Whose University Is It?

whose university is it?

Whose university is it? Proceedings of a Symposium held, 8 June 2005, on the occasion of the 430th anniversary of Leiden University

Douwe Breimer Frans Saris (eds.)

Cover illustration: Academiegebouw, Leiden University Cover design: Mesika Design, Hilversum Layout: Het Steen Typografie, Maarssen isbn-13 978 90 8555 341 0 isbn-10 90 8555 341 5 nur 840 © Leiden University / Amsterdam University Press • Pallas Publications, Amsterdam 2006 All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this book may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the written permission of both the copyright owner and the author of the book.

Table of contents Introduction 9 Douwe Breimer / Frans Saris Introduction by the chairman Paul Schnabel

13

part i historical and international views on the future role of the university Many masters, many servants Sheldon Rothblatt The university we want Gesine Schwan

17

27

Future funding for universities

35

Independence, dependence or inter-dependence?

Eric Thomas

part ii the future of the university as a state or private institution in the netherlands Amongst professors? Amongst students? Or amongst administrators? 43 Mark Rutte Where is the student??? Elselijn Kingma

49

Reputation, market and deregulation

55

Unfolding the future of Dutch higher education

Frans van Vught

The context of excellence Hans Adriaansens The university of the willing Bas Haring Tom Wolfe

77

63

71

Douwe Breimer (l.), Rector Magnificus, Leiden University, and Frans Saris (r.), Dean, Faculty of Science, Leiden University

Introduction The story goes that once the siege of Leiden had ended, Prince William of Orange offered the town of Leiden a gift: the choice between either a tax reduction or obtaining a university… Universities used to be governed by national and municipal bodies or by the Catholic or Reformed churches. Nowadays, universities are no longer ruled by the minister, the mayor or the church, so whose university is it anyway? Are we aware of who is accountable for our university, who cares for it? “He who pays, decides,” so it is said. Most universities worldwide still receive the major part of their funding from the national government and therefore it can make demands on their quality and accountability. But to what extent are universities themselves responsible? Do they, for example, have the right to pre-select their students? On the one hand, the government requires universities to operate at a comparative level nationally, and yet on the other it expects them to profile themselves and be competitive. How far should governmental influence stretch? Higher education has been subjected to large budgetary cuts during the past decades, while at the same time the number of students has increased drastically, resulting in continuous financial struggles for our universities. Since no solution is expected from the government, should students therefore pay higher education fees as they do in the United States? Alternatively, should universities be privatised and be allowed to implement marketing mechanisms? Should they look beyond their own national borders and compete for increasing numbers of foreign students? Education and scientific research are closely linked in Dutch universities. In other European countries this link between education and research is not as tight, since much research is done in non-academic institutions. Nonetheless, academic education will always have to be associated with learning in a research environment. A number of universities have joined ranks to form the League of European Research Universities, initiated by Leiden, Louvain, Oxford and Cambridge. What does this orientation towards research mean to the university as such, as well as to those faculties that have less of a tradition in scientific research and are more engaged in formal education? Once, universities were ivory towers, but from the democratising movement onwards they have been positioned in the middle of society. Are universities indeed the common ground for independent and new social developments? Does society represent the research laboratory for universities? Some universities themselves explicitly encourage entrepreneurialism and surround themselves with business parks; is the development of knowledge nowadays primarily to serve ecoINTRODUCTION

9

nomic prosperity purposes or are well-being and culture not at least as important? What does the future have in store for academic freedom and social cohesion? To discuss these and other questions, Leiden University has organised a one-day symposium during the week when its 430th anniversary was celebrated. The programme was divided in two parts, first the historical and international views on the future role of the university was discussed by three distinguished speakers from abroad, then in the second part the future of the university as a state or private institution in the Netherlands was presented by speakers from our country. The symposium was chaired by Paul Schnabel, director of the Social and Cultural Planning Office of the Netherlands and University Professor at Utrecht University. We are grateful to him and to the speakers for their most valuable contributions. Together they have offered rather interesting views on the above questions. The present proceedings contain edited transcripts of the original speeches, rather than formal essays. Still, with this book we aim at stimulating the discussions within academia on the fundamental question: Whose university is it? Leiden, the Netherlands, June 2005 Douwe Breimer / Frans Saris

10

DOUWE BREIMER / FRANS SARIS

Paul Schnabel, Director, Social and Cultural Planning Office of the Netherlands and University Professor at Utrecht University

Introduction by the chairman Paul Schnabel

Welcome to this international symposium of Leiden University that is celebrating its 430 years of existence this year, being the oldest university in the Netherlands. Of course, this is the opportunity, also from Utrecht University where I am from, to wish the director, the board, the faculty and all students of this revered institution many happy returns. Outsiders may wonder why you have to become 430 years old to come up with the question: “Whose university is it” or what most people would think maybe, “Whose university is it anyway?” Today it will be outsiders that are going to answer that question. I hope we will have the answer by the evening. It is not an easy question, of course, and it is certainly not easy to resolve this question. I counted the number of unanswered questions in the small booklet we all got with today’s programme and with the small introduction by the Leiden University on all kinds of questions that have to be answered today. On one page, there were no less than 15 questions. Some of these questions were quite mundane and had to do with money, had to do with who is the boss and had to do with the position of the students at the university. Some others are more of ideological nature: what is the goal of the university and what is the place of the university in present society? Or the last question: what does the future have in store for academic freedom and social cohesion? A very difficult question indeed. We have speakers, distinguished speakers, from universities outside and inside the Netherlands and we hope to hear from them what their experiences are, what their knowledge is about, what the future of the university is, also in the light of the development universities have been going through. Not only in the last decades, but also in the last centuries. How they have developed and what we can expect from the future. Certainly also what can we expect from the government, from the boards of universities, from students and maybe from the people from outside, people who are in the business world, people who are wealthy, people who were alumni of the university and might give some money to the university. I do not think that it will be easy to have all the answers at the end of the day, but some of the answers may come up.

INTRODUCTION BY THE CHAIRMAN

13

PA RT I

historical and international views on the future role of the university

Sheldon Rothblatt, Prof. Em. University of California, Berkeley

Many masters, many servants Sheldon Rothblatt

Thank you, Rector Magnificus, colleagues, students and members of the Leiden communities for inviting me to your birthday party. Universities only get better as they get older (unlike people!). Over time traditions firm up, continuities are established, and legacies provide some guidance to future uncertainties. That at least will be one of my themes today. There is every reason for me to feel welcome. Universities are sisters of one another, all, in a sense, born in that historic moment at the end of the twelfth century when Bologna, Paris, Oxford and Salerno first come to notice. So although I come here today as a member of the University of California at Berkeley, to bring you greetings and congratulations from what the founders there were once pleased to call the “Athens of the West,” I am by virtue of a common medieval heritage a member of an international guild of masters. I am a member here as you are members there on the Pacific Ocean. The learned and quietly witty Bishop William Stubbs, famed nineteenth-century historian from Christ Church, Oxford University, a college known familiarly as “the House,” once scribbled that “in the House I’m at home like the Pope in Rome.” I’m at home in Leiden. “Whose university is it?” I will provide one historian’s answer to this interesting question, but in due course. I ask you to be patient. For now I will at least hint at the broader tone of the narrative, which will be in the optimistic spirit of Professor Saris’s wise and illuminating lecture of yesterday. It is good to be occasionally optimistic, and especially on birthdays. I want first to provide several overarching notions of how the university functions in relation to society. I will state what I believe are several of the salient structural features of any university. I will ask how its members have looked upon themselves in the past. I will broadly calibrate missions and obligations, that list of responsibilities that we have learned to label “professional” because the university began primarily and fundamentally to undertake professional tasks for medieval society. But the word “professional,” which is related to “profess” to express something such as knowledge, not only refers to occupations within society. It is also a word that connotes a moral role. Once I have provided some working framework for viewing the university as a generic institution, I can move on to some of the other questions raised in the background paper to this celebratory symposium. Universities are no longer exactly of one type, and often we cannot distinguish a “university” from other types of higher education institutions. I will skip over such M A N Y M A S T E R S , M A N Y S E R VA N T S

17

distinctions as remain, except to note that today’s universities contain many features once associated with institutions such as colleges and polytechnics. They are hybrids in some respects. At the moment I will simply state that in today’s world of interlocking and intersecting institutions, it is important for those of us who dwell within institutions titled “research universities” to remember that the other forms of higher education are part of our wider educational family. Given the plural educational environments of today, it is well to bear in mind that no research-dominant institution can function successfully without the assistance of the others, whose reach and defining traits bring into higher education many of the groups that have not traditionally been the target of research university admissions. Differences and accretions notwithstanding, the most intriguing and fascinating aspect of the university as an institution is that it still bears the marks of its genetic code. It has rumbled through some eight centuries of history retaining fundamental traits present at its birth. It is the second oldest institution in the western world with a continuous and unbroken history. Only the Roman Catholic Church is older. It would be foolish and misleading to imagine that in all the centuries of recorded history the university smoothly glided through the turmoil that is the story of human affairs. To name the great transformations of history since the twelfth century is to indicate how many trials and tribulations the university experienced. Closely associated with the medieval and then the later Protestant churches but not of them, the university underwent the disciplinary metamorphoses associated with the momentous conflict of religions and experienced the purging of members whose orthodoxy was suspect. It also faced disciplinary challenges arising from other sources, from the recovery of lost aspects of the classical heritage in the Renaissance, to which some academics were opposed, to the birth of modern experimental science, again to which some academics were opposed. The ages of technological change provided yet other challenges. What, for example, was to be the place of the engineering sciences in the curriculum of the modernizing university? Time and again the erosion of inherited social certainties engendered existential crises to which universities were asked to respond. Those of the early modern period were severe enough. But none has ever been as great as the terrors of the twentieth century when universities in many countries were destroyed by brutal totalitarian regimes. Certainly today outside the free world, universities continue to be intimidated by authoritarian states. When I contemplate some of the horrible events of national history, I conclude that the challenges of today, those that are named in the call to this symposium, are mild and manageable. I realize that these words are not altogether soothing. The university that I am describing lives in the long run. We as academics and members of the communities of scholars live in the short run. Understandably the moment is of more significance to us as individuals than the past. Yet in answering the question of “Whose university is it?” I would still point to the basically fortunate circumstances in which we find ourselves today. We live in free soci18

