting it at the time of graduation or later.
With regard to methods of job search, around 60 percent or more of graduates,
both in Japan and Europe, used types of information such as job-placement maga-
zines. The recent (1995) Japanese graduates were more likely to have used job-
placement magazines than the older graduates from 1988-1990, and this may reflect
the long-lasting economic depression of the 1990s. Conversely, the proportion of
Japanese graduates who "received an invitation from a company" decreased during
the 1990s, from 22.8 percent of male graduates in 1988-90 to 16.9 percent in 1995.
Compared with Europe, the use of university support is quite popular in Japan.
For example, 57.5 percent of male graduates and 66.7 percent of females in 1995
used a "career and placement office in a university" and the percentage who had a
"consultation with teaching staff' is 23.3 percent for males and 22.5 percent for fe-
males. It is clear that universities arc expected to play an important role in employ-
ment guidance and placement in Japan. In contrast, it is not common for universities
to support students' job searches in Europe. On average, 17.5 percent of male gradu-
ates and 16.5 percent of female graduates in Europe used a career and placement
office in their university and 10.6 percent of males and 7.4 percent of females men-
tioned consultation with teaching staff. In the case of Germany, only 7.0 percent of
male graduates and 6.3 percent of females used a university careers office, and 8.7
percent of males and 6.0 percent of females had a consultation with teaching staff. In
other words, German graduates experienced even less support from their university
than the European average: it seems that German students are expected to act more
independently. However, there are considerable variations across Europe, and the
role of university careers offices is much more significant in the U.K. Specifically,
at tradItional universities in the U.K., the proportion utilising careers offices is 41.4
percent, which is nearly equivalent to the figure of 48.4 percent for graduates of na-
 HIGHER EDUCATION AND TRANSITION IN JAPAN AND EUROPE 227

tional or public universities in Japan, although it is far behind the figure of 74.9 per-
cent for graduates from Japanese private universities.
Instead, most European graduates used a variety of methods. Over half of all
graduates in Europe made "blind" contact with the company, in other words without
checking whether there were currently vacancies for graduates. They were also
much more likely to use personal connections, public employment service organisa-
tions and private-sector employment service organisations in their job searches than
their Japanese counterparts: this is one of the big differences between Europe and
Japan.
However, the recent Japanese graduates (from 1995) used many more job search
methods than the older graduates from 1988-1990: they appear to be moving closer
to the diversified job search pattern of European graduates. For example, the use of
public employment services by female graduates was 4.8 percent in 1988-1990, but
this figure increased to 15.3 percent for those graduating in 1995.
By approximately three years after graduation, most graduates are in employ-
ment, both in Japan and Europe. For 1995 graduates, the survey (conducted in 1998-
99) showed that 87.0 percent of Japanese males, 85.4 percent of European males,
80.0 percent of Japanese females and 77.2 percent of European females were em-
ployed.

3.2. Occupation and Income

There is a large difference between Japan and Europe with respect to type of occupa-
tion. At the time of the survey three years after graduation, fewer than half of all
Japanese graduates held a professional or managerial occupation: 48.3 percent for
males and 44.5 percent for females. In almost all eleven European countries there
was a higher percentage of graduates with such occupations than in Japan. In the
case of Germany, 81.8 percent of males and 83.6 percent of females were in a pro-
fessional or managerial occupation. However, in this respect too there are large
variations within Europe: for example the corresponding figures are 60 percent for
both male and female graduates in Italy, and lowest of all, 43.7 percent for females
in Norway.
The question is whether or not these differences directly reflect the performance
of the transition system and the appropriateness of higher education. In particular,
can we conclude that university education is unsuitable for working life in Japan?
One answer might be that, after several years of their early career in their occupa-
tion, many Japanese graduates go on to acquire an appropriate professional status
through promotion in their company. Even if they start their career in a white-collar
or grey-collar occupation, the occupational tasks and hence the requirements of
Japanese work organisations may be just as high as those expected of graduate man-
agers and professionals in other European countries. To answer the question fully,
we would need to include information on companies' personnel management ap-
proaches to university graduates.
With regard to the annual income of graduates, although this must be fundamen-
tally related to the general economic context of each country, it is clear that on an
228 KEIICHI YOSHIMOTO

age-related basis, both male and female graduates in Japan have higher annual in-
comes than the European average. Average annual earnings for male graduates in
Japan are €30,400, and for females €23,500. Although these absolute sums are less
in Japan than in Germany, where the figures are €36,100 for males and €25,200 for
females, it should be noted that wage structures are strongly related to seniority in
each country. There is an average age difference of almost 4 years between gradu-
ates in Germany and Japan (a point we shall return to later), and the correlation be-
tween average age and income by country is 0.539. Therefore, if we adjust for age
compo'sition, Japanese graduates' income should be seen as one of the highest
among the 12 countries, even though the initial earnings of Japan's young graduates
are depressed by its sharply age-related seniority salary system.
Our general conclusion is that university graduates in Japan experience a smooth
and appropriate transition to working life, even if they do not start work in a mana-
gerial or professional occupation.

3.3. Utilisation of University Knowledge in Working Life

As we have just seen, the Japanese higher education system's performance in sup-
porting graduates' transition to working life in Japan, as indicated by standard
measures such as employment, income and so on, does not appear to be problematic.
However, if we assume that a successful transition to work should entail a good cor-
respondence between university knowledge and occupational competencies (Bren-
nan, Kogan and Teichler 1996), then Table 2 suggests that our positive evaluation
should be reversed. Many Japanese graduates feel that the knowledge and skills they
acquired during university study are little utilised in their working life, while Euro-
pean graduates (including German graduates) far surpass Japanese graduates in this
regard.

Table 2. Use of knowledge and skills acquired at university in working life*, by country
(mean and standard deviation + ).

NO FI SE CZ AT NL UK IT ES DE FR JP Total

Mean 4.05 3.94 3.88 3.68 3.58 3.48 3.45 3.42 3.40 3.30 2.95 2.7 I 3.48

S.D. 0.89 I.03 I.02 I.06 I.090.93 I.21 1.131.18 I.04 I.03 1.18 1.13

N 3,132 2,444 2,434 2,540 2,075 2,915 3,151 2,550 2,154 3,233 2,294 2,880 31,802

*Question: "Taking into consideration your current work tasks as a whole, to what extent do you use the
knowledge and skills you acquired in the course of your study?"
+Scale of answers: 5 = "To a very high extent" to 1 = "Not at all"

This phenomenon seems likely to be connected with the "common perception of

the irrelevance of university education in Japan" (Yoshimoto 1997). So how should
this result be evaluated? It is at least clear that the transition indicators are mutually
inconsistent. Therefore in order to make better sense of this apparent weakness in
Japan, Section 5 of this chapter undertakes a multivariate analysis of the utilisation
 HIGHER EDUCATION AND TRANSITION IN JAPAN AND EUROPE 229

of knowledge as a key transition indicator. Depending on the outcome, the conclu-

sion might then be that, to judge by this comparison with European graduates, Japa-
nese society may require a reorganisation of university curricula along with various
other aspects of university reform.

4. ATTRIBUTES AND EXPERIENCES

Before carrying out our multiple regression analysis, we describe the individual at-
tributes and the university experiences of graduates from the 12 countries.

4.1. Enrolment Patterns by Gender, Age and Subject

First, the percentage of males is slightly higher than that of females in both Japan
(52.9 percent male) and Germany (55.9 percent).

Table 3. Age and duration of study in higher education by country, in years.

Duration of
Age of Entry Age of Graduation
Study
Mean Mean Mean S.D.
IP 19.3 4.1 23.4 1.53
FR(l) 20.0 5.1 23.8 3.28
ES 19.4 4.9 24.3 3.32
CZ 19.4 5.5 24.4 3.52
NL 20.8 4.7 25.6 4.36
UK 22.8 3.5 26.2 8.25
IT 19.7 7.2 27.3 3.56
DE 21.9 5.3 27.3 3.30
AT 20.4 7.0 27.8 5.05
SE 23.0 4.8 27.8 5.28
NO 23.2 4.6 28.1 5.73
FI 22.6 5.1 28.9 5.61
(1)Study duration in France includes any previous programme at higher education level in addition to the
programme referred to in the questionnaire.

As Table 3 shows, there are big differences in the period of university study,
from a low average of 3.5 years in the U.K. to the highest average of 7.2 years in
Italy. As a consequence both of this and of different ages of entry, the average age at
graduation in 1995 ranged from the youngest, 23.4 years old, in Japan to the oldest,
230 KEliCHI YOSHIMOTO

28.9 years old, in Finland. In the case of Germany, the average study duration is 5.3
years and the average graduation age is 27.4 years old.
There are significant variations not only between countries but also within coun-
tries, for in countries such as the U.K. many adults study alongside younger stu-
dents, as shown by the exceptionally high standard deviation in graduation age of
8.25 years. Japan has by far the smallest variability, with a standard deviation of
1.53 years.
The distribution of fields of specialisation also shows wide variations according
to country. The percentage of graduates who studied humanities or social sciences
varies from a high of 67.7 percent in Japan to a low of 37.7 percent in Norway. 49.3
percent of German graduates studied humanities and social science - in the middle
range of the 12 countries.

4.2. Work Experience Before and During Higher Education Study

There is also a wide variation between countries in employment experience, both

before entry to higher education and during university enrolment.

Table 4. Correspondence of work experience during study period with content of study *
(mean+).

Mean S.D. N

FI 3.24 1.40 2,619

NL 3.22 1.25 2,870
AT 3.08 1.38 2,169
DE 3.07 1.29 3,306
NO 3.02 1.51 2,908
FR 2.97 1.48 2,672
CZ 2.65 1.11 2,601
ES 2.50 1.58 1,582 I
IT 2.30 1.39 1,750
I
UK 2.20 1.51 2,569
JP 2.03 1.26 3,257
Total 2.77 1.44 28,303
*Question: "To what extent did your work experience (employment, internships etc.) during study corre-
spond with the content of your studies? "
+Sealeofanswers: 5 = "To a very high extent" to 1 = "Notatall"

To start with prior experience, in Finland and Norway, at one extreme, more than
half the graduates have work experience before entry. 38.1 percent of German
graduates have prior experience. On the other hand, in Spain and France nearly all
graduates go directly to university, without any experience of work. Japan seems to
 HIGHER EDUCATION AND TRANSITION IN JAPAN AND EUROPE 231

be in the middle between these two extremes, with 22.2 percent of graduates having
work experience prior to entry to university.4
A substantial proportion of graduates, both in Europe and Japan, have had work
experience of some kind during their period of enrolment in a university. Comparing
the rates, 85.3 percent of Japanese graduates worked in a part-time job during their
period of study. In contrast, fewer than half of all European graduates worked during
the same period: 53.9 percent in the case of Germany. Furthermore, the slightly dif-
ferent phrases of "work" for European students and "a part-time job" for the Japa-
nese turned out to be almost equivalent with respect to working hours per week, at
around 13 hours both in Europe and Japan.
Graduates were also asked whether work experience during study, including in-
dividual employment, internships and other work experiences, was connected with
the content of graduates' studies at university. As Table 4 shows, and unlike the in-
cidence of simple exposure to work experience which we have just described, the
relationship between work experience and the content of study is clearly lowest in
Japan. Most Japanese students' work experience is seen as irrelevant to their study.
In contrast, in the case of Germany graduates report a relatively high correspondence
between work experience and the content of their studies.

4.3. Selectivity and Hierarchy Among Higher Education Institutions in European

Countries
The hierarchical nature of the Japanese higher education system is well known.
However, hierarchies are not confined to Japan. In the U.K. it is agreed that Oxford
and Cambridge are in an exceptionally elite position, and that there are also differ-
ences of social esteem between the old and the new universities (former polytech-
nics) in the U.K. In France, many studies show that the selectivity of those higher
education institutions known as the Grandes Ecoles has a big influence on the tran-
sition to work. On the other hand, the literature on Germany generally points out that
institutional differences are not easily recognisable, although differences between
fields of specialisation are often discussed (Teichler 1996).
An index of "institutional selectivity" was constructed as an aggregate variable at
the organisational level by the average academic entry qualifications of respondents
to the survey. The question on entry qualifications was eliminated from the Japanese
questionnaire, since it was difficult to constitute an appropriate index from such a
simple question, owing to the sharp hierarchical structure of high schools in Japan.
However, because of the importance of the concept of academic selectivity, alterna-
tive information was used to generate the Japanese data. Japanese universities were
classified into three categories by using the university ranking information provided
by a magazine for preparing examination. As a result, 51.2 percent of graduates
were classified as from "national public and highly selective private universities",
35.3 percent from "private universities with medium selectivity" and 13.6 percent
from "private universities with low selectivity".
232 KEncHI YOSHIMOTO

The index of institutional selectivity will be built into the model for the multi-
variate analysis of transition to be presented later in this chapter.

