Higher Education Systems between Quality Assurance, Rankings, and Alienation to the Labour Market. What out-of-Ranking Higher Education Systems Can Teach Us? 1
Higher Education Systems between Quality Assurance, Rankings, and Alienation to the Labour Market. What out-of-Ranking Higher Education Systems Can Teach Us? 1
Thursday, 10 July 2025: 09:00-10:45
Location: SJES009 (Faculty of Legal, Economic, and Social Sciences (JES))
RC36 Alienation Theory and Research (host committee) Language: English
This panel seeks to provide a space for reflecting on the structure and inherent values of today’s higher education systems. This includes identifying factors that drive the transformation of accreditation systems that define the quality of HES courses of study and the mechanisms underlying teachers’ career progress. We should note that the indicators used in international ranking systems provide insight into how university offerings are designed and awarded. Second, the panel will discuss a pertinent example taken from field experience—the EU-funded Erasmus+ capacity-building project “Advancing Strategic Management, Leadership and Fundraising in Higher Education in Asia, 2021-24” (ASTRA)—which focused on improving the financial sustainability of two higher education institutions in Laos and two in Thailand. In Europe, the growth in demand for university-level qualifications has led to standardizing HES (e.g. the Bologna Process and the adoption of the Dublin descriptors) and emphasizing the importance of a close relationship with the labor market. This has often coincided with the adoption of a neo-liberal vision of HES. This raises several questions for RC36. For example, does an HES determine the measures to be taken for fostering societal development, or does society and the market dictate the cultural and educational offerings of universities? Why are the social sciences and humanities losing their appeal in contemporary societies? What factors drive the standardization of knowledge and how do teachers define their research interests and disciplines? Do teachers world-wide still enjoy autonomy, or must they now strictly align their work with neo-liberal economic demands?
Session Organizers:
Oral Presentations