S H E L D O N R O T H B L AT T

eties, representative democracies, reasonably tolerant compared to our ancestors and wealthy, possibly not wealthy enough but that is another issue altogether. It would also be misleading of me to suggest, as some of the wording of the preceding paragraphs may intimate, that the university has been a passive institution, a kind of picaroon if I may continue to be anthropomorphic, merely Fortune’s plaything. That is simply incorrect and would convey a false impression of the active role that universities have steadily played in the central histories of their encompassing environments. It is also not the case that the academic communities have been innocent bystanders, always high-minded and dedicated to many of those worthy ideals of civilization and toleration that have been enunciated by the better minds of our societies. Alas, academics are but human, subject to the petty temptations of status and power. They have been capable of holding to the most appalling bigotries and, in their relationship to students and to one another, have very often lacked the sensitivity that the respect for knowledge requires. I would now go so far into heterodoxy as to say that the university and its members are no better than the societies of which they are a part. They do not reflect those societies in every respect. I would certainly argue against the school of “reproduction theory” which regards institutions as only images of their surrounding and supporting worlds. But it is the case that the range of available opinion and belief within the university does resemble in quality and range that which we find in the social order. I choose my language carefully to develop the thesis that the leaders of our institutions and the academics and others who comprise it must always bear in mind that in our types of freedom-loving societies they bear responsibilities that have in the first place been provided by their societies and that they are ultimately servants of those societies carrying to them the nobler ideals of professional service so intrinsic to the history of the university as a special kind of place. The word “university”, the scholars tell us, did not have a narrow meaning when first used in the Latin. Like the related word “college” it meant a collectivity, a fellowship, a body of persons evolving into self-governing corporations. What we term a “university” was first of all a studium generale. When charters were bestowed by popes and emperors, what had functioned by custom now functioned by law. But from the start an institution whose origins are difficult to pinpoint exactly was never a tightlyconstructed or highly-centralized corporation. It was, in keeping with the overall character of medieval society, a collection of guilds. There were guilds of masters and guilds of students who, according to the customs and circumstances of various locations, developed working relationships with other local constituencies. At Bologna the students had the upper hand. At Paris, the masters. The reality of separate guilds cobbled together soon yielded other similar structural and quasi-independent forms. Before long the medieval institution was a federation of disciplinary faculties, colleges for residence and also instruction and student “nations” performing some of the functions of colleges. In many of the Continent’s older universities we see the architectural expression of federalism by the absence of a campus form. Faculty M A N Y M A S T E R S , M A N Y S E R VA N T S

19

buildings, for example, are scattered about the urban fabric, often nowhere near one another. It is difficult to tell a university building from another kind. In sum, the university was from the start, to use the late President Clark Kerr of the University of California’s famous neologism, a “multiversity.” So strongly pronounced was this structural feature in some ages that in the fourteenth century at Prague there were virtually two universities within what had been a single one, each with its own rector and organization. Ironically, it was only through the intervention of the developing states of the period and the papacy that any sort of unity was created. From the earliest days until now, the university has retained its multiversity aspect, its fissiparous tendencies. Historians have not always closely followed this particular sub-history, but the general causes seem clear enough. The internal divisions of what we prefer to regard as a single corporate entity were caused by the hierarchical rankings and gradings of medieval culture where personal identity was defined only in collective not in individual terms and then, more profoundly, by knowledge creation. As new subjects entered the curriculum, new structures were created to allow them to flourish. As the centuries pass, we find laboratories, museums, botanical gardens, libraries of course, astronomical observatories, galleries. These soon created individual governing and administrative systems. Not all such sub-organizations or disciplines were at first welcome. Experimental science in some nations found its first home in royal academies; and the humanists so responsible for re-orienting the scholastic curriculum of the medieval university were also, in some countries, required to seek new homes at ducal courts or in the midst of cities. But eventually virtually all disciplines gravitated back to universities. Fast forward into our own age and to continue the list with: agriculture stations, marine biology stations, extra-mural (or as called in the US, extension) programs, campuses abroad and other programs allowing students to travel. Consult the phonebook of any contemporary university and notice the staggering number of units and agencies, departments, institutes, honors colleges and support facilities too numerous to mention. Perhaps this is not so special, perhaps all institutions become increasingly complex as their reach and functions expand. Governments have the same confusing collection of bureaus, and so do modern business corporations. If so, then our story becomes even more interesting as we contemplate the interaction of one kind of complex institution with another. I said earlier that universities were from the outset the servants of society, providing the intellectual and professional talent required by developing polities and vibrant cities. But the very fact that the university was composed of many communities of learned people divided into quasi-independent sub-units meant that the academics were responding to the perceived or outright demands of numerous masters. The masters demanded or required many kinds of services, but those demands were rarely coordinated. The medieval canon lawyers developed special connections to the church. The medieval civil lawyers developed special connec20

S H E L D O N R O T H B L AT T

tions to the imperial or lay states. The physicians developed their connections to the municipalities and other users of medical services. The humanists tied themselves into the culture of ducal and ecclesiastical courts and mingled on occasion with like-minded merchant communities. Later the scientists of the eighteenth-century Enlightenment offered their services to governments and the military but also to business firms, for example, those engaged in international trade – or to the general public as we witness the birth of consumer societies with a taste for innumerable educational services. And in the meantime the study of classical languages, which came with the adoption of the Roman seven liberal arts and afterwards Greek literary and historical texts, continued and deepened; and each new disciplinary innovation participated in a Battle of the Books to argue for its legitimate inclusion within the core curriculum. Each new discipline was eventually given a physical home, examination and degree privileges, and each established its own connections with the same practitioners in other universities and eventually, thanks to modern communications technologies, with the globe. In America the “department,” as opposed to the chairholder institutes, was created in the late-nineteenth century. They proliferated and continue to proliferate. In Europe new faculties were established to provide the boundaries so essential to modern specialism. Some of them, when we view the faculties created by the former Communist regimes of eastern Europe, seem very odd to us, built around applied fields without quite the same orientation common to western research universities. Yet each time that this occurred, new leadership systems were devised, different career paths and salary rewards were created, so that, as the historians of a fine new book on Harvard University have stressed, the contemporary university is a collection of numerous fiefdoms. Even the staggering endowment of Harvard, some 22 or 23 billion dollars today, is distributed differentially according to the wishes of donors, leaving richer and poorer departments and schools within a single institution. That general pattern, endowments aside, is virtually true of any university. The language that the distinguished American sociologist Burton Clark uses is that universities are essentially bottom-up institutions. Ideas, innovations and outer connections emerge from the bottom of the administrative pyramid, and the top plays an important role in preserving some sense of a common enterprise. That is the fundamental creative tension of the contemporary university as an institution. Knowledge generation and its dissemination are the core activities embedded in a large number of near-independent bodies, while to maintain some semblance of an overall common destiny and commitment, leaders strive to keep alive the historical sense of an overarching corporate identity without which no single university can maintain a necessary pride. What I have described, a disparate and plural internal academic environment with sub-cultures, may not always be so apparent when attention is focused on the twin issues of today, the financing of universities and student access. A more comM A N Y M A S T E R S , M A N Y S E R VA N T S

21

mon feeling today throughout the university world, with more intensity in some nations and universities than in others, is mentioned in the call to the symposium. The major funding for universities comes from a single source, the governments of our respective countries. This is not as true for private institutions, so plentiful in the United States, but even there it is difficult to imagine that a leading and rich private university could maintain a research commitment without the National Science Foundation, NASA, the National Institutes of Health, the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory and so many other entities that receive their income from Washington. Financial aid, so critical now to the educational prospects of at least half the undergraduates, is not possible without central government assistance. And the individual states make their contributions to the public universities, contributions that as in so many other countries are dwindling given the multiple social and infrastructure needs of modern societies. Sheer numbers have transformed all national systems of higher education. From financially manageable elite circumstances with less than 15% of the relevant age cohort in post-secondary education, and for most historical periods really only 1-2%, higher education now functions under mass access conditions enrolling half or more of the student cohorts. I should not ignore the large numbers of part-time or mature students as we change our conception of higher education from a process suitable for young people to a benefit for people of any years. The numbers fluctuate, but we can no longer imagine the tiny percentages so typical of past student populations. Government is the principal if not only source of university financing throughout the world, but as government is multi-faceted, just like universities, there is usually more than one government source. Separate ministries often have their own funding commitments or derogate sums of money to research or military or medical agencies that dispense funds according to their own policies. Yet if we are to speak in ultimate terms, it is not government money that universities receive but taxpayer money funneled through government bodies according to funding priorities that are developed by governments in power. In a free society, governments are responsive to society’s public opinion. I know that in Europe it is customary to regard society as subservient to the state, but in the US, virtually from the day that a federal constitution was created, the state is regarded as subservient to society. Consequently it is society that the university serves and not government theoretically regarded as an institution absolutely distinct from society. Through its vast internally-differentiated organizational structure, today’s universities serve innumerable constituencies. That is the secret life of the history of universities, not so secret since the documents of its existence are plentiful and open, but secret in that we customarily ignore the multiversity when we speak of the university. No single university can serve all its constituencies in the same way. That is why our most imaginative higher education analysts have urged us to think of universities as part of a system of educational institutions that include polytechnics, teaching-led campuses, colleges, academies and open universities as connected to 22

S H E L D O N R O T H B L AT T

one another, dividing up markets and responsibilities according to missions and resources. In Europe this idea – it is a reality actually – is less accepted by the academic community than in the US, long accustomed to a plethora of different kinds of higher education institutions serving different segments of the population. It means that there cannot be one common academic standard across all institutions. It means that some will remain more expensive and select than others, having certain kinds of historical advantages, and it means that some institutions enjoy less prestige than others. But some of us conclude that departure from a commonlyshared norm of quality is inevitable. No community of taxpayers can ever support mass higher education at elite funding levels. I prefer to say this differently. We need to think in terms of the different kinds of skills and proficiencies that are required by contemporary society, and then use that variation to define what quality standards should obtain in relation to a complex, variegated occupational structure. Those of us who see the reality and necessity of a differentiated system also advocate linkages between the different system segments. Some of those linkages are already apparent here in the Netherlands and in this very university. There are linkages through student transfer, long a reality in Europe through the ERASMUS and other exchanges. There are linkages through inter-university research teams, or the programs of the European Science Foundation. The sharing of library resources and opportunities for academic mobility are a necessity. I believe they have increased. A number of us have also urged that the different types of higher education institutions develop strong internal values with reward systems appropriate to the mission. There need not be a world of haves and have-nots. There should be a world in which institutions are given the freedom to develop distinct identities, offering pride and a sense of mission to scholars, scientists and students, the top cooperating with the bottom, yet at the same time appreciating and reaching out to the other members of the republic of higher learning and to the worlds outside. Examples of how to do this have been mentioned, but the list is hardly exhausted. And I repeat that the university’s DNA prescribes this as a natural course of action. Doctrines and policies of government steering, guiding, the inadequate funding of blue-skies research, the emphasis on wealth generation, the high competition for talent in the modern world and the cost of that talent are some of the themes of this symposium. They are the cause of the anxieties felt widely within the university communities of our countries. It is felt that universities cannot be ivory towers – a phrase that we first encounter in the nineteenth century if not exactly in connection with universities. Universities can no longer live in splendid isolation obedient to the dictates of the pursuit of ideas and knowledge for their own sake. But the long-term history of universities nowhere yields up the idea of an ivory tower. Universities, I have said, were born to provide services, many services to many masters. St Augustine thought it was only possible to serve one master. Choose, he said, between God and Mammon. Universities have rejected the distinction and have served both and many more. States and churches have always been interventionist. M A N Y M A S T E R S , M A N Y S E R VA N T S