5. MULTIVARIATE ANALYSIS OF KNOWLEDGE UTILISATION

We argued above that if we are to assess how well Japanese higher education con-
tributes to an effective transition to work, it is crucial to analyse the degree of utili-
sation of university knowledge in working life. Table 5 presents the results of
multilevel regression analysis of knowledge utilisation on a set of variables at na-
tional, institutional and individual level (for full details see Appendix, Table AI).
Analysis was carried out in three steps: first, we checked to see whether there is a
structure of common factors for each country; this was followed by analysis of the
eleven European countries as a single group to be compared with Japan; finally the
whole sample was modelled, combining the European countries and Japan.

5.1. Country Differences in Knowledge Utilisation

For simplicity, Table 5 shows only the results of regression analyses for those coun-
tries where R-squared is higher than 0.10. In single-country modelling it was found
that the utilisation of university knowledge in working life is affected as follows.
1. The variable "correspondence between work experience during study and the
content of study" has a strong positive effect.
2. Managerial and professional occupations also have a significant positive effect
in most countries. Austria is the only exception: but in Austria an exceptionally
high proportion of graduates are in these occupations. This variable was there-
fore eliminated from the explanatory model for Austria.
3. In many countries but with some exceptions, female graduates use knowledge
gained at university significantly more than male graduates.
4. With regard to fields of specialisation, there are differences between countries:
graduates from humanities and social sciences show a significantly higher de-
gree of utilisation than graduates from natural science and other fields in Austria,
the U.K. and Japan; but the reverse is true in France and Germany.
5. Although individual academic achievement at entry is statistically not significant
in many countries, there is a positive coefficient in most of the models. Institu-
tional selectivity (academic achievement level) has no clear and consistent ten-
dency among the twelve countries. There may be an estimation error in those
countries such as Austria and Finland where the diversity of institutions is small.
Although these country-by-country results show that there are some different ef-
fects between countries, the model adopted here can be interpreted as indicating a
fundamental structure of common factors among the twelve countries.

5.2. Multi-level Analysis of Country Differences in Knowledge Utilisation

Therefore, the same model was next used for analysing inter-regional differ-
ences, first by comparing Europe, taken as a whole, with Japan and then by
 Table 5. Regression analysis a/utilisation a/university knowledge in working life.

Within-country analysis: European countries (countries

for which adjusted R2 =.010) Europe as a Europe &
Explanatory variables Japan
whole Japan total
IT FR AT DE ::r:
0 Intercept *** *** *** ** ***
1 Average graduation age (by ~
- - - - 0.013 - 0.l74 *** tIl
country) oc::
2 Selectivity (institution) 0.010 0.001 -0.156 *** 0.080 *** 0.l38 *** -0.008 0.046 *** n
3 Gender: male -0.002 0.065 * 0.068 * -0.005 -0.056 *** -0.021 -0.061 *** ~
4 Age in 1999 0.019 -0.025 -0.069 ** -0.008 0.014 0.030 0.005 oz
5 Academic achievement in
0.042 0.063 * 0.043 0.053 * 0.055 *** - -
high school ~
6 Field of study: Humanities
0.039 0.090 ** -0.059 * 0.064 ** -0.034 *** -0.093 *** -0.056 ***
and Social Sciences
CI'l
I 7 Work experience prior to
~
0.023 0.040 0.009 0.002 0.036 *** 0.014 0.004 ::=i
enrolment
8 Correspondence between
oz
work experience during study 0.193 *** 0.243 *** 0.221 *** 0.231 *** 0.194 *** 0.185 *** 0.194 *** Z
......
and content of study
~
9 Occupation: managerial and
0.528 0.290 * 0.383 ** 0.274 *** 0.288 *** 0.279 *** ~
professional
10 Occupation: white- and grey-
0.278 0.153 -0.148 *** 0.220 0.164 ** -0.053 0.112 * ~tIl
collar
R2 0.112 0.106 0.l08 0.l05 0.110 0.l98 0.155
Adjusted R2 0.106 0.l00 0.103 0.l01 0.109 0.195 0.154
~
"tl
tIl
value 18.604 17.870 22.327 27.337 193.717 64.519 366.834
Significance (F-test) 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000
----
0.000 0.000
Note: variable coefficients are standardised (beta). *** p<.OOl ** p<.Ol * p<.05
tv
~
~
234 KEIlCHI YOSHIMOTO

including variables for all twelve countries within an overall model. This final
model revealed that three variables - managerial and professional occupations, thc
correspondence of work experience with the content of studies and average gradua-
tion age by country - all have large and significant effects. In particular, the extent
of utilisation of knowledge gained at university can be significantly explained by the
average graduation age of each country, which of course has a quite different impli-
cation from age at the individual level. Figure I attempts to present key differences
between the twelve countries in standardised form, on the basis of the model of the
whole sample presented in the rightmost column of Table 5.
For each country, the left-hand bar shows average values (standardised) of the
extent of knowledge utilisation. The central bar plots the residual variance of the
result for each country when performing a simple regression of knowledge utilisa-
tion on average graduation age (beta = .262 and R2 = .062), for the whole sample.
The right-hand bar shows residual variances according to the model shown in Table
5, which uses a full set of explanatory variables. For the sample as a whole, the av-
erage graduation age level, taken on its own, accounts for 6 percent of the total vari-
ance, compared with 15 percent of the total variance explained by the full model in
Table 5. Thus, for example, the chart suggests that it can be concluded that the low
extent of knowledge utilisation in Japan and France is mainly due to the low average
age of graduates in these countries.
Figure 1. Utilisation of university knowledge by country.

0,5

o
-0,5 NO FI Sf CZ AT Nt UK Ii ES

-1

EI ModelO [the mean of 'utilization' by country (standardized for the whole sample]

• Model1 [residual variances by simple regression with country mean of graduation age
(variable 1 of table 5) 13=.262, R2=.62]
II Model2 [residual variances by regression with all variables as shown in the right most
I
I column of table 5]
L -_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _.._______._____ ... __. __.._. _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _....___ ... _._ .------

As we suggested in thc introduction to this chapter. Germany has always been

regarded as a typical representative of those countries which emphasise the rele-
vance of specialist study to employment. However, it now seems that if the age fac-
tor is taken into consideration, not only is the level of knowledge utilisation by
German graduates of the same age even lower than in Italy and Austria. but it is also
 HIGHER EDUCATION AND TRANSITION IN JAPAN AND EUROPE 235

possible to conclude that Japanese graduates make use of their university knowledge
to nearly the same degree as German graduates. On the other hand, although many
northern European countries show a higher level of knowledge utilisation, this may
also be due to their higher graduation ages. Conversely, given the low graduation
age in the Czech Republic, it may be that this country has been the most efficient of
all in achieving the conversion of university knowledge to occupational compe-
tence.
To judge by these findings, it is clear that, as we argued at the beginning of this
chapter, it is not necessarily appropriate to perpetuate the stereotypical view of "spe-
cialist relevance" in Germany and "educational and social selection" in Japan as two
completely heterogeneous models. If we are to succeed in making valid comparisons
of the ways in which graduates utilise university knowledge in working life, it is
both necessary and important to re-examine the fundamental educational and social
conditions of the countries concerned.

6. CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS

6.1. Conclusions

If evaluative conclusions are to be drawn at this stage, we can reasonably describe

the transition to work of Japanese graduates as relatively poor with respect to the
utilisation of university knowledge, but relatively good with respect to employment
outcomes, job search processes and income levels achieved. In other words, one's
evaluation of transition outcomes in Japan and Europe will depend on the indicators
which are being used.
Secondly, the most important feature of university experience which seems to
increase the prospect of knowledge utilisation is the extent of correspondence be-
tween work experience during study and the subject studied at university. This may
well apply to graduates quite generally, and not only to those who have taken a pri-
marily vocational course. It can also be argued that it is important that universities
should recognise not only work experience closely linked to specific fields of study,
such as internships which form a required part of the curriculum, but also individual
voluntary work experience outside university, which may be equally relevant to the
field of study and can also be assessed for credit where appropriate.
Thirdly, one should approach the common social perceptions of the "useless-
ness" of university knowledge in Japan and its "usefulness" in Germany with cau-
tion. Such views may reflect reality in certain subject areas, but they may be
stereotypical prejudices in others. Similarly, the polarised assumption of a hierarchi-
cally selective university system in Japan, compared with the "equal" status of Ger-
man universities, may not be a fair reflection of current realities. Again, such
stereotypes should be re-examined, not as an account based on indisputable facts but
ralher as a social construction based on shared social perceptions. If this is the case,
the Japanese approach - which results in the transition of a younger age group, rela-
tively well equipped with higher education qualifications hut lacking the same ex-
236 KEliCHI YOSHIMOTO

tent of socially and academically recognised work experience - needs more serious
discussion.

6.2. Transition to Adult Life and the Responsibility of Society

To consider the last point further, at the national level the average graduation age
provides an indication of when and how society at large recognises a graduate as an
"adult". If we contrast the Japanese and German approaches to transition, in Japan
young people and young adults generally participate in university life, right through
from high school to graduation, without any experience of the working world except
for arubaito (casual part-time jobs). Because arubaito is not regarded as an experi-
ence which in any way comes close to the role of the adult citizen, the key event
which symbolically confers the status of shakaijin (socially active and full-fledged
citizen) is graduation from university, coupled with the transition to full-time em-
ployment. The term shakaijin in itself defines students as outside the "real world",
devalues the experience and ability of university graduates and indeed even ,Prevents
younger employees from attaining responsible and autonomous positions'. In due
course, however, Japanese graduates reach the same age as typical new graduates
from Germany or other European countries, and they are then given a chance to util-
ise their university knowledge for the first time 6 .

6.3. Implications for Reform

This paper's conclusions have various implications for current reforms of university
education in Japan. At the first sectional meeting of the University Council in 2000,
there was a proposal to recommend setting a fixed interval between graduation from
secondary education and enrolment in higher education. Another relevant political
issue in education was the proposal to require "service activities" in school, which
was discussed by the National Commission of Educational Reform in 2000. How-
ever, both proposals were in the end decided against, and were virtually deleted
from the respective final reports.
We would argue that internship, which is currently being promoted politically,
needs to adopt an approach which emphasises transition into adult society, rather
than employment; and that it should offer experiences which utilise the knowledge
gained at university and hence increase students' motivation to acquire such forms
of knowledge. Furthermore, if it can be made to correspond with students' study
specialisms. the experience of arubaito could also be linked with motivation and the
enhancement of transition; it, too, should be reappraised. In other words, and espe-
cially in the higher education environment of Japan, with tuition fees and other fi-
nancial costs which are higher than in European countries, there should be integrated
and appropriate support for every activity which gives students a chance to gain
some experience of social independence.
This paper has argued that the diversification of graduate employment and initial
careers indicates a widespread and growing problem of transition. This issue needs
to be handled through collaboration between the various stakeholders. However, at
 HIGHER EDUCATION AND TRANSITION IN JAPAN AND EUROPE 237

government level, collaboration between the spheres of education and labour has to
be accomplished by two different ministries, which may become more separated in
spite of, or rather because of, the reorganisation of central government in 200e. In
any event, a new approach to monitoring graduate transition is now required because
of the drastic changes in the education and labour market; but the two ministries are
not yet collaborating effectively in monitoring young people's education-work tran-
sitions. This is because "School basic surveys" and other official statistics in Japan
have provided highly reliable data on transition for the last half century.

6.4. Monitoring Youth Transition

In the 1950s and 1960s, it was reasonable to monitor graduate employment practices
through institution-based data collection, because most statistics focused on a single
formal and symbolic transition point (the two day period covering graduation day on
March 31 81 and the standard hiring date of April 181). This style of information gath-
ering was both consistent with policy goals and cost-effective. But now, because of
the drastic social changes of the 1990s, this approach is self-evidently out of date,
and cannot provide the fundamental information which is needed to underpin pro-
posals for university reform. Understanding the outcomes of transition, for graduates
and other people leaving the educational system, is an essential prerequisite for de-
termining the appropriateness of education to society. Both new policy formation
and sociological research depend on proper monitoring of the whole young genera-
tion with regard to successive stages of development and transition.
One might also conclude that each higher educational institution should be asked
to develop a methodology for graduate surveys, with an agreed framework which
includes a comparative design on the lines of the present analysis, as a necessary
component of its own self-study and self-evaluation.

6.5. Institutional Guidance and Support in the Era of Massification and

Universalisation

The implications of this analysis for Europe may be better discussed by those who
are more knowledgeable about European higher education than the author of this
paper. However, the survey results are suggestive. In contrast to Japanese students,
who as we have seen are not regarded as shakaijin, most German students already
possess, at the time of entry into higher education, the Abitur qualification which is
also referred to as the Reifepriifung or certificate of maturity. Although this concep-
tion may well encourage students in more independent and responsible behaviour, it
may also exempt higher education institutions both from equipping students with
general knowledge and skills and from providing organisational support for student
guidance, counselling and placement. Once again, social perceptions of the relative
dependency of Japanese students and the relative maturity of German students may
be based not on present-day realities but on the assumptions of elite higher educa-
tion. In our view, while Japanese society needs to respond to the diversification of
youth transition with a thinner but wider safety-net, many higher education institu-
238 KEIICHI YOSHIMOTO

tions in European countries would do better to recognise the lack of maturity of pre-
sent-day students following the period of educational expansion, and to offer them
more organised and intensive guidance and support for their transition to working
life.

