This article reviews the Norwegian higher education debate from the publication of a radical reform proposal made by a government committee in May 2000 until the closure of the reform process in the parliament in May 2001. It is argued that a great rhetorical divide between neo-liberal and Humboldtian concepts of higher education characterized the debate, and that this to some extent distorted the coherence of the final solutions. Nevertheless, it is maintained that the reform is quite likely to instigate a period of profound changes in the national higher education system.
The French Government has had a paradoxical relationship with globalization. Globalization is perceived as both a threat to react against and a cradle for new policy ideas. French policymakers have a love-hate relationship with the European higher education reforms that started in the 1990s, a mixed sentiment that French singer Serge Gainsbourg spoke of in his popular song, ‘Je t’aime moi non plus’. At the outset, most of higher education reforms, such as the Bologna declaration, were framed as a way to build Europe and fight against international competition....
It is estimated that approximately 3 million students are enrolled as international students, and it is possible to project that this number may reach more than 7 million by 2025. As global demand exceeds the supply, competition is building for the best of these students. Some countries (or regions) clearly envisage the opportunity this represents and have been strongly stimulating student mobility. There is a race for “brains”, be it for professors at the end of their careers looking for new professional opportunities and/or the opportunity to return to their native countries, or for...
Higher education systems in Europe are currently undergoing profound transformations. At the macro-level, there is an increase in the number of students enrolled, subjects of study offered, and university missions that have gained legitimacy over time. At the second level changes are evident at the level of university governance. New Public Management reforms have put into question the traditional mode of governance that was based on the interplay of strong state regulation and academic self-governance. Under the current regime, new actors like accreditation and evaluation bodies or...
This paper focuses on China both as an object and a subject in the globalization of higher education and the sometimes paradoxical nature of the country’s policies in this respect. How is the Chinese perspective on globalization shaping its agenda for higher education, the development of world-class universities, and cooperation with Europe and the West? What is China’s role in the globalization of higher education, its global agency in higher education, and the impact of its diaspora, soft power, and its new Silk Routes policies? What is its capacity to become a global leader in...
The global competition and related international academic mobility in science and research is rising. Within this context, Europe faces quantitative skills shortages, including an estimate of between 800,000 and one million researchers. Within Europe skills imbalances and mismatches increase, with a growing divergence between countries and regions, in particular between the North and South, in terms of their ability to invest and attract human and financial capital for R&D. As a result intra-European mobility is not only on the rise, but may easily turn from an intended brain...
University learning objectives and the curriculum have evolved to include more knowledge, skills and aptitudes related to the increasingly international nature of a broad range of professions and occupations. More broadly, graduates are expected to know more about the world outside their home country in order to be informed and responsible citizens and to function personally and professionally in international contexts. There is, however, very little systematic assessment of international learning and programming A review of the literature indicates that studies of...
Strategic planning plays an important but sometimes controversial role in higher education. This paper examines how strategic planning works in Chinese universities, using Peking University as a case study. This essay discusses the rationale for why Peking University (PKU) decided to pursue status as a world-class university along with objectives and value of its various strategic plans beginning in the 1990s. These plans have had four main roles at Peking University: as a means to periodically alter the development path or "roadmap" of the university; as a method to gain or "...
Dramatic enrollment expansion at the undergraduate level and institutional diversification are characteristics frequently used to describe major trends in China's massive higher education system. A less understood phenomenon is the relatively new and rapid establishment of graduate level programs that have implications for national economic development. As described in this study, beginning in the early 1980s, the Chinese government launched the first of a number of reforms meant to encourage the development of graduate programs and to change the face of China's higher education...