23

But academics have proven to be good negotiators, that is to say, wherever they can enter into active and good-faith negotiation with their multiple constituencies. These negotiations are not the same for each school of studies, faculty or discipline. Each bargains within and without the institution as a whole. This is a necessity. Institutional autonomy has never been a feature of universities however much we admire the idea. But let us bear in mind the complex structure of the institutions that we love. In my father’s house, we read, there are many mansions. If the university has never been an ivory tower, within its spacious and spreading boundaries there have been ivory towers, small separatist communities whose work does not easily connect to specific occupations but which are of value to society as monuments to learning and decency. Those scholars are also, however, servants of society, and it is their obligation to imaginatively consider the gifts which they can offer. We now find anthropologists and philosophers of ethics functioning within medical schools. The humanities in general are sorely needed in the lifelong learning programs so common today as national populations live longer, revivify their skills and return to the classroom to regain their connections to general culture. There are more social uses for knowledge than ever before, and if we overlook that fact, we are missing out on great opportunities to enhance the quality of public life. There is always much discussion over whether universities are based on a fundamental idea, usually a philosophical one. The two dominant sources of the search for an idea are Cardinal Newman in the Anglophone world and the Von Humboldt brothers here. General conceptions of mission are part of the fundamental process by which institutions guide themselves. The innumerable symbols of academic association provide visual reinforcement of more abstract ideas. Occasions such as today illustrate the importance of such symbols as the processions and academic regalia. We must retain these symbols to remind us of an ancient lineage. But we must also not be led astray into thinking that a single idea or two is sufficient to understand what the university is about. Our strength and glory are precisely the extraordinary variety of our joint enterprise, our adaptive capacity to provide innumerable services driven by the knowledge that we generate and profess. Politicians come and go. A change of ministers brings a change of policy; but the underlying consumer and democratic elements of our societies will not change. Precisely because a university is composed of fiefdoms, because it is a federation of enclaves, it exhibits contradictory features. It is both a repository of inherited values and ideas and an aggressive pursuer of new knowledge, even fads and fashions. But by having many masters, it need not cater to the whims of any single one. It can adapt one part of itself to changing circumstances, while allowing the other sections to remain reasonably aloof. This is the secret of the university’s success, which in my view will continue and continue best if we recognize the university’s basic DNA and leave it to do the work of building cells and transmitting legacies. I said at the outset that my general mood would be upbeat. But I also mentioned downturns in university history, periods of difficulty or shaken confidence, fears for 24

S H E L D O N R O T H B L AT T

survival. In the course of human affairs, such are inevitable. But do not abandon all hope, ye who enter here. Let us then forthrightly confront the present as our forebears confronted the past, not separate from society but absolutely part of it. Let me suggest that in dealing with the thorny issues of our day, we remember what kind of place we are. In remembering that fundamental fact, we can conclude, as I have done, that it is always better to have many masters instead of one. Slaves have one master. Professional men and women have many and live in freedom. It is better to make alliance with many groups than refer to only one. It is better to offer many services and not just several, remembering as well that all higher education institutions are interlinked and cooperative, some offering services that the others do not. Let us not speak of ivory towers; but do let us speak of the freedoms that go with modern plural democracies. Let us be confident of the spaces that the very notion of a free society provides. “Whose university is it?” There are legal definitions of ownership. In some American states, public universities are under the legislatures. In others, a smaller number, they are “owned” by boards of trustees or regents. They were, public or private, once eleemosynary foundations acting under the laws incorporating charities. In Britain, universities are still legally registered as charities. Universities are chartered, often falling under statutory law, which gives them corporate standing. In Sweden the buildings of a university are actually owned by the government. There are various arrangements, various legal definitions of ownership, but none of them has ever prevented either royal or lay governments, parliaments or churches, or in some cases as in the history of Edinburgh University, cities from intervening. But whatever the legal definition, in practice and in a democratic polity, universities belong first and foremost to society. Some historians refer to this conception of ownership as falling within the idea of a “social contract,” referring back to the philosophy of John Locke, a contract that is not real in legal terms but absolutely real in social and historical experience. “Whose university is it?” In a professional society, he who pays the piper does not necessarily call the tune. There are many tunes. Professions have a long history of independent service. But the university does not belong to us, nor to students, nor to government, nor to business, nor to any one group or institution. We are all but trustees of an institution that no one truly owns. We are its stewards, inheriting the injunction, if I may quote the Old Testament, to be fruitful and multiply. The university belongs to the whole of democratic society in its non-organic condition. The essential nature of modern society is its pluralism. Many masters, many servants. That is the story of the special kind of institution that we honor today, and in honoring Leiden on the illustrious occasion of its birthday, at the same time we honor all universities. Thank you, esteemed colleagues, students and guests for allowing me this historic opportunity to celebrate with you and to explain, however briefly, what an historian might say in response to the question of whose university is it. M A N Y M A S T E R S , M A N Y S E R VA N T S

25

Gesine Schwan, President University of Frankfurt-Oder

The university we want Gesine Schwan

I. Introduction

During the last decade European discussions on the role of universities dealt mostly with their financial survival and there contribution to the economic welfare of the region or the country they are located in. The arguments almost always started and start with the term of competition, which seemed – and to many politicians and university rectors seems still nowadays – a sufficient intellectual base for its conceptual design. Competition in that sense points to the existential challenge of the European universities by the US ones and at the same time serves as a ruling principle for its institutional structure and as the most efficient motivation and instigation for an excellent performance in teaching and research, of professors as well as of students. Criteria of evaluation and reputation focus – besides Nobel Prizes and Citation Indexes – on the contribution of the universities to technological and economic innovation and strength of the region or country they are situated in. External financing, public as well as private, follows to a large extent the same priorities. Thus the so-called Bologna Process requires the internationalisation of universities and curricula mainly in order to fit the international labour market requirements and to promote the economic and technological position and power of the European Union in the global competition. It does not emphasize questions like the following ones: Does internationalisation also contribute to a richer and more interesting research concerning topics and methods? Is it especially necessary to promote intercultural understanding? Or more generally speaking: What are the broader challenges of our future world and of our universities therein? What are the scientific and cultural potentials to help solving regional as well as global problems? Which are these problems? What is the purpose of scientific research besides to serve economic development and interests? Has it still to do with what was formerly called “the search for truth”? Is there any concept of that traditional term we could if not agree upon at least use as a heuristic tool? What is the relation between scientific research (including humanities) and education in a university ready for our future? I do not claim to have satisfying answers to these questions but I do think it is extremely short-sighted if not dangerous not to raise them and not to try, again and again, to find “digestible” answers, digestible in the sense that they are at least understandable and fruitful for the constant effort to identify the role of universiTHE UNIVERSITY WE WANT

27

ties. Maybe my training as a philosopher has heightened my frustration tolerance concerning questions which will never meet definite answers, but I think the definite openness – to coin it paradoxically – of any truth-finding process is probably the most solid experience of any research experience. Thus, if I try now to offer you my tentative answers to the questions put above, please take them really as offers which of course can be rejected anytime.

II. The role of universities in a global world

In order not to remain within the perspective of today, it might be helpful to start with a brief historical reminiscence. Traditionally the role of universities was to promote knowledge about the “reality” or the “world” and to educate young people for a professional role in their contemporaneous societies. Following the famous German theoretician and university founder Wilhelm von Humboldt we could distinguish within research-based education between what we call in German “Bildung” and “Ausbildung”, meaning education in a larger sense and professional formation in a narrower understanding. “Wissenschaft” as scientific research and humanities had to be the determining specific of university education which would strengthen a human society concerning its general culture but also the quality of its professions. Today we see more and more, especially in Germany, an institutional separation between research on the one hand and university teaching on the other, at least concerning technology and natural sciences. Their loyalty is no longer tied to society as a whole but to various demands from the private or the public sector which do not even claim anymore to raise questions of “common good” nor of “uninterested truth”, both terms seeming nowadays to many people hopelessly old-fashioned and without any purpose for the orientation of research and universities. In order not to contrast these tendencies with an abstract counterproject but to try to find answers in the light of these short remarks, I would like to get back now to the commonly accepted aim of modern universities, namely to prepare students academically as best as possible for the future labour market. What could be the best possible teaching for it? Has that teaching also to educate students in the sense of Humboldt’s “Bildung”? Pragmatically the first idea seems to connect university teaching as closely as possible to the existing labour market so that there wouldn’t be any gap between the academic training and its practical application. But research on the possibilities to foresee the future labour market – still more in its international global dimension – shows that its changes are extremely rapid and that in order to truly prepare students for the future the horizon of the present market might even be misleading. Even more: the future labour market does not follow out of any necessary evolution of the present one because it is influenced by the quality of the labour force 28

GESINE SCHWAN

which is at the disposal of possible entrepreneurs at the time they will need it. Thus it might be sensible to develop and educate for qualities which are not yet needed but which might be needed in the future. For we will have to care for the quality or nature of the labour market and thus of the labour force because it strongly influences the quality and nature of our societies: A sharp cleavage between low- and high-quality jobs will result in sharp social cleavages which might create social conflicts difficult to handle in the frame of free and democratic societies. Thus in order even to pursue only the pragmatic project of preparing students for the labour market we end up with two results: the necessity to educate them in a much broader sense than only to adapt them to present labour market requirements and a normative question concerning the nature of our future society, and, to enlarge this horizon: of our future world. Both results are interconnected because the competences following from a broader understanding of education –in the German sense of Bildung – have to fit the uncertainties of the future world and the challenges of its normative nature. Hence the fundamental question we have to answer at the onset is a normative one: Do we consider our world as a challenge for moral and political decisions and acts and do we want for ourselves and for future generations to live in a free and peaceful world whose shape we are responsible for, or do we accept following blindly the particularistic demands and offers of the present economy including the present labour market? In the second case we risk that the tools we teach may not fit tomorrow’s challenges because the market conditions have rapidly changed and that the research we pursue may dominate us and turn us into instruments which obey imperatives we can neither judge nor influence. I therefore discover a convergence between both an intelligent preparation for the future labour market and the answer to the normative and moral challenge for our students how to shape or at least influence the world they will live in and how to promote – if ever possible – a peaceful life in freedom thanks to the capacity of mediating the unlimited number and kinds of conflicts we will face in our future global world. The convergence lays in rediscovering the value of science and humanities in their interconnection and interdisciplinarity which points to the original impetus of epistemological, methodological and normative self-reflection. Such a self-reflection constantly transcends heuristically any particularistic perspective in order not to omit or negate interrelations between the various dimensions of the reality which are now or might become one day extremely important if we want to avoid catastrophes or to find new solutions for pressing problems. The result of such fundamental intellectual training, which would follow from what Humboldt called the close interconnection between teaching and research but which would nowadays need a new effort for normative and interdisciplinary reflections, would enable the students to become self-reflecting and creative “engines” of their individual biographies, their professional life and of a creative social development which would have the flexibility and the imagination to respond to unexpected and complex challenges. THE UNIVERSITY WE WANT