NOTES

This chapter, based on Yoshimoto (2001), has been specially revised for this book to focus on the
comparison with Germany.
The research in Japan was supported by the Japan Institute of Labour, a Grant-in-Aid for Scientific
Research and the Tokyo Club. The European research team was supported by the European Commis-
sion as a project within the Framework IV Programme of Targeted Socio-Economic Research. Ulrich
Teichler of the University of Kassel served as the overall co-ordinator, and the author of this chapter
as the Japanese co-ordinator. I would like to express my appreciation of the work of the Japanese
team including Yuichi Akinaga, Tomoko Ito, Yuki Inenaga, Naoyuki Ogata, Motohisa Kaneko,
Reiko Kosugi, Fumiaki Nakajima, Tatsuya Natsume, Tomokazu Fujitsuka, Yuki Honda, Shu Yo-
shida, Hiroaki Yoshino, and Akiyoshi Yonezawa.
The analysis of macro (system) level characteristics of transition and the factors affecting it has re-
cently been discussed, for nine European countries, in a special issue of the European lournal of
Education (Paul, Teichler, and Van der Velden 20(0).
4
Although this may seem somewhat strange to Japanese readers, this figure includes the number work·
ing at an "arubaito" (a casual part-time job). In the Japanese questionnaire the option of "arubaito"
was listed for the questions on work experience prior to and during study, in addition to the options in
the master questionnaire such as "employed" or "self-employed". This is because Japanese students
tend to regard work experience while at school as arubaito, irrespective of the length of working
hours and type of employment contracts.
The age of adult suffrage has historically been 20 years old in Japan, but during discussions of the
reform of juvenile law in 2001 there was widespread support for an upward revision. The result of
any revision may be a further prolongation of the period of youth.
Specific knowledge and skills acquired through education can become obsolete, so that it is common
thinking that the relevance of knowledge gained at university will decrease over the years following
graduation. However, a follow-up survey of Japanese graduates (the same respondents, surveyed ill
both 1992 and 1998) shows that the reverse is true: the usefulness of uni versity education increases
with age. This finding suggests the possibility that it is only after a few years at entry level that many
Japanese graduates will be promoted to a position where they can utilise the knowledge and skills ac-
quired at university (Yoshimoto 1999).
In 2001 the Ministry of Labour merged with the Ministry of Welfare into the Ministry of Health,
Labour and Welfare, and the Ministry of Education, Sports and Culture merged with the Science and
Technology Agency, to form the new Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technol·
ogy.
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240 KEIICHI YOSHIMOTO

APPENDIX

Table AI. Details of explanatory model usedfor multilevel analysis in Table 5.

I Variable INotes and categories I Level

Response variable

Utilisation of university knowl- 5-point scale [5 = high; I = not at all] Individual

edge in working life

Explanatory variables

I Average graduation age for coun- Country mean (based on variable 4)
try
2 Selecti vity of institution
3 Gender: male
4 Age in 1999
5 Academic achievement in high
school
6 Field of study: Humanities and
Social Sciences
7 Work experience prior to enrol-
ment
8 Correspondence between work
experience during study and
content of studies
9 Occupation: managerial and
professional
I als: 0 = others I
I I
10 Occupation: white- and grey-
collar
i -
National
Institutional mean (based on variable Institutional
5)
Dummy variable [I = male; 0 = fe-
male]
5'
e,
3-point scale [3 = high to I = low] ""
5:
c::
e:..
Dummy variable [1= Humanities, Law
and Social Sciences; 0 = Natural Sci-
ences, Mathematics, Engineering,
Medical Sciences and Others]
Dummy variable [1 = Yes; 0 = No]
5-poim scale [5 = high; I = not at all]
Dummy variable [1 = legislators, sen-
ior officials, managers and profession-
Dummy variable f I = technicians.
I
associate professionals, clerks, service
workers and shop and market sales I
,
workers: () = others 1 I
I -_.
 ELAINE EL-KHAW AS

DEVELOPING AN ACADEMIC CAREER IN

A GLOBALISING WORLD

Among all of the possible topics for a researcher into employment and careers,
one of the most difficult must be the study of academic careers. As many analysts
have discussed, academics form an unusually independent profession, one that
draws heavily on traditional ideals about its proper role even as its present-day oper-
ating realities in many countries have become increasingly diverse (e.g., Becher,
1989; Clark, 1987a; Gumport, 1997; Fulton, 1996a). A further complication arises
from Teichler's admonition about mad-cow disease, namely that for an academic to
undertake a study of academic careers is akin to the cows studying mad-cow disease.
Lacking any semblance of psychological distance, how can one make any claim to
objectivity or attempt to offer incisive comments? This is a variation on the "famili-
arity" problem noted long ago by Howard Becker and other anthropologists as they
undertook studies of the schooling process. Assessing one's own profession may be
an advanced case of the same disease.
This chapter considers the prospects for persons entering academic careers in the
early decades of the twenty-first century. It especially looks at the ways that new
academics might shape their careers in order to bring a stronger international dimen-
sion to their scholarly work. In the past, an international awareness of cross-national
developments in one's specialist area has always been valued; in the future, as the
forces of globalisation move forward, such awareness may become critically impor-
tant to most areas of scholarship.
Two issues are the focus of exploration here: what are the mechanisms by which
academics include an international dimension in their work, and what opportunities
and constraints do new academics face in building careers that include international
components? The analysis will, first, draw on a diverse but somewhat fragmented
literature to review what is known about the extent to which academic work already
takes a global perspective. It will then turn to some of the issues that newer academ-
ics face in launching an academic career with an international dimension. Because
this is a sparsely researched topic, yet likely to become more salient, the chapter
includes some discussion of potential directions of research that might help us to
better understand the process of launching an academic career in an increasingly
global world.
An acknowledgement must be made at the outset. This chapter was developed as
part of a tribute to the enormously productive career of Professor Ulrich Teichler,
higher education scholar extraordinaire. It builds on his long-term interests in aca-
demic careers (e.g., Teichler, 1996; Enders & Teichler, 1997) and his own commit-
ment to examining issues from an international perspective. It seeks to emulate his

241
J. Enders and O. Fulton (eds.), Higher Education in a Globalising World, 241-254.
© 2002 Kluwer Academic Publishers.
242 ELAINE EL-KHA W AS

characteristic approach to research: fearless about taking on unclear but significant

issues, probing for insights that may extend current scholarship, and ready to offer a
critical sociological perspective, all with the purpose of gaining deeper understand-
ing. He has modelled, too, a willingness to identify possible research agendas while
encouraging others to join him in moving these agendas forward. In appreciation of
his inspiring example, this chapter has the ambitious objective of considering what
is known and what should be learned on an issue likely to be more significant in the
future. Following Teichler's example, the chapter offers many suggestions for fur-
ther research, and other researchers are encouraged to pursue or adapt these sugges-
tions.

1. THE INTERNATIONAL DIMENSION IN ACADEMIC WORK

The ideal of academic inquiry is to conduct curiosity-driven research, in which a

scholar is able to pursue a question systematically and comprehensively, reaching
for relevant evidence wherever it exists and striving to formulate theories and prin-
ciples that fit a wide universe of circumstances. Such inquiry has always crossed
national boundaries. As the twenty-first century begins, the pace may be quickening.
As Altbach and Lewis (1996: 3) have commented,
... with the evolution of the international academic labour market and scientific commu-
nity, along with more efficient travel and communications, the international community
of scholars and scientists has become much stronger and more professionally connected.

Varied mechanisms have been developed to honour and support international re-
search. Most countries fund study trips or other study-abroad experiences. Many
countries, and individual universities, have criteria for the promotion and career ad-
vancement of academics that place high value on international research and publica-
tion. Similarly, the academic profession has developed mechanism&., for commu-
nication among academics around the world (e.g., through journals, conferences, or
association linkages), typically organised on the basis of discipline or specialised
field of research. Many academic journals have international reputations and reader-
ship. Disciplinary societies and associations in each country often have ties to coun-
terpart associations in other countries. In recent years, the number of international
conferences has increased, as has the number of international memberships in some
of the more prestigious disciplinary societies. Electronic communications - from the
e-mail transfer of documents to the electronic accessibility of the full text of journal
articles - are becoming routinely and broadly available. Instant language translation
of electronic documents will soon be available (Branscomb, 1995; Muller, 1995).
A fourteen-country study sponsored by the Carnegie Foundation in the early
1990s, a major source of empirical evidence about the academic profession, shows
that academics generally support the ideal of having an international perspective.
Academic support was especially strong on two indicators - the importance of hav-
ing contacts internationally and of keeping up with research published in other coun-
tries. Almost 8 in 10 academics in the Carnegie survey reported that contacts with
academics in other parts of the world are very important to their professional work,
 DEVELOPING AN ACADEMIC CAREER 243

and fully 9 in 10 reported that they are committed to keeping up with research pub-
lished in other countries (Boyer, Altbach, & Whitelaw, 1996: 68).
The available evidence is summarised in the following pages according to form
of international support mechanism. In general, it suggests that much work remains
to be done in order to promote international inquiry. The barriers to realising the
ideal of international work need to be better understood.

1.1. International Travel

Academic involvement in international scholarship can be illustrated with travel

abroad, one of the major forms of international involvement. Study-abroad pro-
grammes, usually organised within specific countries, encourage and facilitate for-
eign travel for research and study, either for a short term or for more extended
periods. The Fulbright-sponsored fellowships and the exchange programmes exist-
ing within the British Commonwealth are among the well-known programmes that
have had deep impact on scholarship throughout the world. Japan has recently made
a substantial commitment to increasing exchange opportunities. In the Carnegie sur-
vey,7 out of 10 Japanese academics reported that foreign faculty regularly taught at
their institutions, and almost 6 out of 10 regularly hosted international seminars.
Other exchange programmes operate on a bilateral basis, are administered by
non-profit organisations or private foundations, or by universities themselves. One
of the activities of Universitas 21, for example, is to sponsor greater mobility among
the students and academics in its member universities (Blight, Davis and Olsen,
2000: 107). So too, the ERASMUS, TEMPUS and SOCRATES programmes of the
European Union are systematic, sustained programmes designed to facilitate inter-
country mobility of students and academics.
The Carnegie survey found that just over half of the academics in ten countries
had made at least one trip abroad for study or research sometime in the last three
years (Boyer, Altbach, and Whitelaw, 1996: 19). Academics in Israel were the most
active, with 9 out of 10 having studied abroad and about 6 out of 10 having taught
abroad in the last three years (Chen, Gottlieb & Yakir, 1996). Next most active were
academics in Sweden, the Netherlands, and Hong Kong, where at least 70 percent of
academics had studied in another country. In other settings, especially in large coun-
tries, the record of travel abroad was generally much lower, sometimes with as few
as 10 percent of academics having travelled abroad (Boyer, Altbach, & Whitelaw,
1996: 19-21).
In the Carnegie study, about one-third of academics reported that they had served
as faculty in another country. On average, such activity amounted to about a month
over a three-year period (Altbach & Lewis, 1996: 37). For US academics; about 1 in
10 had served as faculty in other countries (Haas, 1996: 377).
Research-active academics are more likely than others to carry out international
work. Most studies suggest that only a small number of the total pool of academics
make up what has been called the "research cadre", actively engaged in research and
scholarly activities. Among these academics, about half reported having recent ex-
244 ELAINE EL-KHA W AS

perience of foreign travel. On average, they spent three months on international

travel over the last three years (Altbach & Lewis, 1996: 38).

1.2. International Research and Publication

A well-recognised indicator of an academic's international involvement is having

research published in another country. Many scholarly journals encourage research
from all parts of the world. However, most are published in the English language, a
problem for many academics around the world. Some journals serve a geographic
region but have other multi-country linkages. European journals, for example, are
readily accessible to academics throughout Europe and in other countries.
The Carnegie survey offers information on the level of research publication in
other countries. On average, academics in the survey reported that they had about 4
out-of-country publications during a three-year period, slightly more than one per
year (Altbach & Lewis, 1996: 37). These results do not distinguish between jour-
nals, books, and other forms of publication.
When the Carnegie study asked academics whether they conducted research with
academics from other countries, an average of about 5 months over three years was
reported (Altbach & Lewis, 1996: 37). At US research universities, only half of the
academics had worked on a research project with foreign colleagues in the last three
years (Haas, 1996: 377).

1.3. International Focus in the Curriculum

Another approach is for academics to influence the content of the curriculum in their
university or department. Much teaching can be cross-national in perspective and in
the source materials that are used. Even when using materials in a single language.
an academic can draw on cases, histories, journals and other documents that give an
international perspective to each lecture or course. Limited evidence exists on the
ways that academic programmes are given an international perspective; in the
United States, for example, it has been shown that courses with international themes
or materials can be found at most universities, but they reach a small proportion of
students (Lambert, 1989; Pickert & Turlington, 1992). Certain clusters of countries
may spur progress. Recent initiatives under NAFTA agreements, for example, have
spurred a new integration of subject areas among several universities in the US,
Canada and Mexico. The Scandinavian countries, with long traditions of cross-
border co-operation, have integrated multi-country information in many academic
programmes.
Area studies programmes are another approach to developing global awareness,
in this instance by promoting in-depth knowledge and scholarship on specific geo-
graphic areas. Only a small number of academics may be expert in such areas, but a
far larger number could have interests, expertise and research related to a geographic
area, for instance in health care facilities or religious studies related to a region.
Only a few countries have made it a matter of national policy to maintain area stud-
ies programmes. The US experience is that, apart from limited government funding,
 DEVEWPING AN ACADEMIC CAREER 245

support for such programmes depends very much on levels of student demand. In
the last decade, for example, student interest has grown in Latin American studies.
Possibly, following the terrorist attacks of September 2001, demand for Middle
Eastern or Islamic studies may grow.