29

Contrary to what is often stated today I do not think that such an education, which is characterized by epistemological, methodological and normative selfreflection, should be reserved for the few or for an elite which aims at a university career, nor do I think that the majority of a generation is unable to take part in such an education. In fact I do think that the future of our free and democratic societies depends on the qualitative as well as the quantitative extent to which we succeed to promote such a scientific attitude and self-reflective mental map in the society as a whole. The often preached counterstrategy, namely to concentrate on educating an elite which would then either lead the rest of the society or provoke trickle-down effects, be it by competition mechanisms or by benchmarking, does not convince me because neither of the two is able to found the flexibility and the creativity of a large majority which we need. And there is a further reason for pleading for such a strategy. The self-reflection I claim also offers the best precondition for peaceful conflict mediation and solving. Thanks to it we understand the unavoidable insecurity of our knowledge, the doubtful implications of our decisions and the “relationality” or perspectivity of our mental, cultural, social and political positions. By “relationality” I mean the methodological insight that our “truths”, i.e. the results of our intellectual endeavours, can claim their validity only in relation to the methodological preconditions or hypotheses we presuppose and that in the case of conflict with other “truths” the chance to mediate peacefully grows if we are able to find common intellectual or normative levels respectively principles upon which we can agree. Each result of a research is preconditioned by the methodology which is applied. It is easier to understand differences and conflicts if we are aware of the various implications of our own position, i.e. of their “relationality” to these presuppositions and implications. I know that such mental training requires not only many intellectual but also emotional qualities because we need the constant disposition to question ourselves, to analyse our own prejudices which we have to differentiate from our prejudgements without which we would not be able to think and to analyse. But this is exactly the difference between a prejudice and a prejudgement: whereas we are ready to question the latter we commonly tend to resist questioning the former. So one could define the result of a successful university education in short as the faculty to transform prejudices into prejudgements. In the German tradition of Bildung, which stems from the time of the Enlightenment, a political element plays an important role. An educated citizen, brought up by a successful education and university system, feels politically responsible, is not supposed to lead a particularistic private life. The term “responsibility” points to a generalized commitment to the political community, which in the 18th and 19th century was the state. Have universities nowadays a political obligation? Would such a role contradict the claim for a “value-free” scientific approach? We know that this term transports a misunderstanding of Max Weber who never pleaded for a valuefree approach. On the contrary, he underlined that there is no scientific approach 30

GESINE SCHWAN

without a normative implication and thus decision (be it only by defining the subject which always means to tell between what seems to be important and what not). But he also stressed that these normative decisions can never claim to be scientifically provable and therefore have to be made transparent in order to facilitate the verification of the scientific quality of a research. But even if we accept that there is no scientific approach without a normative implication, we could doubt the obligation, even the opportunity, of a university to educate for good citizenship. For citizenship is conceived within the framework of a nation-state. The arena of present and future democratic politics will no longer be restricted to a nation-state, politics will be dealt with on various levels between the community, the state, regional political bodies like the European Union and the global dimension of governance. Also the actors of such politics which are called nowadays “governance” are more complex. They will range from traditionally legitimated politicians over big companies up to civil society agents. This new complexity of political decision-making will require a corresponding complex citizenship with differentiated loyalties and the readiness for voluntary civil society initiatives and conflict mediating as well as supervision of agreements. Here again we need a large amount of scientifically and methodologically founded knowledge on complex matters which transcends single cultures and university disciplines. Because of that complexity the famous German sociologist Niklas Luhman denied the further possibility of political governance. Thinking in terms of system analysis he was convinced of the hermetic differences between the various social, political and economic systems and their codes. The political scientist Fritz Scharpf contradicted him but at the same time he spelled out the condition for possible future politics in general and global governance specifically: the capacity to communicate in various codes, to be multi-lingual in the proper and in a transferred sense. Only if there are sufficient multilingual people who understand at the same time the codes of economics and of medicine, of arts and of natural sciences, of literature and of biology, but also of African and Asian culture, of Polish and German politics, of Palestinian and Israeli history, only under that condition will we be able to practise our citizenship, to take part in the governance of common problems and challenges. Thus multilingualism in the mentioned double sense becomes a core condition of education for a future governance which will be an indispensable way to operate democratic politics. This leads me to sum up the main lines by which I tried to draw a normative picture of a university which would be able to face the challenges of today’s and tomorrow’s world. University teaching and research have a public responsibility which is tied to the norm of free, open, peaceful and democratically ruled societies. The trust universities still enjoy stems from their commitment to the “search of truth” as a common good, but they will only keep and deserve it to the extent that they transgress particularistic interests and practise a teaching and research which is committed to epistemological, methodological and normative self-reflection. UniversiTHE UNIVERSITY WE WANT

31

ties thus correspond to the constantly growing necessity of peaceful conflict mediation in a globally interdependent and multicultural world. They contribute to their negotiation or solution because and if they are able to promote a multilingualism which is necessary to understand and to negotiate multidimensional conflicts. So what I would call in German “Verständigungsfähigkeit” in the double meaning of being able and ready by the capacity of multilingualism, for a better understanding, seems to me the main criterion of a successful university in research as well as in teaching.

III. What can be done in order to overcome the present economisation of universities?

Of course I know that universities are not what they ought to be and that there are endless obstacles which hinder the realization of the normative picture I have drawn. But I think without a reflection about what they ought to be we will certainly not succeed in bringing them in good shape. What can be done in order to overcome the present economisation of universities? A first step for the European universities could be that their national conferences and the European Association of Universities organise a new discourse about the nature of universities which would transgress the present paradigm of economic competition talk. They could learn, by the way, from their Anglo-Saxon and especially from their American competitors the importance of a personality education which takes into account not only cognitive but also emotional and artistic competences and activities. At least on the European Continent, focusing on mere cognitive training overlooks the fact that real education should aim at a much broader range of competences – social, emotional and cultural ones – in order to enable students to act and judge as independent, creative, innovative and responsible persons. In fact, I do think that it should be the responsibility of scientists and university managers to point to the risks of the present priorities, as well as to influence politicians so that they would understand that a better public financing of the universities would strengthen their independence from private particularistic priorities. Thus the scientific community would get the chance to follow at least partly their own logic of research, to promote nonconformist theories and to broaden the variety of research questions independently from their possible economic use. Presently, in Germany we are celebrating Albert Einstein’s 100th birthday. On every occasion he is praised for his nonconformism, his imagination, his intellectual independence and social responsibility. In fact, his performance teaches us the importance of creative individualism and of epistemological self-reflection. This could tell responsible decision makers that it lays in the well-understood and longterm interest of free societies to care for the independence of research and education. 32

GESINE SCHWAN

Another thing we could learn from the United States is their culture of foundations and endowments which supports the autonomy of universities. The legal framework should strengthen such a culture for which of course we should also try to convince the important representatives of companies. With my own rather small European University Viadrina I am trying to follow these examples in transforming it into a foundation university which would start with a public endowment and then try to attract further financial support. This would promote a more autonomous status of the university which would enable us to start non-conventional programmes and education methods. In comparison with Albert Hirshman’s famous book on “Exit and Voice” this would be an “exit” for “voice”, meaning an experiment which could find new ways in a world which seems to be resistant to radical innovation. So the two ways to change the present orientation of universities which is of course mostly determined by what we call the global economy may seem rather stony: influencing public discourse and trying to pursue our own experiments. What can such a soft power do in the face of the hard one of the global economy? The chance of soft power lays in the scarcity of a resource which becomes more and more obviously important: the scarcity of trust which is needed to find peaceful solutions for complex problems. If the president of the United States, the only remaining hegemony power, now publicly recognizes that military force and sophisticated technology are not sufficient to build up a democracy, this would be a big step forward. As long as he thinks that US civil servants could do it the step is still behind reality. But democracies are the political systems which have to learn in order to survive and which are able to learn. So the chance for the universities I suggest lays in the democratic opportunity to learn. It is a chance we have to hope and to work for. Otherwise it will not get realized.

THE UNIVERSITY WE WANT

33

Eric Thomas, Vice-Chancellor University of Bristol

Future funding for universities Independence, dependence or inter-dependence? Eric Thomas

Thank you for that very kind introduction and may I repeat what my colleagues have already said that it is an enormous honour for me to be asked to give this talk at the celebration of 430 years of one of Europe’s most prestigious and ancient seats of learning. Whenever I visit a major European university such as Leiden, I find that essential value of the pursuit of scholarship is renewed in me – I am reminded that amidst all the talk of funding, independence, economic relevance, technology transfer and governance, that universities have remained essentially unchanged for centuries because their fundamental mission – the pursuit of scholarship – is so essential to the success of society. Whatever else we decide to change nothing should divert us from that as our central purpose. However we cannot expect not to change, not to have to react to the environment in which we find ourselves. The modern world demands that we justify our existence and our funding. Higher education is just one call on the fiscal budget – we cannot expect the taxpayer to simply fund us because we tell them that we are “a good thing”. In fact, I would go further and say that in the face of substantial public funding we have a duty to explain to our citizens why they should continue to spend money on us as opposed to health and social care. The very centre of my talk today is just how much the public should spend on us and how much our income should come from other sources. Apart from public funds, I am going to focus on income from two non-public sources: first from our main consumers, the students, and secondly from philanthropy, from fundraising. I know you will be aware that the UK recently went through an anguished debate about whether we should increase fees from students in order to increase income to our universities. Higher education entered the realms of public debate in an unprecedented way – never before had there been such a public profile for the sector. At the very heart of the debate was the question about who funded higher education. The first notion that came as a surprise for the public was that universities are not part of the public sector in the UK. In fact, this was a surprise to many educated commentators. Under our charters, universities are self-governing, autonomous institutions that accept core grants from the government through the Higher Education Funding Agency. For the University of Bristol this grant is currently £ 94 million per year, which equates to about 35% of our total income. For institutions FUTURE FUNDING FOR UNIVERSITIES

35

like the London School of Economics this grant is only about 14% of total income. Virtually no one wanted that situation to change. There was considerable support for continuing autonomy but an acknowledgement that the state should provide significant funding for two reasons. Firstly, higher education is a public good. The economy and the society of the United Kingdom undoubtedly benefit from successful higher education in highly skilled graduates entering the job market, in creating society’s leaders, in knowledge transfer, in research and in technology transfer. The second reason was less well articulated but certainly understood clearly by a small minority – namely, successful higher education is so important to a knowledge economy like the UK that the state had to continue to fund it so that it had leverage to make the sector change to meet future challenges. The state couldn’t, in other words, allow higher education to become completely independent, otherwise it lost any influence over the sector. There was some debate about universities becoming completely private with no state funding. Whilst lots of bombastic statements were made, it became very obvious to all that no university could survive without government income. Certainly Bristol could not simply give back £ 94 million a year. Some of that could be recouped through increased fees but how would we replace our core research grant, which is £ 37 million per year? Examples were cited from the United States – Harvard and Yale. In fact what that demonstrated was how ignorant we in the UK were about the funding of higher education in the States. Whilst Harvard may not have a core state funding it receives significant state support – almost $ 0.5 billion of federal funds for research, for example. Last year I visited the University of Maryland and Johns Hopkins University. The people at Maryland complained loudly that Johns Hopkins, a private institution, received more support from the State of Maryland than they did! Finally, these private institutions have huge endowments – Harvard’s was over $ 23 billion in its accounts for 2003-04 and they aim to distribute about 5% of that annually – that is over $ 1 billion. Such an income stream really will underpin the ability to be a sustainable private university. No institution in the UK has anything like such an endowment. So it was concluded that public funding of universities was appropriate and inevitable in the long term. Having decided that, the debate then focused on what amount of public funding there should be. It became clear that there was no desire to increase funding from the government and in the final analysis the taxpayer. It was argued that higher education was not obligatory like primary or secondary education, which was undertaken by all. Higher education was only experienced by a minority of the population who also tended to be from the wealthier parts of society. Simply to increase taxes to increase income to higher education was actually regressive – it created a middle class subsidy that was paid for by large numbers of people who didn’t benefit from the education. The government was even clearer – should there be any budgetary increase for education it was going to be focused in the primary and secondary sectors. A consensus was reached that the public funding of 36

ERIC THOMAS

universities was about right but there was no support for increasing that funding from taxation. This then moved the debate onto where additional income should come from. Evidence was produced to show that the lifetime benefits to a graduate in additional income were approximately £ 400,000. There is some debate about the actual amount and recent research has shown that the benefit may only be £ 150,000 over a lifetime. However, the fact that there was a substantial benefit was accepted by virtually everybody. It was argued that the recipients of such benefits should partially pay for the cost of their education through increasing fees. The debate over this was ferocious. Interestingly it was almost religious. MPs argued that they had received their higher education for free so why shouldn’t today’s students, all the while quietly forgetting that when they went to university only 10% of 18 years olds went with them and that now the figure was 43%. They also failed to produce any other suggestions for sources of increased income. In the final analysis they all knew that to suggest that taxes should be increased for higher education was electoral suicide. In the end the Higher Education Bill raising fees to a maximum of £ 3000 per year in 2006 was passed with a majority of 5, and remember, this was a government with a majority of over 160. It is interesting how quickly the debate has moved on. In our most recent election the issue of higher tuition fees had high profile in some parties’ literature and in the media but was almost irrelevant in surveys of the voters’ priorities. Increased fees were only a political issue in a small number of university seats. Fees are now capped at £ 3000 until 2010 but I have no doubt that they will increase after that and that the UK higher education system will become much more market orientated and much more comparable to what we see across the Atlantic in North America. I do appreciate that some of you will not consider that to be a good outcome but for now in the UK it has provided substantial additional income. And that income matters. For Bristol it will mean an increase of 7.5% in annual income. Combined with extra infrastructure grants, with additional government investment in science and with our ability to increase our borrowings, we are planning a £ 250 million investment in physical and human infrastructure in our university over the next five years. And I mean planning; that amount of money is now budgeted through our five year forward projections and agreed by our governing body, Council. This is transformational but is not the end and we hope to push that investment out to £ 350 million through energising the last income stream I want to talk about – philanthropic fundraising. The UK government asked me to Chair a Taskforce investigating the potential for increasing philanthropic giving to higher education and we published our report last May. We are all aware of the success of fundraising for higher education in North America. There has been some success in UK universities, notably Oxford and Cambridge, and I believe some success in a small number of European universities. But in general Europe (and I include the UK in that) has not embraced this FUTURE FUNDING FOR UNIVERSITIES

37

method of generating income or support. We took much written and oral evidence and visited four US universities: Florida, Johns Hopkins, Penn State and Maryland. We made four main conclusions: 1. Increasing philanthropic activity is a legitimate activity for universities. 2. Donors will give to universities. 3. There is a well-established professional business called fundraising and we should invest and lead that. 4. Changes in taxation could increase donations. The opening chapter of our report is a tightly argued debate about the legitimacy of fundraising by a university. There are those in the UK who argue that this is not an activity that universities should do, it was somehow beneath them and not part of the values of higher education. We noted that many universities in the UK had been started by philanthropy, that philanthropy to education had a long history and that universities are themselves registered charities that pursue noble and valuable aims. It was perfectly legitimate for us to ask individuals to help us pursue those aims. We pointed out that there was considerable evidence in the UK that, if asked, individuals and other charities will give to higher education and this is not only Oxford and Cambridge. Aberdeen and the London School of Economics are currently running very successful fundraising initiatives. We explained that fundraising is a professional business with a well-described set of practices and operations. These include setting up proper alumni relations and records, an annual fund, legacy giving, proper management of high net worth individuals and a well-planned campaign. If these are properly invested in and led, they will return a five- to tenfold yield on investment once the operation is in steady state. Alumni are a particularly important source of donations. The leadership must come from the top of the institution and this has significant implications for the future role of vice-chancellors and rectors if institutions are going to embrace this possibility. Finally we recommended some changes to taxation law that have been shown to increase giving in the United States. I won’t go into these today. All I can say is that if you wish to have a one to one meeting with your Finance ministers – recommend changes to taxation, it really catches their interest! I have no doubt that this stream of income will increase in the UK. It is important to stress that the evidence from the US is that it cannot be used to support the core business of teaching and research. That will remain with the state and the student. However, it adds value and creates excellence. I like to say that it “creates a better university than we could otherwise afford”. I started this talk by posing the question of “Future Funding for Universities – Independence, Dependence or Interdependence?” In the UK I predict that the position in ten years will be of interdependence. State funding will remain but will 38

ERIC THOMAS

be a much smaller part of annual turnover. A significantly greater part of income will come from the student in the form of fees. Finally, we will have diversified our other income streams including a significant stream from donations. I believe this combines the correct amount of continued state engagement and thus influence, with asking those who benefit to support the system and giving universities greater freedom to take risks and create other income streams. It does, of course, as many of you will recognise, become much closer to the American model of higher education than the current European one. I do appreciate that this model is very distant from that under which many of you lead your universities. It may also be very far away from what you consider should be the correct funding of universities that is consonant with their values and that of a liberal democracy. We have a UK saying – horses for courses. The UK solution is one that had to address our fundamental dilemma of having virtually the lowest fiscal income from GDP in Europe with a need to fund higher education. Fiscal income is not going to increase and therefore other funding must be created. Interdependence has been decided as the way forward. For me the main positive outcomes are a more direct relationship with the student, more engagement of the student in their institution, a need for very clear leadership, management and controls as the income streams diversify and enough independence and self-determination to be able to take risks which is such an essential part of seizing opportunities.

FUTURE FUNDING FOR UNIVERSITIES

39

PA RT I I

the future of the university as a state or private institution in the netherlands

Mark Rutte (l.), State Secretary for Education, Culture and Science, is presented with the book Eureka! European Research Universities and the Challenges of the 21st Century by Douwe Breimer (r.), Rector Magnificus, Leiden University

Amongst professors? Amongst students? Or amongst administrators? Mark Rutte

Intro “Her Majesty’s Governor in this province, honourable governors, professors, lecturers and other employees of this university, respected students and all those gracing this ceremony with their presence. (…) We have come together for a very joyful ceremony to celebrate the fact that our university was founded three hundred and fifty-eight years ago.” This was how the official speech started, given by vice-chancellor Prof. Dr Iwert Meinema in the book Onder professoren (in English: ‘Amongst professors’) to mark the anniversary of the imaginary university at which the story takes place. In Onder professoren, W.F. Hermans satirically and caustically describes the consequences for students and teachers of the wave of democratisation of the Seventies. The vice-chancellor does not get much further than this introduction because protesting students prevent him from continuing. In addition of course to the abolition of tuition fees and a considerable student wage grant, they also demand a say in the curriculum – described tersely by chemistry students as being ‘the boss in one’s own test tube!’ (or in Dutch: ‘Baas in eigen reageerbuis!’). The question ‘Whose university is it?’ was therefore already an issue in those years as well. Whereas the focus then was only on students and teachers, administrators are now also an explicit part of the equation. Whose university is it? That is the question which I would like us to try and answer today.

The perceptions First of all I would like to start with examining what perceptions exist of life at today’s universities. The following are a few of the ideas that I am regularly confronted with: – Just as elsewhere in the public and semi-public sector, the power at universities is in the hands of the managers and that is detrimental to the influence of the professionals. – More and more government funding is thought to be spent on overheads and less and less on the primary process of the instruction. – Teachers have less and less influence on matters concerning their own subjects. The managers of the institutions – which are constantly increasing in size – push through educational reforms. As a result, the teachers – who by then have been A M O N G S T P R O F E S S O R S ? A M O N G S T S T U D E N T S ? O R A M O N G S T A D M I N I S T R AT O R S ?

43

beaten into submission – lapse into uninspired, routine activities. – Students adopt the attitude of passive consumers since education is just one of the many issues which require their attention. Mediocrity reigns as a result.