1.4. Country Differences

While these are the broad patterns of international involvement, variation by country
is extensive. In the Carnegie survey, for example, Germany, Sweden, Hong Kong,
the Netherlands, and Israel reported substantially higher levels of international in-
volvement among their academics, compared to the other industrialised countries in
the survey (Altbach & Lewis, 1996: 38).
Differences within countries in the availability of research facilities and other re-
sources, in research culture, and in governmental policies all influence the choices
that academic researchers make regarding their involvement in international research
activities (Hanson & Meyerson, 1995). In some settings, government policy or uni-
versity administrations support specialised research institutes or centres that focus
on internationally directed research. In the last decade, such research institutes have
often been established to pursue broad multidisciplinary studies, for example in such
areas as strategic policy studies, environmental research, or bioengineering.
Governments in several countries have policies that expect academics to partici-
pate in international conferences and publish in international journals. Australia, for
example, being distant from other centres of learning, strongly values international
involvement among its academics (Sheehan & Welch, 1996: 85). In smaller coun-
tries such as Israel and Denmark, scholarly publication in international journals is
often given more weight than journals published within the home country. In Swe-
den, it is necessary to publish in a journal or book in another country as a condition
of promotion (Blomqvist, JaIling, & Lundeqvist, 1996: 552).
Japan has had a long-term policy of developing a stronger international research
presence among its academics. The Carnegie survey indicated that about half of
Japanese academics had published abroad, and one-third had worked with academ-
ics from another country (Arimoto, 1996: 177). As in other countries, Japanese aca-
demics in the research universities were much more likely than other academics to
be active internationally.
The availability of resources to support foreign study is a major factor influenc-
ing international research, one where government policy plays a significant role.
Some countries support international travel to conduct research or to present re-
search results at academic conferences, even if limited to a certain number per year
(Sheehan & Welch, 1996). In other countries, funding for travel is available on a
competitive basis. The Fulbright programme, which supports hundreds of fellow-
ships each year for research and teaching in other countries, is a competitive, peer-
judged process to make awards. Private foundations sometimes offer fellowship
programmes (Institute ofInternational Education, 1993), often with a specific coun-
try or regional focus.
246 ELAINE EL-KHA W AS

Financial difficulties help explain certain country-by-country patterns of interna-

tional involvement. Developing countries often cannot provide any support for for-
eign study (Shive, Gopinathan, & Cummings, 1988). In Russia, in Eastern and
Central Europe, in Latin America and other settings, severe financial constraints,
sometimes combined with problems of currency conversion, preclude the participa-
tion of many academics in international research activity.

1.5. Discussion
This review of the international dimension in academic work has identified several
factors that may be worthy of further study. Differences by academic field and dis-
cipline, for example, deserve further exploration. In certain academic fields, but not
in others, the disciplinary research culture exerts a strong push toward international
work (Becher, 1989). In the Carnegie survey, for example, US academics in the
physical sciences, biological sciences, mathematics and engineering were the most
likely to publish in foreign journals or spend time collaborating on a research project
with academics from other countries (Haas, 1996). Whether due to the necessities of
conducting research on health and disease in several country settings, or of studying
earthquakes and other natural disasters wherever they occur, academics in the sci-
ences, medicine and engineering are more likely than other academics to be engaged
in research that extends across national boundaries.
Further research is needed to better understand the dynamics of how discipline-
based incentives for international work actually affect the career decisions that aca-
demics make. Similarly, research is needed that might identify both facilitating and
hindering factors that are at play among the disciplines that are less supportive of
international research. Some systematic barriers may operate at both the individual
and the discipline level. It is also possible that many disciplines are simply "neu-
tral", neither encouraging nor discouraging international research.
Differences among countries suggest other factors, including the effect that sup-
portive government policies can have on international research. Quite likely, too,
long-term support programmes are more effective than special, limited-period pro-
grammes if academics are to arrange international research in ways that can be bal-
anced with their instructional and other obligations. Other country-level factors that
need to be better understood include the effect of national attitudes, cultural tradi-
tions, and economic conditions.
The financial constraints facing academics who wish to undertake international
work are often noted, but further issues should be explored. On the individual level,
more work is needed to identify the issues that arise for academics with families, for
example where one's partner has a separate career. To be explored, too, is the extent
to which the terms of exchange programmes are responsive to such family issues.
There are also questions with respect to the way that different stages of the aca-
demic career may influence an academic's ability to undertake international re-
search. Early in one's career, the opportunities for international research may be
few; late in the career, administrative or other university-based commitments may
preclude the pursuit of any substantial international research. Potentially, pro-
 DEVELOPING AN ACADEMIC CAREER 247

grammes offering research support could make adjustments in their programmes to

accommodate such career-stage patterns.
At the policy level, other questions can be raised about the role of financial con-
straints. Is there a problem with the distribution of resources, in which countries
make resources available only to certain disciplines, or mainly to elite institutions?
Do these countries offer proportionately fewer resources to support international
activity, compared to other countries, thus forcing academics to compete for limited
funds?
Other factors should be considered. To what extent is the level of international
activity constrained by problems of international communication, which persist in
many countries? Aside from communication factors, what are the cultural difficul-
ties in establishing colleague networks across barriers of language and national tra-
dition? Still other questions might focus on the "research cadre" of academics, and
seek to understand, within each discipline, how international work is valued among
the most prestigious members of each discipline. Worth exploring, too, is the possi-
bility that the research culture in larger countries encourages insularity, giving first
priority to the contributions of one's country colleagues and, indirectly, placing less
value on contributions from other countries.
Future conditions are likely to accelerate the need for an international dimension
in academic work. The expansion of the European Union will bring more countries
into its orbit, increasing the number of students and the number of venues that may
participate in the EU mobility programmes. The trend of research toward Mode II
forms of academic work - interdisciplinary and problem-led (Gibbons et aI., 1994)-
may also push academic research toward multi-country or comparative studies.
These and other trends, from the rule making of the World Trade Organisation to the
strengthened regional forums that are pressing for economic co-operation, can be
expected to add urgency to having an international dimension in academic work.

2. LAUNCHING AN ACADEMIC CAREER

Our attention now turns to questions related to how academic careers of the future
might be shaped. What opportunities and constraints will new academics face in
trying to carry out international research? As the world becomes more aware of sig-
nificant globalising forces, will it become easier, or perhaps expected, that academ-
ics should strive toward the ideal of academic pursuits that know no borders?
If an international dimension will become more important, a new question must
be raised: what will globalisation mean for the normal contours of an academic ca-
reer path? An initial answer, discussed in the following pages, is that increasing
global awareness and linkages will offer new opportunities for academic careers,
perhaps imparting a much more pervasive international sensibility to universities
and academic work (Muller, 1995; Blight, Davis & Olsen, 2000: 107-08). But new
difficulties will also undoubtedly emerge, as globalisation shapes academic life in
ways that as yet are unclear.
The general patterns of career entry for academic staff are well established
within each country. Several studies have detailed the rules that govern academic
248 ELAINE EL- KHA W AS

entry (e.g., Clark, 1987b; Moses, 1993; Kogan, Moses, & El-Khawas, 1994), includ-
ing a recent analysis by Enders and colleagues (2001) of the conditions of service
for both junior and senior academics in fourteen European countries. Other studies
have analysed the cultural and sociological aspects of the process of "learning the
ropes" about academic life (e.g., Clark, 1987a; Becher, 1989; Trowler, 1998; Hen-
kel,2000).
New opportunities afforded by globalisation could be significant for new aca-
demics, who generally are not yet settled into a specific university environment, a
set of research projects, and comfortable networks of colleagues. Some gains may
include better access to information, especially to academic journals and other pub-
lications with international coverage, and a chance to have professional dialogues
with other academics in one's discipline or specialisation, unconstrained by geo-
graphic space or language capacities. With recent advances in electronic communi-
cation technology, such opportunities are already technically possible. In the future,
as infrastructure is improved in various countries and across a wide range of aca-
demic institutions, a much larger number of academics will be able to benefit. The
forces of globalisation will also make it easier for academics to travel to new loca-
tions for research, to work with foreign colleagues in more extensive ways, and to
assemble research teams that have a wider range of relevant experience and exper-
tise (Muller, 1995; Blight, Davis & Olsen, 2000).
The greatest payoff may be found with new academics who work in countries
that have constrained financial resources (cf. Shive, Gopinathan, & Cummings,
1988). Especially in developing countries, the costs of travel are likely to continue to
be exorbitant, but opportunities for international research and communication could
become available through access on the Internet or in virtual uni versities, as such
technologies become more widely available (World Bank, 2000).
Despite the excitement of new possibilities, it must be recognised that new aca-
demics already face constraints in launching their careers, wholly apart from issues
of developing international work. New academics typically have heavy responsibili-
ties for teaching and, being inexperienced, may not have learned effective tech-
niques for balancing the separate demands of teaching and research. Getting
established and well known in their academic field is a slow process. New academ-
ics often take on punishing workloads in order to get several publications out or to
make presentations at several conferences over a short period of time. Many new
academics' terms of appointment are restricted, perhaps to a one- or two-year con-
tract; others work under terms of probation, with some prospect that they will not
receive long-term positions.
These constraints may have become more problematic in the context of new
pressures on universities (e.g., Fulton, 1996b; Fulton, 2001). Universities in many
countries face severe financial pressures, due in part to economic dislocations and
industry adjustments brought on by globalisation. Many analysts believe that these
financial pressures on universities will continue, and that universities must recognise
that there arc "limits to the resources available" for support of research (Adams,
2000: 171; Scott, 2000). Government ministries and funding councils can be ex-
pected to pressure universities to adopt more "high-yield" approaches to research,
 DEVELOPING AN ACADEMIC CAREER 249

perhaps to develop collaborative mechanisms or to propose new forms of research,

such as research that is multi-disciplinary (Adams, 2000: 171; Horgan, 1997).
Several consequences of restricted university finances have already affected aca-
demic careers (Maassen & Van Vught, 1996; Maassen, 1996). Universities have
been parsimonious in allowing new academic appointments to be made. In some
countries, the ranks of part-time and temporary positions have increased. In other
countries, universities have given a greater responsibility for undergraduate instruc-
tion to doctoral students and research assistants. Most universities have reorganised
internally, often by strengthening the managerial responsibilities of department
chairpersons or deans (Gumport & Pusser, 1997; Sporn, 1999; Bauer, Askling, Mar-
ton & Marton, 1999). Demands for greater accountability have led to more pressure
on academics to publish an.d, as in England, to have one's research published within
certain time periods. Similarly, teaching effectiveness is under new scrutiny by gov-
ernment agencies and university administrators, following years of relative inatten-
tion (Fulton, 1996b; Fulton, 2001; van Vught, 1995; Westerheijden, 1996).
Such changing dynamics pose dilemmas for new academics. Does working
closely with a senior professor still make sense in settings where the chair system is
evolving and department structures are becoming more prominent? What research
directions are the most promising, in light of shifting priorities among funding coun-
cils? With long-term trends toward Mode II research, will interdisciplinary and
problem-directed research gain greater legitimacy in one's own discipline? Yet how
much effort should be devoted to research compared to teaching, at a time when
many governments are pressing for evidence of teaching effectiveness?
New academics may realise that they are fortunate to have an academic ap-
pointment, but most can also be expected to feel daunted by the problems they face
(Teichler, 1996: 19-21). Some recent research in the US on the cross-pressures fac-
ing new academics demonstrates that long-existing problems continue, including
ambiguous expectations, poorly understood evaluation and promotion processes, and
the demands of preparing and teaching new courses with limited prior preparation
(Trower, Austin, & Sorcinelli, 2001).
New entrants to an academic department are on probation and must find a way to
perform according to expectations, not only those that have been given to them ex-
plicitly but also those that are embedded in the "tacit" culture of their department
and school (Becher, 1989). In some settings, international research may not be well
understood, and may be judged to be frivolous, perhaps seen as simply a way to
"have a good time" in another country (Haas, 1996). Some academic departments
develop a strong, locally oriented research culture, where most members direct their
attention toward a series of related experiments underway at their university, toward
collaborative theoretical work, or toward the effort of several colleagues to work out
a new research methodology. These settings have a local rather than cosmopolitan
orientation, to use Gouldner's terms, where the research in the local setting simply
receives a higher priority. Conversely, any research done outside the local setting is
ascribed lower value, whether the outside location is 50 miles or 5000 miles away.
In such circumstances, new academics are likely to decide that their environment is
not right for pursuing international work. Their primary objective is to fit into their
new environment, not to strike out on their own (Becher, 1989; Enders, 2001).
250 ELAINE EL- KHA WAS