The reality As usual, though, there is some daylight between perception and reality. However, the fact is that the academic flame used to burn brighter than is currently the case. An additional fact is that the motivation of students rapidly decreases after an enthusiastic start. Moreover, 50% of students in higher vocational education find the courses too easy. In most disciplines, on average, the students spend relatively little time on their studies. University teaching staff tend to focus primarily on research (and successfully too, since the Netherlands is a world leader in a number of different fields of research). Lastly, there is usually no relationship between toplevel research and top-level education at the universities. As far as I am concerned, perception and reality show us very clearly what is required, namely that we should make sure that the academic flame is returned to the universities. We must return the flame to the students and to the teachers. Such education, which I have previously referred to as begeisterd education, stimulates people to get the best out of themselves. That is better for the people themselves and also better for our society as a whole. Studying must not become a sideline. Not something that you do on the side in order to make it easier to find a well-paid job later in life thanks to the network you have built up. On the basis of this perspective, the entire higher education community – that is, the teachers, the students, the students’ associations – must be characterised by the inspired education I just referred to. On the basis of the view that education should encourage people to get the best out of themselves, students must not be passive consumers. The student should, in fact, be the focus, the pivot around which the entire university world turns. – Education like this is not uniform. – Education like this acknowledges individual differences. – Education like this discovers hidden talent – such as that of many non-native Dutch students. – Education like this stimulates excellence – with brilliant students not being portrayed as social climbers. This is only possible on the basis of trust in, and respect for, professionals. They are not implementing parties that have to be constantly monitored but rather the key figures in the primary education process. This process is literally of crucial importance to the Netherlands. After all, education is all about training the citizens of tomorrow’s society. The process involves them being prepared for both the employment market and social functioning. Universities have an additional responsibility in this respect because they help develop 44

MARK RUTTE

our society’s scientific and intellectual vanguard. A vanguard comprising people who have to sustain and develop our culture, push back borders, be critical, responsible, reflect on their own thoughts and actions and respect cultural differences. In this way we will attract a generation of people who are not only economically valuable but who are also able to determine the social debate of the future. We can, no, we must expect people who have been educated to a higher level to have not only a high level of knowledge, but also a critical, determined attitude. Only by rating this social function at its true value can education optimally fulfil its economic function. And this is long overdue. The power transfer from West to East is in full swing. The Pacific is going to become the new centre and it looks as if everyone will have to pull out all the stops even to keep up with the new economic superpowers. There are plenty of similar examples in relation to China. This country is responsible for the growing transhipment activities in almost all Western European harbours, and particularly Rotterdam. At this moment, the Shanghai Automotive Industry Corporation, a Chinese car company, is holding the key to the survival of the British car manufacturer Rover. A telling contribution in this context is the book The World is Flat by New York Times journalist Thomas Friedman. In almost 500 pages he outlines the development of the Asian world which, from the economic and technological point of view, is advancing at breakneck speed. There are hundreds of millions of increasingly well-educated and ambitious young people who are dying to outdo their parents. The book contains an urgent warning for the United States, namely that its politicians, economists and business people should not underestimate this force. Doing so would mean decimation within a couple of years! But what does Friedman say about Europe? Absolutely nothing! Apparently, as far as he is concerned, old Europe has already ceased to play a role from an economic point of view… This is reason enough for Europe to leave no stone unturned in order to strengthen our economies. A sufficient supply of knowledge workers is an absolute precondition for success. An increase in the level of education of the working population will have a direct influence on the innovative capacity and productivity. The situation is clearer than ever. Higher education plays a crucial role in our country’s future. That is why we have to hand the academic flame back to students and teachers. This is not possible without a clear and active contribution by my ministry. We are the ones who have to lead the debate. We are the ones who have to make the quality of education a priority and we are the ones who have to make sure that students continue to be the focus. This also means, of course, that we as the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science, will have to take a critical look at ourselves and our policy.

The policy As a ministry we are going to consult with students and teachers much more than in the past. This approach will give us a better perception of the problems and the A M O N G S T P R O F E S S O R S ? A M O N G S T S T U D E N T S ? O R A M O N G S T A D M I N I S T R AT O R S ?

45

opportunities for increasing quality. In this context, we are working on the following concrete measures.

Fewer rules, less bureaucracy Education and research must not be hindered by unnecessary bureaucracy and restrictive legislation and regulations. The Higher Education Act was not exactly a paragon of deregulation. This situation simply has to end. The point of departure for the new Higher Education Act is therefore that we only regulate what really has to be regulated.

More say for students The voice of students is crucial for a properly functioning university. After all, students are the pivot around which the entire university world revolves. From their point of view, therefore, they are the best inspectors of quality at universities and colleges of higher education. That is why I am going to work hard to ensure that students are given a proper say, with the focus primarily on quality.

Transparent information to permit the right choice of study The right student in the right place: that is an absolute condition for inspired studying. Students must acquire information concerning the different study opportunities. And it has to be possible to gain an insight into, and compare, the quality of courses. It was for this reason that we issued Kennis in Kaart [‘An Analysis of Knowledge’] last year. If I remember correctly, this did not get an equally enthusiastic reception at every university… Nevertheless, I still believe in comparative research into universities and colleges of higher education, including at the European level. My intention is not to attach a value judgement to the data but rather to make it possible for students to ascertain in a straightforward manner which university or college of higher education best fulfils their needs.

‘Clearing the way for talent’ experiments Higher education is being characterised more and more by the maximisation of accessibility and the possibilities for transfers. The advantage of this is that larger and larger groups are now participating in higher education. However, the disadvantage is that, to a lot students, education is not much of a challenge. That is the reason why more space needs to be created for excellence. In order to achieve this, we are starting experiments, this year and next, relating to courses with ‘recognised and clear added value’, based partly on the application of selection at the point of intake and an increase in tuition fees. This kind of experiment is intended to stimulate universities to reflect more on the quality and the profile of the courses they offer. 46

MARK RUTTE

The aim What is this all supposed to lead to? I started this speech by focusing on perceptions and I would like to end in the same way by presenting a view of the future in the Netherlands. More and more foreign students are coming to the Netherlands and more and more Dutch students are going abroad to study. Higher education in the Netherlands has an A-brand status abroad. At least one of our institutions is high on the list of the top-50 universities worldwide. Dutch knowledge workers are valued around the world for their cultural added value. They are regarded as being able to combine their high level of knowledge with huge optimism and as being creative and enthusiastic. They are informal networkers who know better than anyone else how to deal with differences and they also have considerable critical faculties. Above all, if I look towards the near future, I see an academic world focused on inspired education. An academic world dominated by curiosity. In which the emphasis is on the value of education and in which people encourage each other to get the best out of themselves, based on personal responsibility and on social responsibility.

Conclusion Whose university is it? And whose university should it be? My answer to this question is loud and clear: to students, and to teachers and researchers. In other words, the consumers of education and the professionals. And not to the administrators whom I regard rather as oil for the cogs. They are an indispensable but not the most important component. The real focus is the students and the teachers and researchers. So, in so far as this is not the case, I want to contribute to universities being returned to students and teachers because that ownership is absolutely crucial for inspired education. And for universities at which the academic flame burns brightly again. I am pleased that I, in contrast to vice-chancellor Prof. Dr Iwert Meinema in Onder professoren, have been able to complete my speech and that I have not had to terminate my speech prematurely due to the activities of – in this case perhaps – angry administrators. This gives me every confidence that we can conduct the debate on whose university it is on the basis of sound consultation. I would like to conclude my contribution here with a small but telling anecdote. This anecdote concerns a question that was asked of the French writer, playwright and film director Jean Cocteau. The question was: “Monsieur, if your house were on fire and you had saved your loved ones from the burning house, you who have such a beautiful collection of books and art, what would you save from the fire?” Cocteau replied, without batting an eyelid and apparently without even thinking: ‘The flame of course. I would save the flame.’” A M O N G S T P R O F E S S O R S ? A M O N G S T S T U D E N T S ? O R A M O N G S T A D M I N I S T R AT O R S ?

47

Elselijn Kingma, student LUMC

Where is the student??? Elselijn Kingma

I could not just do what I felt like, when professor Klasen asked me to give you a speech; he gave me a mission and whether that turns out to be a mission impossible, that remains to be seen. I was asked to represent the perspective of a student and I forgot to ask at that moment, did he mean, “the student” or “a student”. Because the perspective of “a student”, I am able to give, it is my own. But whether I can represent “the student” I cannot vouch for, I am reluctant to think that I can. My perspective is colored. I studied medicine here, a study known for its academic rigor or challenging philosophies, and I studied psychology, where the average classroom has three hundred students. I rarely went to those classes. I am currently studying in Cambridge in a small department of history, philosophy and science, where the business of science itself is continuously questioned whenever I stumble across my professors in the coffee room. I don’t know whether this background played a role in my being asked to speak at this symposium. It may give some useful perspectives, but it is hard to disentangle the cause of contributing factors, is it just the teaching system, is it selection, is it culture or is it mainly subject matter and a difference in department size. Now I leave it up to you to determine that, but it’s dangerous because you might just take away what fits in your particular framework. But at the same time you are all academics and you are all aware of the dangers of attributing causality that says you don’t get carried away with that, I won’t. Professor Klasen explicitly told me last night to be critical, so I will be. But also there are the students whom I am supposed to represent and I feel responsible for them. Now I did some asking around amongst my friends and I must confess, they were all women. That’s a refreshing change perhaps if I look at all the other speakers sitting here on the first bench. I asked them whether they could find themselves in my ideas and they did; so this will be a mixture, a mixture of my perspective and a mixture hopefully of the perspective of my friends and the people around me. I am not very good at making choices and people often warn me for doing two jobs that are half done, so feel free to give me feedback afterwards because I am a student and I like learning. So the title of my speech is “Where is the student???” with three question marks, since it is going to be split up into three questions, Where is the student in society? Where is the student and where is the professor? And where is the student in the future? I hope it fits in with the “whose university is it anyway” theme. I am just going to use the chance to voice my opinion. So where is the student in society or perhaps where is the university in society? Now I need to give a bit of backgroundWHERE IS THE STUDENT???

49

information and I need to set the ground for what I am going to talk about. I can’t build up this argument from scratch and obviously I did not do enough background reading so I can’t really fit notes, but I will try to make an educated guess, hopefully educated. I do not need to tell you about the roles of the university, you probably know more about that than I do. I think there are many things a university needs to do and many of them Leiden does very very well. Leiden educates people, it turns out decent doctors, it turns out decent lawyers, we don’t produce engineers but I spent sufficient time in Delft during my time in Leiden to check that they do a decent job there; and also we develop people, we allow them to reach their potential. The university lets us play sports, it lets us organize the more and the less serious aspects of the students life. It allows us to have a great, diverse and fruitful life, I definitely did. It stimulates this and it should. ‘Studentenverenigingen’, a word that is as untranslatable as well as unpronounceable as is ‘gezelligheid’, are our prized possession and they should remain so. And also, Leiden does good research, it does great research, so what is the problem? I think that the problem lies with exactly what Leiden is trying to do at the moment. It is trying to cater for its most talented students and more in general it lies with education. Now there, Professor Klasen, is your critical note, I hope, because in fostering talent, I think that Leiden teaches but fails. Should Leiden aim for talent, it desperately wants to be vierhonderdendertig jaar talentgericht, but should it? I think yes and no, we should be realistic. I don’t think Leiden should try to be another Harvard. It is not only unrealistic if we listen to prof. Thomas about endowment, but also I doubt that it is something we should aim for. First of all Leiden has far too large a role as a public institution that should turn out those doctors and it should turn out those lawyers even though we could question if we really need them. In that respect Leiden does a good job and that is also what students want, they want to have a good education and they want to have a good life in which they can develop themselves. Leiden does that well and should remain doing so. Yet at the same time I also think Leiden has a role to foster talent. It needs talent as an academic goal, as an end in itself. But it also needs it to guarantee research, to guarantee education in the future and a spinoff that comes off that invention, progress and freedom. Now let me give you an analogy here. I run a rowing club. Now I could try to have all the international top rowers, that’s what Harvard tries to do and it buys them, but I can’t do that, so what do I do: I recruit a large group of people, I teach them how to row and for the first boat I select people that are tall, that are strong, lean and learn well. And I select one of the tiny people with a very big mouth, which is really very important. Now I think that is what Leiden needs to do. Leiden needs to select that first boat and focus on it and then make that first boat work hard. At the same time I also have all my other boats and all my other rowers. And they are not the first boat, they won’t win Henley, but they are important and we let them row too. They sustain rowing, they provide coaches, they keep it fun, they mend the bar, they 50

ELSELIJN KINGMA

run the whole enterprise, they are generally important for themselves and to make sure that the first boat can win Henley. So that is actually how a university works, that’s what Leiden should do. It should not need to be Harvard overall, because it is Leiden and that is commendable, but it should find that first boat, select those people and work hard, and to that boat, to those people, it can be Cambridge and it should be Harvard. So I think that is a realistic aim and I think that is where Leiden fails. Now let me tell you a story. Last Tuesday I had a supervision. Now what is a supervision? I spent some time in the library behind my computer. I weep, sweat, moan, groan and winch, and I turn out something like this - my draft for my interview, which is due on Monday. I send it to my supervisor and I turn up in his room and I say, “Hi Peter, how are you?” Peter is also known as professor Lipton, head of the department and sort of semi-god on philosophy. And Peter says in an American accent, “Hi Elly, how are you?” and I say, well that depends on my dissertation. “Oh well let’s have a look at your dissertation.” And then we spend one and a half hour just talking about my dissertation and he pushes me and I try to argue back and he approaches it from a different angle and I argue back and I cannot convey to you how fantastic that is. That is the complete fulfillment of my academic dream and if that is what academia has to offer, I am willing to stay for the rest of my life. And not only do I thoroughly enjoy this, I also get the impression that Peter, that is Professor Lipton, does as well. Now let me tell you the other story. It is eight thirty five, I have a ‘werkgroep’, tutorial group. I am late and not prepared. Why should I, I have to learn my exam in one day. If I prepare the ‘werkgroep’, it will only be more boring than it already is as nothing new will be offered; and if I ask a question not only will my classmates look at me as if I am an alien, which I don’t care that much about, but also the tutor will sort of go pale and mumble something about ‘beyond the material’ and ‘coffee break’. Now so I will go off and I will spend my time doing fun stuff and Leiden has a lot to offer in that respect. But where is the difference, that is what I have been asking myself ever since I arrived in Cambridge. Where is the difference? Is it me, I mean I am the same person, Easyjet does not inject twenty extra IQ points or a whole batch of motivation in me as I fly over the North Sea. So is it the tutor then, is Peter Lipton really so much better than what everyone has to offer at Leiden. Now I don’t think so, I refuse to believe that and I know it’s not true, all of us know that that is not true. In the Leiden university medical center we have good people, we have people that set the very highest standards in the world, but I don’t see them and that is not just my perspective. That is the perspective that every single student I talked to has confirmed, we don’t see them. Whether we are sailing to two degrees or whether we struggle to get our thirty points a year, there is no reward, there is no incentive. We don’t see the good people because a supervision like that is a reward in itself, not just to me but also to people who perhaps struggle harder to get through university, so where is the professor? Yet when I talk to professors they tell WHERE IS THE STUDENT???

51

me the opposite story, when they give a tutorial group, you know, where are the stimulating talents of the students? So understandably, they stop teaching, they pass it on to their PhD’s, they become slack, they become unmotivated and I can see this. Where is that hole in the wall, how should Leiden bridge this gap? I think that is the real problem – how do you match the talented student with a talented professor? I don’t think that is something we should aim to do on a systemic level. Harvard can do that, Cambridge can perhaps do that as well. We should not try to do that with every one, but, and here we go back to the first boat: if Leiden wants to do something it should identify those people, it should identify the first boat and it should place the good coaches on it and then that boat should flourish and that should not be imposed on the rest of the rowing club. But, interestingly, those clubs with a good first boat also have a good second and have a good third, there are spinoffs, people pop in and out and then you make people work hard. I don’t think I have time to go into this, but I do think there is more of a culture of working hard in Cambridge than there is here. That also is something that is confirmed by my friends, whether they are really right or whether they try to struggle to get their degree, everyone says: “No one really works hard.” There is no culture of working hard, so this is what Leiden should do, if it should really focus on the really talented students. Now what about the students that can’t quite make it, isn’t that unfair? No, I don’t think so. I mean, first of all I think the university has a certain accountability towards the taxpayer, they should just turn out all those lawyers and all those doctors that are just good, but out of no particular need for a huge catered fostering talent thing. They all have a need, as well, for seeing their professors. That outcry that I give, of where are the good people, is real for all the students. But I think this is what Leiden should do. It has good students, it has good professors, it needs to identify them and bring them together. It has those resources and now, therefore, it should be done. Otherwise, where will the students be in the future? Well, they won’t be here. There will be students, yes, but the good ones will be pulled away. I feel that pull, it is strong, it is tempting, it is very tempting. Yet every time I’m here, I want to stay. Leiden has many strengths, it has many good things, if only it would offer that tiny bit of Cambridge, that tiny bit of one on one, really good academic challenge. And that is something that it can offer. If it doesn’t do that, there will be no first boat. No rowing club will say, we have eight good rowers, let’s put one in each boat. If you do so, not only will you have eight mediocre boats, hardly better than they otherwise would have been, but also your talents will not develop. Worse, they will leave. And for a university that will also mean a financial close-out. The University of Leiden gets paid per graduated head, the ones that graduate quickly pay for the ones that graduate slowly. If the ones that graduate quickly leave, there will be no money left. Now, I hope that I’ve given you somewhat of the perspective of a student. At least I’ve given you my perspective. I hope I’ve given you some useful points. Bas Haring 52

ELSELIJN KINGMA

will tell you about motivated people, about the university of the willing. Mark Rutte also spoke about the student that should be motivated. But motivation is not all internal. We all know this. I can be honest, I didn’t do it all myself, I am lazy, I need some stimulation. Now I thought Hans Adriaansens was going to talk to you about the benefits of selection so I wanted to delegate that to him. I think we should only select for that first boat, but perhaps Professor Adriaansens can explain why he thinks the Netherlands is big enough for two university colleges. Because I think we should foster talent, not dilute it. Let’s not kid ourselves, Cambridge is not that rich, some of what they do we can do too. At the same time, let’s not kid ourselves. We cannot be Harvard but also, we don’t want to be Harvard. My Harvard classmates are annoying and it took me half a year to talk to them about anything else than the endowment. So let’s be Leiden and let’s think Leiden. Leiden is good, we have all the good things we have. But don’t talk about foster talent, foster talent. Be a Cambridge to a talented student and be Leiden to everyone. Now don’t forget to ask people to step in and out of that first boat occasionally. Do put your coaches, your Nobel Prize winners on that first boat, but don’t dilute. The club with the best first boat is attractive. That is where people will go. We have the resources to do this, the people, the students, it just needs to be done. Grab the good people, hold them, bring them together, that’s what the university should be, a dating agency. If this is achieved, people will stick and flourish you know, it just goes on. So Professor Klasen, I hope you have had the student’s perspective. I hope I fulfilled the role or the mission I was given. I also hope you have had your critical note. I hope it was constructive. Now I’m no good decision maker. I feel the pull both ways. I don’t really want to stay in Cambridge. I like Leiden very much, so I just hope that Leiden will pull hard enough. I have told you how.

WHERE IS THE STUDENT???

53

Frans van Vught, President Emeritus University of Twente

Reputation, market and deregulation* Unfolding the future of Dutch higher education Frans van Vught

I once was a professor at this distinguished university. Something of which I am very proud. So it is with special pleasure that I offer my sincere and warmest congratulations to my friends and colleagues of this wonderful university on its birthday. It is a special treat that I can be here after so many years. Having been a professor of forecasting at this university, I thought perhaps what I should do is try to speak about a possible future of higher education in the Netherlands. Not so much a prediction, rather a description of a few trends and a conclusion based on these trends. I will use an analytical perspective and especially try to discuss the dynamics of higher education systems. My discussion addresses basically any system, at least in the western world and especially those like ours in which the autonomy of higher education institutions is increasing and the competition between institutions is growing. So let me offer you this analytical perspective, which is rather straightforward and simple (Figure 1). Explaining the dynamics of higher education systems: From elite to mass higher education Quality control Funding Higher Education Policy

Conduct by actors involved

▼

▼ ▼

▼ Higher education market structure

Dynamics of higher education systems

Number of actors

Pricing

Diversity of programmes/institutions

Cooperation/competition

Barriers to entry/exit

Strategic behaviour

Figure 1

* This text is the edited result of the notes that were taken during the presentation. It is not a full paper. Frans van Vught

R E P U TAT I O N , M A R K E T A N D D E R E G U L AT I O N

55

I will assume that the dynamics of a higher education system are influenced first of all by the behavior of the actors involved, i.e. both the clients and the suppliers of higher education. Secondly that their behavior is influenced by what I have called at this slide the market structure, in which they both operate. And finally I will assume that both the market structure in higher education systems and the behavior of higher education institutions are influenced by higher education policies regarding issues like participation rates, quality and funding. On the overhead I have indicated a number of variables that appear to be relevant. I will not go into all the details. But let me indicate a few things. The behavior of the actors (both the clients and the suppliers) to a large extent can be described by the level of pricing that they agree upon; by the intensity of their cooperation and competition with or amongst one another and by their strategic orientations. The market structure can be described by the number of actors in the market, by their diversity and by the barriers to entry to or exit out of the market. Higher education policy, as we all know, involves things like the massification of higher education, its quality assurance and control and certainly also the funding of higher education. What I would like to suggest as the basic explanatory mechanism for the dynamics of a higher education system in this context of higher education dynamics is the concept of institutional reputation, which I would like to define as the level of prestige that a higher education institution and university has in the eyes of the public; not in their own eyes but in the eyes of others. So in other words, the reputation of a higher education institution is about the perception the institution creates about its quality, about its relevance, about its trustworthiness, etcetera (Figure 2). Basic explanatory mechanism: institutional reputation • Reputation: level of prestige as assumed by the public • Higher education institutions maximise their reputation by: • hiring the best possible faculty • selecting the most qualified students

Figure 2

I argue that, given the market structure an institution operates in, and given the context of the higher education policies it is confronted with, it is the reputational behavior that explains the dynamics of a higher education system. Higher education institutions in any system in the western world try to maximize their reputation by hiring the best faculty and by recruiting the most talented students (I will come back to this point later). Let me first say a few words about the general directions of higher education poli56

F R A N S VA N V U G H T

cy-making. In other words, what are the trends in higher education policies across the western world (Figure 3)? In nearly all western industrialized countries there is Higher education policies across the world: • From state control to state supervision • Encourage diversity and competition • Create/stimulate higher education markets

Figure 3

a decrease of state control. In most higher education systems the national governments are trying to step away from detailed control on higher education, getting involved, more than before, with supervisory roles. Secondly, in nearly every higher education policy across the world and certainly the western world, there is an increasing emphasis on diversity and competition. Nearly all governments (for instance in the European Union) are trying to encourage diversity in their higher education systems and are trying to increase the competition in higher education systems. In addition, nearly all governments in the western industrialized countries are trying to create a higher education market (Figure 4). ‘Market’ is a word that is, I The changing market structure in higher education: • Decrease of costs of geographical mobility • Increase of information on (presumed) quality