Conflicting role pressures may be another factor. New academics need to be con-
scientious about their "local" responsibilities, including their teaching but also ad-
vising students and contributing to administrative tasks and committee assignments
at their home university. To be away from their universities engaged in international
work may leave them vulnerable to being perceived as not taking a "fair" share of
institutional obligations.
Some of these issues vary in their significance from country to country. The size
of a country, or the number of academics working within one's discipline, may play
a role. Another factor may be the degree to which there is academic mobility in a
country (Teichler, 1996). Where little exists, it may be particularly difficult to ne-
glect one's "local" responsibilities in order to pursue international work.
Other difficulties in developing an international research agenda may stem from
a lack of access to resources. New academics often point to a lack of funds for
travel. Others note that they are not knowledgeable about salient issues in other
countries or do not know how to identify a university suitable for a visit. Part of the
problem may be that they have not yet developed relationships with colleagues in
other countries who might suggest interesting research projects for collaborative
work. Issues of resources and building a sufficient knowledge base can often only be
resolved over time as new academics become involved in collaboration with foreign
colleagues.
This review seems to suggest that the constraints on new academics are strong,
and that, on balance, they are likely to cause them to put aside any hopes of doing
international work. In recent years, the difficulties may well have increased in view
of the generally worsened conditions of employment that all academics are facing.
However, another perspective emerges from an informal survey conducted for
this analysis. Ten new academics in one specialised field, higher education, were
asked about their own prospects for building an international dimension into their
work. These new academics, from diverse settings in the US and Europe, all have
had some exposure to international issues, either in their preparation or in their cur-
rent work. Most of these new academics readily pointed to specific problems - lack
of funds for travel, inadequate substantive preparation during doctoral studies, etc.
However, most also described some international dimension to their current work,
often in research projects or in attendance at international conferences. and some-
times in the materials they were using in their teaching.
Especially striking were their positive attitudes. For this group of new academ-
ics, it was a desirable, almost automatic expectation that academics should conduct
comparative research, have colleagues from several countries and attend interna-
tional conferences. Obstacles existed, certainly, but they were not judged to be so
substantial as to require abandoning the overall objective. These new academics
were determined, and confident that they could develop an academic career with an
international dimension. Although the informal survey is certainly not representa-
tive, as it includes new academics who have already had some success in having an
international dimension to their work, the survey results do remind us that determi-
nation and confidence are additional factors in pursuing this or other objectives. It
may be that, despite the real obstacles, many new academics have a strong and posi-
tive sense of the possibilities for international research. Their personal conviction
 DEVELOPING AN ACADEMIC CAREER 251

offers an important counterweight to analytic research findings that make any new
effort seem impossible.

3. TOWARD A RESEARCH AGENDA

This review has established several baseline realities regarding the international di-
mension in academic careers. Clearly, a strong academic ideal and a considerable
degree of rhetoric emphasises the value, if not the necessity, of international per-
spectives in academic research. It is clear, too, that a good amount of international
work is already being conducted by present-day academics. For new academics,
there are numerous pressures constraining them, but also some prospects that they
will work toward developing a stronger international dimension. To ensure long-
term progress towards greater internationalisation, there should be substantial
changes in the ways that future scholars are trained and in the support they receive
when launching their careers in academic settings. Changes in academic culture are
also needed.
Research studies cannot accomplish such change, but they can help focus on
what is needed. The following comments identify some lessons that might be drawn
from current experience and, looking ahead, some new directions of research that
are needed to build the case for substantial change. For the purposes of this discus-
sion differences among countries, although important, are not taken into account. It
is suggested that there are three critical phases for intervention as careers get
launched: the preparatory years, the first academic position, and the period of estab-
lishing a reputation.
Support for new academics should start during their preparatory years, that is
during doctoral study. It is probable that many students have an interest in the inter-
national dimensions of their academic pursuits, but only a few find an outlet for that
interest during their studies. Such students would welcome changes in substantive
aspects of their preparation to add more study of cross-national issues and, perhaps,
more opportunities for international travel and study. Questions can certainly be
raised as to why this is not done more readily. A research study might examine con-
ditions in academic settings or disciplines where a strong international emphasis
exists, compared with other settings with less emphasis on international matters.
Research is also needed to investigate several questions about the tacit cultural
signals that doctoral students encounter, that is, how far their doctoral environments
are open - or resistant - to international work. Experiences might be compared
across countries that have different approaches to doctoral study: are there socialisa-
tion processes underlying different approaches that are more open to cross-national
inquiry by doctoral students?
After completing doctoral studies, new academics enter an entirely new culture
when they accept their first academic position. Here, too, their position as neophyte
hardly gives them any power to shape their work in line with their preferences.
Those that are fortunate will find themselves in positions where projects and re-
sources support international activities. Others may find that any interest in interna-
tional activity is thwarted by unfavourable circumstances.
252 ELAINE EL-KHAW AS

Several research directions might shed new light on such settings. The core task
is shaping an identity that includes international work; we know that many academ-
ics are successful in doing so. How do they do it? We might compare aspects of in-
ternational work that differ in their demands, for example, the type of involvement
that calls for foreign travel compared with the lesser demands of engaging in inter-
national discourse without extensive travel. Do neophyte academics find it easier to
engage in one type and not the other?
Even after getting established in a first position, the new academic faces another
task, establishing a reputation in one's field. Networking and conference presenta-
tions now take on greater salience. Further examination would be desirable of the
strategies chosen by established scholars. Becher (1989: 55-7) was quite persuasive
in arguing that, as academics build their reputation, there is continuing attention to
comparison and ranking of professional activities. This may offer an interesting lead
for deeper investigation; academics who are successful with international work must
be able to position themselves and their work in ways to ensure that it "counts" to-
ward building their reputation.
This chapter concludes with the view that, while acknowledging the constraining
factors, it is more productive to focus on how to overcome constraints. Still, in the
spirit of objective inquiry - and remembering Ulrich Teichler's oft-stated plea that
all research should be guided by alternative hypotheses, all sides of the issue should
be examined. Thus another possibility should be acknowledged. Wholly apart from
efforts to motivate academics to adopt an international stance, it is quite possible
that in the future it will simply become a requirement, imposed by others, that aca-
demics undertake international work. University administrations and government
policy officials could call for changes, for example, to insist that the content of aca-
demic programmes be revised to give more attention to global perspectives or to
restrict funding to research with an international component. Within universities,
these calls have already become strong in certain fields of study. Schools of business
management, for example, have been vocal about the urgency of adopting a global
perspective in their curricular offerings (Schuster, 1994: 105).
Better understanding is needed of both the motivators and the constraints on in-
ternational work. However, just as useful is the hard work of getting on with it.

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 ANNEX

ULRICH TEICHLER - SELECTED MAJOR PUBLICATIONS 1

1. MONOGRAPHS
Maiwonn, Friedheim and Teichler, Ulrich together with Annette Reck (2002): Das Reform-Experiment
ifu - Potenziale, Risiken una Ertrage aus der Sicht der Beteiligten. Kassel: Centre for Research on
Higher Education and Work, University of Kassel (Werkstattberichte; 60).
Teichler, Ulrich; Gordon, Jean and Maiwonn, FriedheIm (2001). SOCRATES 2000 Evaluation Study.
Brussels: European Commission (http://europa.eu.int.lcommleducationlevaluationlsocrates_en.html).
Teicher, Kerstin and Teichler, Ulrich (2000). Der Ubergang von der Hochschule in die Berufstatigkeit in
Japan. Opladen: Leske und Budrich.
Teichler, Ulrich; Maiwonn FriedheIm and Schotte-Kmoch, Martina (1999). Das ERASMUS-Programm.
Bonn: Bundesministerium fur Bildung und Wissenschaft.
Hennessey, Mary Ann; Lampinen, Osmo; SchrOder, Thomas; Sebkova, Helena; Setenyi, Janos and
Teichler, Ulrich (1998). Tertiary Professional and Vocational Education in Central and Eastern
Europe. Strasbourg and Torino: Council of Europe and European Training Foundation.
Maiwonn, FriedheIm and Teichler, Ulrich (1997). European Research Experience 1987-1998. Luxem-
bourg: Office for Official Publications of the European Communities.
Teichler, Ulrich and Maiwonn, FriedheIm (1997). The ERASMUS Experience. Luxembourg: Office for
Official Publications of the European Communities.
Teichler, Ulrich (1997). Higher Education and Graduate Employment in Europe. Kassel: Centre for
Research on Higher Education and Work, University of Kassel (Werkstattberichte, 52).
Faulstich, Peter, Teichler, Ulrich and Doring, Ottmar (1996). Bestand und Entwicklungsrichtungen der
Weiterbildung in Schleswig-Holstein. Weinheim: Deutscher Studien Verlag.
Kehm, Barbara, Maiwonn, FriedheIm, Kreitz, Robert, Steube, Wolfgang and Teichler, Ulrich (1996).
Integrating Europe Through Cooperation Among Universities: The Experience of the TEMPUS Pro-
gramme. London: Jessica Kingsley.
Maiwonn, FriedheIm; Sosa, Winnetou and Teichler, Ulrich (1996). The Context of ERASMUS: A Survey
of Institutional Management and Infrastructure in Support of Mobility and Co-operation. Kassel:
Centre for Research on Higher Education and Work, University of Kassel (Werkstattberichte, 49;
ERASMUS Monographs, 22).
Maiwonn, FriedheIm and Teichler, Ulrich (1996). Study Abroad and Early Career. Experiences of For-
mer ERASMUS Students. London and Bristol, PA.: Jessica Kingsley.
Enders, Jiirgen and Teichler, Ulrich (1995). Der Hochschullehrerberuf im intemationalen Vergleich.
Ergebnisse einer Befragung aber die wissenschaftliche Profession. Bonn: Bundesministerium fur
Bildung, Wissenschaft, Forschung und Technologie.
Enders, Jiirgen and Teichler, Ulrich (1995). Berufsbild der Lehrenden und Forschenden an Hochschulen.
Ergebnisse einer Befragung des wissenschaftlichen Personals an westdeutschen Hochschulen. Bonn:
Bundesministerium fur Bildung, Wissenschaft, Forschung und Technologie.
Kehm, Barbara M. and Teichler, Ulrich (1994). Durchfiihrung von EG-Bildungsprogrammen in Deutsch-
land. Erfahrungen, Probleme, Empfehlungen zur Verbesserung. Bad Honnef: Bock (Bundesministe-
rium fur Bildung und Wissenschaft: Studien zu Bildung und Wissenschaft, 120).
Teichler, Ulrich and Maiwonn, Friedheim: Transition to Work (1994). The Experience of Former
ERASMUS Students. London: Jessica Kingsley Publishers.
Maiwonn, FriedheIm; Steube, Wolfgang and Teichler, Ulrich (1993). ERASMUS Student Mobility Pro-
grammes 1989/90 in the View of Their Coordinators. Select Findings of the ICP Coordinators' Re-
ports. Kassel: Centre for Research on Higher Education and Work, University of Kassel (Werk-
stattberichte, 41; ERASMUS Monographs, 16).

255
256 ANNEX

Maiwonn, Friedheim; Steube, Wolfgang and Teichler, Ulrich (1993) Experiences of ERASMUS Students
1990/91. Kassel: Centre for Research on Higher Education and Work, University of Kassel (Werk-
stattberichte, 42; ERASMUS Monographs, 17).
lablonska-Skinder, Hanna and Teichler, Ulrich, together with Matthias Lanzendorfer (1992). Handbook
of Higher Education Diplomas in Europe. Miinchen: Saur 1992.
Faulstich, Peter, Teichler, Ulrich, Bojanowski, Arnulf and Doring, Ottmar (1991). Bestand und Perspekti-
ven der Weiterbildung. Das Beispiel Hessen. Weinheim: Deutscher Studien Verlag.
Maiwonn, Friedheim, Steube, Wolfgang and Teichler, Ulrich (1991). Learning in Europe. The
ERASMUS Experience. London: Jessica Kingsley.
Opper, Susan, Teichler, Ulrich and Carlson, Jerrry (1990). The Impact of Study Abroad Programmes on
Students and Graduates. London: Jessica Kingsley.
Teichler, Ulrich; Becker, Peter; Maiwonn, Friedheim and Holtkamp, Rolf (1990). Experiences and Ca-
reers of Science and Engineering Fellows Supported by the European Community. Luxembourg: Of-
fice for Official Publications of European Communities (Research Evaluation, EUR 12932 EN).
Teichler, Ulrich (1990). Europaische Hochschulsysteme: Die Beharrlichkeit vielfaltiger Modelle. Frank-
furt a. M. and New York: Campus.
Teichler, Ulrich and Opper, Susan (1988). Ertrage des Auslandsstudiums for Studierende und Absolven-
ten. Bad Honnef: Bock (Bundesminister flir Bildung und Wissenschaft: Studien zu Bildung und Wis-
senschaft, 69).
Teichler, Ulrich, Smith, Alan and Steube, Wolfgang (1988). Auslandsstudienprogramme im Vergleich.
Eifahrungen, Problem, Eifolge. Bad Honnef: Bock (Bundesminister flir Bildung und Wissenschaft:
Studien zu Bildung und Wissenschaft, 68).
Teichler, Ulrich (l988).Convergence or Growing Variety: The Changing Organisation of Studies. Stras-
bourg: Council of Europe (short version in French).
Teichler, Ulrich (l988).Changing Patterns of the Higher Education System. The Experience of Three
Decades. London: Jessica Kingsley 1988 (2. ed. 1991).
Teichler, Ulrich et al. (1987 ). Hochschule - Studium - Berufsvorstellungen. Eine empirische Unter-
suchung zur Vielfalt der Hochschulen und deren Auswirkungen. Bonn (Bundesminister fiir Bildung
und Wissenschaft: Studien zu Bildung und Wissenschaft, 50).
Dalichow, Fritz and Teichler, Ulrich (1986). Higher Education in the European Community. Recognition
of Study Abroad in the European Community. Luxembourg: Office for Official Publications of the
European Communities (also in French).
Teichler, Ulrich (1986). Erziehung und Gesellschaft in Japan. Hagen: Fernuniversitat - Gesamthochschu-
Ie (Arbeit und Ausbildung in Japan, Kurseinheit 1); revised editions: 1988, 1989.
Teichler, Ulrich, Buttgereit, Michael and Holtkamp, Rolf (1984). Hochschulzertifikate in der betriebli-
chen Einstellungspraxis. Bad Honnef: Bock (Bundesminister fiir Bildung und Wissenschaft: Studien
zu Bildung und Wissenschaft, 6).
Teichler, Ulrich and Sanyal, Bikas C. (1982). Higher Education and the Labour Market in the Federal
Republic of Germany. Paris: Unesco Press; in Gennan: Teichler, Ulrich (1981). Der Arbeitsmarkt for
Hochschulabsolventen. Miinchen: Sauro
Cerych, Ladislav, Neusel, AyUi, Teichler, Ulrich and Winkler, Helmut (1981). Gesamthochschule - Er-
fahrungen, Hemmnisse, Zielwandel. Frankfurt a. M. and New York: Campus 1981 (short version in
English: (1991). Implementation of Higher Education Reforms. The German Gesamthochschule.
Paris: Institute of Education, European Cultural Foundation).
Hartung, Dirk, Nuthmann, Reinhard and Teichler, Ulrich (1981). Bildung und Beschdftigung. Miinchen:
Saur 1981.
Kluge, Norbert, Neusel, Ayla and Teichler, Ulrich (1981). Beispiele praxisorientierten Studiums. Bonn
Bundesminister flir Bildung und Wissenschaft (Werkstattberichte, 35).
Brinckmann, Hans, Hackforth, Susanne and Teichler, Ulrich (1980). Die neuen Beamtenhochschulen.
Bildungs-, verwaltungs- und arbeitsmarktpolitische Probleme einer verspdteten Reform. Frankfurt a.
M. and New York: Campus.
Teichler, Ulrich (1978). Admission to Higher Education in the United States. A German Critique. New
York: International Council for Educational Development; in Gennan (1978). Probleme der Hoch-
schulzulassung in den Vereinigten Staaten. Miinchen: Saur 1978.
 ANNEX 257

Teichler, Ulrich, Hartung, Dirk and Nuthmann, Reinhard (1976). Hochschulexpansion und Bedarf der
Gesellschaft. Stuttgart: Klett; in English (1980). Higher Education and the Needs of Society. Winds-
or: NFER Publishing Company.
Teichler, Ulrich (1976). Das Dilemma der modernen Bildungsgesellschaft. Japans Hochschulen unter
den Zwangen der Statuszuteilung. Stuttgart: Klett.
Teichler, Ulrich (1975). Geschichte und Struktur des japanischen Hochschulwesens. Stuttgart: Klett.
Teichler, Ulrich and Teichler-Urata, Yoko (1975). Der Arbeitsmarktfiir Akademiker in Japan. Giittingen:
Schwartz.
Spiegel, Yorick and Teichler, Ulrich (1974). Theologie und gesellschaftliche Praxis. Miinchen: Kaiser.
Teichler, Ulrich and Voss, Friedrich (1974). Bibliography on Japanese Education/Bibliographie zum
japanischen Erziehungswesen. Pullach bei Miinchen: Verlag Dokumentation.
Teichler, Ulrich (1971). 1970 nen no jiten ni okeru nishidoitsu kOtb kybiku seido kaikaku no bkyb. (The
Higher Education Reform Sett;ng in Germany in 1970). Tokyo: Kyoiku Kenkyu Shinkokai (Kyoiku
kenkyfi shinkokai kiyo, 3).

2. EDITED VOLUMES
Teichler, Ulrich and Trommsdorf, Gisela (eds.) (2002). Challenges of the 21" Century in Japan and Ger-
many. Lengerich et al.: Pabst Science.
Schomburg, Harald; Teichler, Ulrich, Doerry, Martin and Mohr, Joachim (eds.) (2001). Erfolgreich von
der Uni in den Job. Regensburg: Fit for Business.
Teichler, Ulrich and Gordon, Jean (eds.) (2001). Mobility and Cooperation in Education - Recent Experi-
ences in Europe (special issue). European Journal of Education, 36(4).
Schwarz, Stefanie and Teichler, Ulrich (eds.) (2000). The Institutional Basis of Higher Education Re-
search. Experiences and Perspectives. Dortrecht, Boston and London: Kluwer.
Teichler, Ulrich and Sadlak, Jan (eds.) (2000). Higher Education Research: Its Relationship to Policy and
Practice. Oxford, Pergamon/IAU Press.
Schwarz, Stefanie and Teichler, Ulrich (eds.) (1999). Changes in Higher Education and Its Societal Con-
text as a Challenge for Future Research (Special Issues I and II). Higher Education, 38(1).
Daniel, Hans-Dieter, Schwarz, Stefanie and Teichler, Ulrich (eds.) (1999). Student Costs and Financing
(special issue). European Journal of Education, 34(1).
Barbian, Andris; Kehm, Barbara M., Reichert, Sybille and Teichler, Ulrich (eds.) (1998). Emerging
European Policy Profiles of Higher Education Institutions. Kassel: Centre for Research on Higher
Education and Work, University of Kassel (Werkstattberichte, 55).
Takanashi, Akira and Teichler, Ulrich (eds.) (1998). BerufLiche Kompetenzentwicklung im Bildungs- und
Beschaftigungssystem in Japan und Deutschland. Baden-Baden: Nomos.
Teichler, Ulrich; Daniel, Hans-Dieter and Enders, Jiirgen (eds.) (1998). Brennpunkt Hochschule. Neuere
Analysen zu Hochschule, Berufund Gesellschaft. Frankfurt a. M. and New York: Campus.
Kaneko, Motohisa and Teichler, Ulrich (eds.) (1997). Special Issue on Japanese Higher Education.
Higher Education, 34(2).
Blumenthal, Peggy; Goodwin, Craufurd; Smith, Alan and Teichler, Ulrich (eds.) (1996). Academic Mo-
bility in a Changing World. Regional and Global Trends. London and Bristol, PA: Jessica Kingsley
Publishers.
Teichler, Ulrich (ed.) (1996). Special Issue on the State of Comparative Research in Higher Education.
lligher Education, 32(4).
Enders, Jiirgen and Teichler, Ulrich (eds.) (1995). Der Hochschullehrerberuf Aktuelle Studiol und ihre
hochschulpolitische Diskussion. Neuwied, Kriftel and Berlin: Luchterhand.
Brennan, John, Kogan, Maurice and Teichler, Ulrich (cds.) (1995). Higher Education and Work. London:
Jessica Kingsley.
Kehm, Barbara M. and Teichler, Ulrich (eds.) (1995). Higher Education and Employment. European
Journal o{Education (special issue), 30( I).
258 ANNEX

Kehm, Barbara M. and Teichler, Ulrich (eds.) (1995). Higher Education and Employment. European
Journal of Education (special issue) 30(2).
Smith, Alan, Teichler, Ulrich and Wende, Marijk van der (eds.) (1994). The International Dimension of
Education: Setting the Research Agenda. Wien: Internationales Forschungszentrum Kulturwissen-
schaften.
Neusel, Ayla, Teichler, Ulrich and Winkler, Helmut (eds.) (1993). Hochschule - Staat - Politik. Christoph
Oehler zum 65. Geburtstag. Frankfurt and New York: Campus.
Buttgereit, Michael and Teichler, Ulrich (eds.) (1992). Hochschulabsolventen im Beruf Bad Honnef:
Bock (Bundesminister fiir Bildung und Wissenschaft: Studien zu Bildung und Wissenschaft, 102).
Teichler, Ulrich and Wasser, Henry (eds.) (1992). German and American Universities. Mutual Influences
- Past and Present. Kassel: Centre for Research on Higher Education ad Work, University of Kassel
(Werkstattberichte, 36)
Teichler, Ulrich and Winkler, Helmut (eds.) (1990). Der Berufsstart von Hochschulabsolventen. Bad
Honnef: Bock (Bundesminister fiir Bildung und Wissenschaft: Studien zu Bildung und Wissenschaft,
87).
Teichler, Ulrich (ed.) (1990). Das Hochschulwesen in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland. Weinheim: Deut-
scher Studien Verlag.
Gorzka, Gabriele, Heipcke, Klaus and Teichler, Ulrich (eds.) (1988). Hochschule - Beruf - Gesellschaft.
Ergebnisse der Forschung zum Funktionswandel der Hochschulen. Frankfurt a. M. and New York:
Campus.
Neusel, Aylii and Teichler, Ulrich (eds.) (1986). Hochschulentwicklung seir den sechziger Jahren. Wein-
heim and Basel: Beltz.
Baethge, Martin, Hartung, Dirk, Husemann, Rudolf and Teichler, Ulrich (eds.) (1986). Studium und
Beruf Freiburg i.Br.: Dreisam.
Avakov, Ratja; Buttgereit, Michael; Sanyal, Bikas and Teichler, Ulrich (eds.) (1984). Higher Education
and Employment in the USSR and in the Federal Republic of Germany. Paris: Unesco, International
Institute for Education Planning.
Goldschmidt, Dietrich, Teichler, Ulrich and Webler, Wolff-Dietrich (eds.) (1984). Forschungsgegensland
Hochschule. Frankfurt a. M. and New York: Campus.
Kluczynski, Jan, Neusel, Aylii and Teichler, Ulrich (eds.) (1984). Forschung zu Hochschule und Beruf in
Polen in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland. Kassel: Stauda (slightly modified version published in
Polish).
Hermanns, Harry, Teichler, Ulrich and Wasser, Henry (eds.) (1983). The Compleat University. Break
from Tradition in Germany, Sweden and the U.S.A. Cambridge/Mass.: Schenkman; (in German
(1982). Integrierte Hochschulmodelle. Eifahrungen aus drei Liindern. Frankfurt a. M. and New
York: Campus.
Holtkamp, Rolf and Teichler, Ulrich (eds.) (1983). BerufHiitigkeit von Hochschulabsolventen. Frankfurt
a. M. and New York: Campus 1983.
Kluczynski, Jan, Teichler, Ulrich and Tkocz, Christian (eds.) (1983). Hochschule und Berufin Polen und
in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland. Kassel: Stauda (slightly modified version in Polish).
Kluge, Norbert; Neusel, Aylii, Oehler, Christoph and Teichler, Ulrich (eds.) (1981). Gesamthochschule
Kassel 1971-1981. Riickblick auf das erste Jahrzehnt. Kassel: Stauda.
Freidank, Gabriele; Neusel, Aylii and Teichler, Ulrich (eds.) (1980). Praxisorientierung als institutionel-
les Problem der Hochschule. Frankfurt a. M. and New York: Campus.
Teichler, Urich (ed.) (1979). Hochschule und Beruf Problemlage und Aufgaben der Forschung. Frankfurt
a. M. and New York: Campus.
Teichler, Ulrich and Winkler, Helmut (eds.) (1979). Praxisorientierung des Studiums. Frankfurt a. M. and
New York: Campus.
Teichler, Ulrich (ed.) (1970). Faktoren und Zielvorstellungen der Hochschulreform in der Bundesrepu-
blik Deutschland. Hamburg: Unesco-Institut flir Piidagogik.
 ANNEX 259

3. ARTICLES AND CHAPTERS IN BOOKS AND JOURNALS

Maiwonn, FriedheIm and Teichler, Ulrich (2002) "Die Internationale Frauenuniversitiit aus der Sicht der
TeiInehrnerinnen" and " Die Internationale Frauenuniversitiit aus der Sicht der Dozentinnen". In
Metz-Gockel, Sigrid (ed.) Lehren uad Lernen an der Internationalen Frauenuniversitiit. Ergebnisse
der wissenschaftlichen Begleituntersuchung. Leverkusen: Leske und Budrich, 45-88 and 89-110.
Teichler, Ulrich (2002) "A1gunas reflexiones sobre educaci6n superior y empleo". In Carnilloni, Alicia
W. de (ed.) Estudios para la reforma curricular en La Universidad de Buenos Aires. Volumen 2.
Buenos Aires: Editorial Universitaria de Buenos Aires, 21-27.
Teichler, Ulrich (2002) ,,Hochschulbildung". In Tippelt, Rudolf (ed.) Haadbuch Bildungsforschung.
Opladen: Leske und Budrich, 349-370.
Teichler, Ulrich (2002) "Intemationalisierung der Hochschulen". Das Hochschulwesen, 50(1), 3-9.
Teichler, Ulrich (2002) ,,Potentiale und Ertrage von Absolventenstudien". Sozialwissenschajten und
Berufspraxis, 25(1-2), 9-32.
Teichler, Ulrich (2002) "University Refonn and Governance in Gennany". In Arimoto, Akira (ed.) Uni-
versity Reform and Academic Governance Reconsidered. Hiroshima: Hiroshima University, Research
Institute for Higher Education, 17-29.
A1tbach, Philip G. and Teichler, Ulrich (2001). "Internatonalisation and Exchanges in a Globalized Uni-
versity".lournal of Studies in International Education, 5(1), 5-25.
Teichler, Ulrich and Jahr, Volker (2001). "Mobility During the Course of Study and After Gradua-
tion".European Journal of Education, 36(4),443-458.
Teichler, Ulrich and Schwarz, Stefanie (2001). "Gestufte Studiengiinge". In Hanft, Anke (ed.) Gruadbe-
griffe des Hochschulmanagements. Neuwied and Krifte!: Luchterhand, 141-145.
Teichler, Ulrich (2001). ,,AIle wollen die Gesarnthochschulidee, niemand will die Gesamthochschule".
Das Hochschulwesen, 49(4), 102-107
Teichler, Ulrich (2001). "Bachelor-Level Programmes and Degrees in Europe: Problems and Opportuni-
ties".Yliopistotieto, 29(1), 8-15.
Teichler, Ulrich (2001). ,,Bachelor-Studiengiinge und -abschliisse in Europa. Chancen und Probleme"
Forschung und Lehre, 8(9), 477-479.
Teichler, Ulrich (2001). "Changes of ERASMUS Under the Umbrella of SOCRATES". Journal of Stud-
ies in International Education, 5(3), 201-227.
Teichler, Ulrich (2001). ,,Die Entwicklung der externen Anforderungen an das tertiiire Bildungssystem".
In Latzel, Giinther and Kanaan, Sarni (eds.) Die Zukunft des Hochschulstaadorts Schweiz. Ziirich:
Gesellschaft fiir Hochschule und Forschung, 27-34.
Teichler, Ulrich (2001). ,,Erfahrungen der Studierenden mit dem Auslandsstudium - das Beispiel
ERASMUS". Recht der Jugend uad des Bildungswesens, 49(2), 199-207.
Teichler, Ulrich (2001). "Institutional and Societal Implications of the Virtual University". In Molen,
Henk J. van der (ed.) Virtual University? Educational Environments of the Future. London: Portland
Press, 113-116.
Teichler, Ulrich (2001). "Internationalisierung a1s Aufgabe und Problem der Hochschulen". In Welbers,
Ulrich (ed.). Studienreform mit Bachelor uad Master. Neuwied and Kriftel: Luchterhand, 60-80.
Teichler, Ulrich (2001). "Lehren und Lemen an der internationalen Frauenuniversitiit: Die Eindriicke def
Teilnehmerinnen und Dozentinnen". Bildung und Wissenschaft, (2)2001, 19-20.
Teichler, Ulrich (2001). ,,Mass Higher Education and the Need for New Perspectives". Tertiary Educa-
lion and Management, 7(1), 3-7.
Teichler, Ulrich (2001). ,,zur Einfiihrung von Credits an deutschen Hochschulen: Zwischen Vielfalt und
Einheitlichkeit". In Wuttig, Siegbert and Scholle-Pollmann (comp.) Success Stories IV. Das Euro-
peall Credit Trallsfer System (ECTS) ill Deutschland. Bonn: German Academic Exchange Service,
41-48.
Teichler, Ulrich and Teichler-Urata, Yoko (2000). "Deutschland als Studienort fiir Japaner. Grenzen und
Chancen". In Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst (ed.) Mubilitiitsstudien. Zur Attraktivitiit des
Studienstandorts Deutschland in Asien. Bielefeld: Bertelsmann, 5-106.
260 ANNEX

Teichler, Ulrich (1999). "The Contribution of Education and Training to the Employability of Youth:
Changing Concerns, Debates and Measures". In OECD (ed.) Preparing Youth for the 21st Century.
The Transitionfrom Education to the Labour Market. Paris, 215-261.
Teichler, Ulrich (1999). "Gestufte Studiengiinge und -abschliisse in den Geistes- und Sozialwissenschaf-
ten". In Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst and Hochschulrektorenkonferenz (eds.) Bachelor
und Master in den Geistes-, Sprach- und Kulturwissenschaften. Bonn: Deutscher Akademischer Aus-
tauschdienst 1999 (Dokumentationen und Materialien, Band 33), 37-141.
Teichler, Ulrich (1999). "Higher Education Policy and the World of Work: Changing Conditions and
Challenges". Higher Education Policy, 12,285-312.
Teichler, Ulrich (1999). "Internationalisation as a Challenge to Higher Education in Europe". Tertiary
Education and Management, 5(1), 5-23.
Teichler, Ulrich (1999). "The University and Lifelong Learning". In Tuijnman, Albert and Schuller, Tom.
(eds.) Lifelong Learning Policy and Research. London: Portland Press, 173-187.
Teichler, Ulrich (1998). "The Changing Roles of the University and Non-University Sectors". European
Review, 6(4), 475-487.
Teichler, Ulrich (1998). "Higher Education and Changing Job Requirements: A Comparative View". In
Henkel, Mary and Little, Brenda (eds.) Changing Relationships between Higher Education and the
State. London and Bristol, PA: Jessica Kingsley, 69-89.
Teichler, Ulrich (1998). "Massification: A Challenge for Institutions of Higher Education". Tertiary Edu-
cation and Management, 4(\),17-27.
Teichler, Ulrich (1998). '''Rohmaterial' oder 'Halbfertigprodukt' - Erwartungen an die Qualifikationen von
Hochschulabsolventen im japanisch-deutschen Vergleich". In Olbertz, Jan (ed.) Zwischen den Fii-
chern - uber den Dingen? Universalisierung versus Spezialisierung akademischer Bildung. Opladen:
Leske und Budrich, 167-186.
Enders, Jiirgen and Teichler, Ulrich (1997). "A Victim of Their Own Success? Employment and Working
Conditions of Academic Staff in Comparative Perspective". Higher Education, 34(3), 347-372.
Teicher, Kerstin and Teichler, Ulrich (1997). "Der Ubergang vom Bildungs- in das Beschiiftigungssystem
in Japan". Bildung und Erziehung, 50(4), 409-429.
Teichler, Ulrich (1997). "Hochschulforschung: Erfahrungen in Deutschland und ihre lmplikationen fiir
die Schweiz". In Herbst, Marcel; Latzel, Giinter and Lutz, Leonard (eds.) Wandel im tertiiiren BU-
dungssektor. Ziirich: vdf Hochschulverlag, \07-129.
Teichler, Ulrich (1997). "Recent Changes in the Transition from Higher Education to Employment in the
Federal Republic of Germany". Higher Education in Europe, 22(4), 457-474 (translated into French
and Russian).
Teichler, Ulrich (1997). "Strukturentwicklung des Hochschulwesens - Konzepte, internationale Erfahrun-
gen und Entwicklungen in Deutschland". Das Hochschulwesen, 45(3), 150-157.
Teichler, Ulrich (1996). "Beschiiftigungsprobleme von Hochschulabsolventen - Entwicklungstendenzen
in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland im internationalen Vergleich". In Hoffmann, Rainer-W. and Riib,
Stefan (eds.) Sozialwissenschaften - wo, wie und was dann? Neuried: Ars una, \02- 136.
Teichler, Ulrich (1996). "Diversity in Higher Education in Germany: The Two-Type-Structure". In Meek.
V. Lynn; Goedegebuure, Leo; Kivinen, Osmo and Rinne, Risto (eds.) The Mockers and Mocked:
Comparative Perspectives on Differentiation, Convergence and Diversity in Higher Education. Ox-
ford: Pergamon, 117-137.
Teichler, Ulrich (1996). "Higher Education and New Socio-Economic Challenges in Europe". In Burgen,
Arnold (ed.) Goals and Purposes of Higher Education in the 21st Century. London and Bristol, PA:
Jessica Kingsley, 96-111.
Teichler, Ulrich (1996). "Higher Education in Japan". In Burgen, Arnold (ed.) Goals and Purposes of
Higher Education in the 21st Century. London and Bristol, PA: Jessica Kingsley, 192-209.
Teichler, Ulrich (1996). "Student Mobility in the Framework of ERASMUFindings of an Evaluation
Study". European Journal of Education, 31 (2), 153-179.
Teichler, Ulrich (1996). "Student Mobility in the Framework of ERASMUFindings of an Evaluation
Study". European Journal of Education, 31 (2), 153-179.
Teichler, Ulrich (1996). "The Changing Nature of Higher Education in Western Europe". Higher Educa-
tion Policy. 9(2),89-111.
 ANNEX 261

Teichler, Ulrich (1996). "The Conditions of the Academic Profession. An International, Comparative
Analysis of the Academic Profession in Western Europe, Japan and the USA". In Maassen, Peter
A.M. and Vught, Frans A. van (eds.) Inside Academia. New Challenges for the Academic Profession.
Utrecht: De Tijdstrom, 15-65.
Kreitz, Robert and Teichler, Ulrich (1995). "Mobility of Adademic Staff for Teaching Purposes". In de
Groof, Jan (ed.) The Legal Status of Teachers in Europe. Mobility and Education. Leuven and Am-
ersfoort: Acco, 83-97.
Teichler, Ulrich (1995). "Hochschule und Beruf - Internationale Tendenzen und Beispiele". In Heidack,
Clemens (ed.) Arbeitsstrukturen im Umbruch. Munchen und Mering: Hampp, 179-196.
Teichler, Ulrich (1995). "QualifIkationsforschung". In Arnold, Rolf and Iipsmeier, Antonius (eds.)
Handbuch der Berufsbildung. Leverkusen: Leske und Budrich, 501-508.
Brennan, John; Lyon, Eva Stina; Schomburg, Harald and Teichler, Ulrich (1994). "The Experiences and
Views of Graduates. Messages from Recent Surveys". Higher Education Management, 6(3), 275-
304.
Enders, Jiirgen and Teichler, Ulrich (1994). "Doctoral Staff in German Higher Education: Selected Find-
ings from the German Survey on the Academic Profession". Higher Education Policy, 7(1), 31-36.
Maiworm, Friedheim and Teichler, Ulrich (1994). "Anerkennung der von ERASMUS-Studierenden im
Ausland erbrachten Studienleistungen an deutschen Hochschulen". Beitriige zur Hochschulfor-
schung, (4), 595-621.
Teicher, Kerstin and Teichler, Ulrich (1994). "Der Ubergang vom Bildungs- in das Beschaftigungssys-
tern: Erfahrungen in Deutschland - Vergleiche zu Japan". In Demes, Helmut and Georg, Walter (eds.)
Gelernte Karriere. Bildung und Berufsverlaufin Japan. MOOchen: Judicium, 35-64.
Teichler, Ulrich (1994). "Das japanische Hochschulwesen - Entwicklungstendenzen im internationalen
Vergleich". In Thofern, Detlef; Gabbani, Sonja and Vosse, Wilhelm (eds.) Rationalitiit im Diskurs.
Rudolf Wolfgang Muller zum 60. Geburtstag. Marburg: Diagonal-Verlag, 167-182.
Teichler, Ulrich (1994). "Hochschulforschung - Situation und Perspektiven". Das Hochschulwesen, 42,
169-177.
Teichler, Ulrich (1994). "Quantity and Quality of Staff in Higher Education". Higher Education Policy,
7(2), 19-23.
Teichler, Ulrich (1994). "Regionsuniversitaten - Situation und Perspektiven in den neunziger Jahren". In
Kellermann, Paul (ed.) Regionsuniversitiiten. Kiagenfurt. Kamtner Druck- und Verlagsgesellschaft,
27-49.
Teichler, Ulrich (1994). "Students and Employment - the Issues for University Management". Journal of
Higher Education Management, 6(2), 217-225.
Teichler, Ulrich (1994). "Study Abroad and Subsequent Employment: Experiences from the ERASMUS
Programme". Industry and Higher Education, 8(4), 223-234.
Teichler, Ulrich (1994). "Zur Akademikerbeschaftigung und zum Akademikerbedarf im internationalen
Vergleich". In Konegen-Grenier, Christiane and Schlaffke, Winfried (eds.) Akademikerbeschiiftigung
und Akademikerbedaif. KOln: Deutscher Institutsverlag, 21-37.
Teichler, Ulrich (1994). "Zur Rolle der Hochschulstrukturkommissionen der Lander im Transformati-
onsprozeB". In Mayntz, Renate (ed.) Aufbruch und Reform von oben. Ostdeutsche Universitiiten im
TransformationsprozeJ3. Frankfurt a.M. and New York: Campus, 227-257.
Schomburg, Harald and Teichler, Ulrich (1993). "Does the Programme Matter?" Higher Education in
Europe, 18(2),37-58.
Teichler, Ulrich (1993). "BenefIcios y peJigros de Ia evaluacion". In Vessouri, Hebe (ed.) Le Evaluaci6n
Academica. Enfoques y Experiencias. Volumen I. Paris: CRE - UNESCO, 28-46.
Teichler, Ulrich (1993). "Structures of Higher Education Systems in Europe". In Gellert, Claudius (ed.)
Higher Education in Europe. London and Philadelphia: Jessica Kingsley, 23-36.
Teichler, Ulrich (1993). "Zur Situation und zukunftigen Entwicklung der Fachhochschulen". Das
Hochschulwesen, 41(3), 269-278.
Kehm, Barbara and Teichler, Ulrich (1992). "Germany, Federal Republic of'. In Clark, Burton R. and
Neave, Guy (eds.) The Encyclopedia of Higher Education, Vol. I. Oxford: Pergamon, 240-260.
Teichler, Ulrich (1992). "Bildung und wirtschaftliche Entwicklung in Japan". In Georg, Walter and Sattel,
Ulrike (eds.) Von Japan lemen? Weinheim: Deutscher Studien Verlag, 17-41.
262 ANNEX

Teichler, Ulrich (1992). "Equality of Opportunity in Education and Career: Japan Seen in an International
Perspective" Oxford Review of Education, 18(3),283-296.
Teichler, Ulrich (1992). "Evaluation von Hochschulen auf der Basis von Absolventenstudien". In Kaiser,
Manfred and Gtirlitz, Herbert (eds.) Bildung und Berufim Umbruch. Niimberg: Institut fiirArbeits-
markt- und Berufsforschung der Bundesanstalt fiir Arbeit (Beitriige zur Arbeitsruarkt- und Berufsfor-
schung, No. 153.3),212-245.
Teichler, Ulrich (1992). "Occupational Structures and Higher Education". In Clark, Burton R. and Neave,
Guy (eds.) The Encyclopedia of Higher Education, Vol. 2. Oxford: Pergamon, 975-992.
Teichler, Ulrich (1992). "Wissenschaftliche Weiterbildung als Zukunftsaufgabe der Hochschulen". Das
Hochschulwesen, 40(4), 164-169.
Teichler, Ulrich and Steube, Wolfgang (1991). "The Logics of Study Abroad Progranunes and Their
Impacts". Higher Education, 21(3), 325-349.
Teichler, Ulrich (1991). "Evaluation of the EC Training Fellowship Progranune Based on a Fellows'
Questionnaire Survey". Scientometrics, 21(3), 343-365.
Teichler, Ulrich (1991). "The Federal Republic of Germany". In Neave, Guy and Vught, Frans van (eds.)
Prometheus Bound. The Changing Relationship between Government and Higher Education in West-
ern Europe. Oxford: Pergamon Press, 29-49.
Teichler, Ulrich (1991). "Towards a Highly Educated Society". Higher Education Policy, 4(4), 11-20.
Teichler, Ulrich (1991). "Western Europe". In Altbach, Philip G. (ed.) International Higher Education:
An Encyclopedia. Vol. 2. New York and London: Garland, 607-642.
Teichler, Ulrich and Schomburg, Harald (1991) "Wamm wird so lange studiert?" In Stifterverband fur die
Deutsche Wissenschaft (ed.) Studienzeitverkiirzung. Ein hochschulpolitisches Symposium. Essen:
Stifterverband, 14-61.
Teichler, Ulrich (1990). "Hochscbftlzugang fiir Berufserfahrene - Erfahrungen und Zukunftsperspekti-
ven". In Kluge, Norbert; Scholz, Wolf-Dieter and Wolter, Andrii (eds.) Yom Lehrling zum Akademi-
ker. Neue Wege des Hochschulzugangs fUr berufserjahrene Erwachsene. Oldenburg: Bibliotheks-
und Informationssystem der Universitiit Oldenburg, 23-48.
Teichler, Ulrich (1990). "The Challenge of Lifelong Learning for the University". CRE-action, 92, 53-68.
Opper, Susan and Teichler, Ulrich (1989). "European Community (EC): Educational Progranunes". In
Husen, Torsten and Postlethwaite, T. Neville (eds.) The International Encyclopaedia of Education.
Supplementary. Vol. I. Oxford: Pergamon, 342-347.
Teichler, Ulrich (1989). "Government and Curriculum Innovation in the Netherlands". In Vught, Frans A.
van (ed.) Governmental Strategies and Innovation in Higher Education. London: Jessica Kingsley
Publishers, 168-211 (also published in German).
Teichler, Ulrich (1989). "Hochschulen in Europa. Studiengiinge, Studiendauer, Ubergang in den Beruf'.
Aus Politik und Zeitgeschichte. Beilage zur Wochenzeitung Das Parlament, (B 50/89),25-39.
Teichler, Ulrich (1988). "Higher Education and Work in Europe". In Smart, John C. (ed.) Higher Educa-
tion: Handbook of Theory and Research. Vol. 4. New York: Agathon, 109-182 (also published in
German).
Teichler, Ulrich and Schomburg, Harald (1988). "Studienzeiten im Spannungsverhiiltnis von Hochschule
und Arbeitsmarkt". In Hochschul-Informations-System GmbH (ed.) Studienzeiten auf dem Pmfstand.
Hannover: HIS, 155-173.
Teichler, Ulrich (1987). "Arbeitsmarkt, Hochschulausbildung und Perspektiven der Studenten". In Habel,
Werner u.a. (ed.) Blockierte Zukunft. Reaktionen von Studierenden und Lehrenden. Weinheim: Deut-
scher Studien Verlag (Blickpunkt Hochschuldidaktik, Vol. 82), 11-27.
Teichler, Ulrich (1987). "Beziehungen von Bildungs- und Beschiiftigungssystem. Erfordern die Entwic-
klungen der achtziger Jahre neue Erkliirnngsansiitze?" In Weymann, Ansgar (ed.) Bildung und Be-
schiiftigung. Gottingen: Schwartz (Soziale Welt, special issue 5), 27-57.
Teichler, Ulrich (1987). "Die Beschiiftigungssituation von Hochschulabsolventen in den USA und Japan".
ZeitschriftfUr Hochschuldidaktik, 11(2-3), 183-210.
Teichler, Ulrich (1987). "Higher Education and New Challenges of the Occupation System". In Rohrs,
Hermann (ed.) Tradition and Reform of the University under an International Perspective. Frank-
furt a. M.: Peter Lang, 293-307. (also published in German).
 ANNEX 263

Teichler, Ulrich (1986). "Hochschulpolitik im intemationalen Vergleich". In Kellermann, Paul (ed.) Uni-
versitiit und Hochschulpolitik. Wien: Bohlau, 24-47.
Teichler, Ulrich (1985). "Prognosen iiber Bildung und Arbeit - eine Bilanz aus soziologischer Sicht". In
Lutz, Burkhart (ed.) Soziologie und gesellschaftliche Entwicklung. Verhandlungen des 22. Deutschen
Soziologentages in Dortmund 1984. Frankfurt a. M. and New York: Campus, 209-223.
Teichler, Ulrich (1985). "The Federal Republic of Germany". In Clark, Burton R. (ed.) The School and
the University. An International Perspective. Berkeley, Cal.: University ofCalifomia Press, 45-76.
Teichler, Ulrich (1985). "Zum Wandel von Bildung und Ausbildung in den 70er und 80er Jahren". Mittei-
lungen aus der Arbeitsmarkt- und Berufsforschung, 18(2), 167-176.
Baethge, Martin and Teichler, Ulrich (1984). "Bildungssystem und Beschiiftigungssystem". Baethge,
Martin and Nevermann, Knut (eds.) Organisation, Recht und Okonomie des Bildungswesens. Stutt-
gart: Klett-Cotta (Enzyklopiidie Erziehungswissenschaft, 5), 206-225.
Teichler, Ulrich (1984). "Hochschulzugang und Hochschulzulassung im intemationalen Vergleich". In
Kellermann, Paul (ed.) Studienaufnahme und Studienzulassung. Klagenfurt: Kiimtner Druck- und
Verlagsgesellschaft,9-24.
Teichler, Ulrich (1983). "Hochschule und Beschiiftigungssystem". In Huber, Ludwig (ed.) Ausbildung
und Sozialisation in der Hochschule. Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta (Enzyklopiidie Erziehungswissenschaft,
10),59-77.
Teichler, Ulrich (1982). "Die politische Verantwortung flir die Erwachsenenbildung". In Deutscher
Volkshochschulverband (ed.) Zukunftsaufgabe Weiterbildung. Die politische Verantwortung flir die
Erwachsenenbildung. Bonn: Deutscher Volkshochschulverband, 21-39.
Teichler, Ulrich (1982). "Japan - Die modeme Bildungsgesellschaft?" Zeitschrift flir Kulturaustausch,
32(2),137-144.
Buttgereit, Michael; Holtkamp, Rolf and Teichler, Ulrich (1981). "Zum Bedeutungswandel von Hoch-
schulzertifIkaten. Erliiutert am Beispiel der BundesrepubJik Deutschland und anderer Industrie-
staaten". Zeitschriftflir Sozialisationsforschung und Erziehungssoziologie, 1(2),221-240.
Teichler, Ulrich (1981). "Bildung und Erziehung". In Hamrnitzsch, Horst (ed.) Japan-Handbuch. Wies-
baden: Steiner, Sp. 1-26.
Teichler, Ulrich (1981). "Der Wandel der Beziehungen von Bildungs- und Beschaftigungssystem und die
Entwicklung der beruflich-sozialen Lebensperspektiven Jugendlicher". In Sornmerkom, Ingrid N.
(ed.) Beruf/ich-soziale Lebensperspektiven Jugendlicher. Miinchen: DJI Verlag Deutsches Jugendin-
stitut, 35-104.
Teichler, Ulrich (1980). "Higher Education for the 1980s: The Case of West Germany". In RIHE (ed.)
Higher Education for the 1980s - Challenges and Responses. Hiroshima: Research Institute for
Higher Education, Hiroshima University, 140-151 (also published in Japanese and German).
Teichler, Ulrich (1978). "Bildung und Statusdistribution". In Raschert, Jiirgen (ed.) Sozialisation, Qualifi-
kation und Statusverteilung. Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta (Jahrbuch flir Erziehungswissenschaft, 3),14-65.
Teichler, Ulrich (1979). "Hochschule und Beruf in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland: Fakten und For-
schung". Zeitschriftflir Hochschuldidaktik, 3(3-4), 363-384.
Teichler, Ulrich (1977). "Kogakureki shakai - The Modem Education Society from the Comparative
Point of View". Asian Profile, 5(5), 487-506.
Simonis, Udo E.; Teichler, Ulrich and Teichler-Urata, Yoko (1978) "Zehn Jahre Japan-Literatur. Eine
Auseinandersetzung mit 177 deutschsprachigen Buchveroffentlichungen". Internationales Asienfo-
rum, 9(3-4), 295-387.
Teichler, Ulrich (1976). "Studium und Berufin Japan". Neue Sammlung, 16(5),417-430.
Teichler, Ulrich (1976). "Problems of West German Universities on the Way to Mass Higher Education".
Western European Education, 8(1-2), 81-120.
Teichler, Ulrich (1974). "Das Verhiiltnis von Bildungspolitik und Wirtschaftspolitik in Japan". In Si-
monis, Heide and Simonis, Udo E. (eds.) Japan. Wirtschaftswachstum und soziale Wohlfahrt. Frank-
furt: Herder und Herder, 167-186.
Teichler, Ulrich (1974). "Struktur des Hochschulwesens und ,Bedarf an sozialer Ungleichheit. Zum
Wandel der Beziehungen zwischen Bildungssystem und Beschiiftigungssystem". Mitteilungen aus
der Arbeitsmarkt- und Beruj.~f{)rschung, 7(3), 197-209.
264 ANNEX

Teichler, Ulrich (1973). "Der japanische Bildungsrefonnplan". In Wittig, Horst. E. (ed.) Menschen-
bildung in Japan. Miinchen and Basel: Reinhardt, 169-187.
Teichler, Ulrich (1972). "Some Aspects of Higher Education in Japan". KBS Bulletin on Japanese Cul-
ture, (114), June-July, 1-16.
Teichler, Ulrich (1971). "Chancengleichheit im japanischen Bildungswesen?" Piidagogik und Schule in
Ost und West, 20(1), 11-20.
Teichler, Ulrich and Teichler, Yoko (1971). "Tendenzen der Hochschulrefonn in Japan". Konstanzer
Bliitterfiir Hochschulfragen, 9(2), 65-79 (also published in Japanese).

NOTES
This Annex contains a selection of the most significant examples out of more than 800 publications
by Ulrich Teichler.