From ‘regional monopolies’ to ‘integrated market’

Figure 4

think, most often heard in higher education policies these days, certainly in Western Europe. What could we say about the market structure in higher education systems? Let me again offer you some very general trends, which I think are empirically, clearly visible in for instance the United States, the United Kingdom and a large number of Western European countries. First there is clearly a decrease of costs of geographical mobility. In the European Union, we talk about mobility programs that have been designed to stimulate geographical mobility. In the US, the mobility of students has increased dramatically over the last 25 years. The second trend relates to the increase of information on quality (or presumed quality). Compared to, say, 30 years ago, there now is more information available on the quality of higher educaR E P U TAT I O N , M A R K E T A N D D E R E G U L AT I O N

57

tion. There are more benchmarks, there are more rankings; there are more student satisfaction polls. The result of these two trends, I argue, is a development from what I’ve called here a market of regional monopolies (where higher education institutions are largely regional players with a regional intake and a regional impact on their networks) to a market which is more integrated (where higher education institutions are confronted with a large number of competitors and where the clients, the students especially, are able to use their ‘consumer’s sovereignty’, to choose amongst a very large number of institutions) (Figure 5). Deregulation policies stimulate this process: • More autonomy for higher education institutions • Increased competition • Search for more private funding

Figure 5

I’d like to stress here that the higher education policies, generally speaking, appear to stimulate this trend of the development towards an integrated market structure by actually increasingly providing more autonomy for higher education institutions, by stimulating competition and certainly also urging higher education institutions to search for more private funding (Figure 6). Explaining the dynamics of higher education systems: • Higher education is ‘experience good’ • Information asymmetry

• Towards an ‘integrated market’

• Increased autonomy • Increased competition

▼ • ‘Reputation race’

Figure 6

What is the effect of all these trends? Before I answer that question, I should perhaps point out that higher education and research are ‘experienced goods’. The quality of higher education and the quality of a research output can only be judged by experi58

F R A N S VA N V U G H T

encing it. Only by consuming it, as we would say in economics, are the clients able to find out what the quality of the services or products are that have been offered to them. This is a well-known ‘market failure’: the well-known problem of imperfect information or information asymmetry. And the existence of this market failure in higher education has a crucial effect. Because the clients of higher education institutions are unable to judge the quality of the products or services that are being provided by higher education institutions, these institutions are able to manipulate that quality information. Let us go back to the general trends. As you will remember, on the one hand, there is this trend from a market of regional monopolies towards a market of further integration. And this trend is reinforced by higher education policies because of their emphasis on increased autonomy and increased competition between institutions. Taking these developments together, I argue, we see the appearance of a type of dynamics in systems of higher education (certainly also in this country) in which universities, higher education institutions at large, engage in a sort of arms race, a reputation race, a race of trying to invest more and more in their reputation. Higher education institutions will do anything that they can to increase their reputation. Of course they will try to increase their quality, or perhaps better, the perception of their quality. Of course they try to increase their popularity as top-level institutions and they will do this by all kinds of means. They will show that they have the best scholars; they will show that they have the best facilities; they will be the most selective of all; they will show that they are respected institutions; they will argue that they are the internationally best known, etcetera. And perhaps even more important: higher education institutions will use all the funding, all the resources that they have at their disposal to do this. In extremo this implies that, rather than serving their clients’ needs, higher education institutions will focus their efforts on trying to get more resources in order to be able to influence the perceptions that the public has of their quality. And they will do more so, the more autonomy they have, and the more resources they have. The reputation race creates a hunger for resources. In the US, for instance, we have seen an enormous explosion of costs and a dramatic increase of tuition fees (Figure 7). The effects of the reputation race: • Stronger collaboration with the private sector (entrepreneurial universities, knowledge transfer, IPR, science parks) • Professionalisation of university management (institutions strategies, financial planning, management teams, support structures) • Transformation of funding base (diversification, pricing, investments and loans) • Renewal of ‘academic elitism’ (entrance selection, high tuition/high aid, honours programs)

Figure 7

R E P U TAT I O N , M A R K E T A N D D E R E G U L AT I O N

59

What are the effects of the reputation race? I won’t go into all the details but just a few things. We see a stronger collaboration with the private sector (entrepreneurial universities, knowledge transfer, intellectual property rights, science parks, etcetera). We see increasingly a further professionalization of university management (financial planning, management teams, etcetera). We see a diversification of the funding base; we see pricing strategies; tuition fees are going up; investment strategies are being developed; increasingly universities are taking out loans from the private sector, etcetera. But let me point out one thing that I think is particularly interesting and worth our attention. This is what I’ve called here the renewal of academic elitism. Universities are increasingly trying to show that they are more elitist now than they have been, let’s say, twenty years ago. Academic elitism is back. As a strategy in the reputation race, higher education institutions have rediscovered elitism.

The effects of the reputation race: • A more pronounced institutional hierarchy • Greater inequality amongst universities • Increased social stratification amongst students

Figure 8

And there are other effects of the reputation race (Figure 8). At the level of higher education systems there is clearly the trend towards a more pronounced hierarchy of higher education institutions. There is also more inequality amongst universities, especially wealth inequality. As we all know, there is no level playing field in higher education systems. Therefore, the wealthier institutions, as we heard so often today already, are able to invest more in their reputation than the poorer institutions. Those who have will be given, also in higher education. Finally, there is an effect which is actually quite crucial from a social point of view. The reputation race leads to an increased social stratification of the student body. Partly based on merit but also partly based on the availability of financial resources, favoring those who are wealthier and therefore more able to go to the highly reputed institutions. My prediction with respect to the future of Dutch higher education is that we are only embarking on this process (Figure 9). We’re only starting our own reputation race. Will it develop in all its intensity as we know it from the United States, Australia, and increasingly the United Kingdom and New Zealand? I don’t know. But I do know that it also depends, to a large extent, on the policies that are being developed in our higher education system. This is something that our state secretary might want to keep in mind. Finally, the European dimension. It should be clear that also on a European scale the reputation race has started. As a matter of fact the European Commis60

F R A N S VA N V U G H T

Unfolding the future of Dutch higher education: • Intensity of the reputation race? • Future higher education policies? • The European dimension?

Figure 9

sion would really like to further stimulate the European reputation race. For the Dutch higher education institutions it might be far more interesting, rather than to focus on our own little race, to see how we can engage in that larger European race, that race for reputation on a European scale. This should also be a crucial focus of Dutch higher education policy. Because it is the European reputation race where the future of our universities will be.

R E P U TAT I O N , M A R K E T A N D D E R E G U L AT I O N

61

Hans Adriaansens, Rector of Roosevelt Academy, Middelburg

The context of excellence Hans Adriaansens

1. Excellence in higher education is the result of many variables. Most of these variables can be subsumed under two headings: individual qualities on the one hand and organizational context on the other. Individual qualities refer to both students and faculty; they focus on intelligence, drive, motivation and inspiration. Together they constitute the necessary condition for excellence in higher education and in scientific research. But it would be a serious mistake to think that these qualities also form a sufficient condition for excellence. One only needs to look around in Dutch universities to realize that being intelligent, driven, motivated or inspired at the start of one’s academic career is certainly not enough to also stay intelligent, driven, motivated and inspired for the entire period of study. Many students – and also many faculty – lose their drive as they proceed. And that is exactly where ‘context’ comes in. For unless individual qualities of students and faculty are embedded in a congenial and supporting type of organizational context, they prove to be less stable and less sustainable. This is why much talent gets wasted within the current university context. And seen from a slightly different perspective: this is also why much, mostly psychological, research has repeatedly shown that within Dutch universities intelligence and motivation are among the worst predictors of study success. 2. Notwithstanding these convincing research outcomes, Dutch discussions keep emphasizing the importance of individual qualities and personal dispositions. Context, on the other hand, remains virtually non-existent in these discussions; it is completely taken for granted and definitely not seen as an important factor in university excellence. It is even worse: the more research comes available showing that individual qualities play only a minor role in excellence, the more our universities focus on the belief that individual qualities are the only key to creating excellence. Social psychologists would consider this an interesting case of ‘cognitive dissonance’. I am now referring to Leon Festinger’s famous observation that the constant empirical frustration of sectarian beliefs has no other effect but to strengthen these beliefs, often to such an extent that the sectarians engage in widespread missionary activities. Apparently, the gap between belief and reality causes ‘cognitive dissonance’. From the believer’s point of view this gap needs to be filled, and the only way to do so is by convincing others of the truthfulness of an idea that has been proven wrong, time and again.

THE CONTEXT OF EXCELLENCE

63

3. Aspects of the university variant of this ‘cognitive dissonance’ are not difficult to find. For instance, the blaming of secondary schools for their allegedly substandard educational results has grown into a popular sport in university boardrooms. According to university officials schools for ‘vwo’ (A levels) have dramatically lowered their standards, they have not been able to instill a serious interest in science subjects and technical studies, they are held responsible for the fact that the vast majority of their graduates lack motivation, drive and elementary competencies. From my own personal experience I seriously doubt these allegations. From what I have experienced in interviewing prospective students for University College Utrecht and Roosevelt Academy Middelburg, from what I have seen and read over the years that these colleges have been functioning, from what I have seen during my frequent visits to such schools, I have come to think that the vwo graduates of today are intellectually more progressed than I was at the age of eighteen. When I compare their letters and papers with the ones I have written during my time at boarding school (and which letters have been scrupulously preserved by my mother…) I cannot but reach the conclusion that most of these worries and allegations are based on what I see as a typical babyboom bias. As far as I can see, the Dutch vwo degree is still a very valuable degree and is as such a good and positive measure of individual qualities and competencies. We should not forget that only 15 percent of the year-group manages to earn that degree, which percentage is exactly similar to the percentage of high-school graduates that are eligible for admission to the University of California, including Berkeley, UCLA and the seven campuses of that university. This puts the current discussion about selection in a somewhat different perspective. In the United States selection among high-school graduates is needed to ensure the level of intellectual competence required for university education. Here, in the Netherlands, the eligibility for university education is guaranteed by the selective nature of our secondary school system. And when this form of pre-selection doesn’t seem to be good enough any more – as many claim – we better pin our faith to improving the organizational context within which we ask these graduates to perform than to introducing new and additional forms of selection. 4. Therefore, given the positive value and relatively high standard of the Dutch vwo degree, universities should concentrate on establishing a congenial context, a context that is capable of developing the individual qualities of students and faculty alike. This is needed for all phases and differentiations within the university, whether we talk about the bachelor phase, the research school or the professional school. But the undergraduate or bachelor phase seems to be more vulnerable for the effects of an inadequate organizational context than the various graduate activities. Matters of scale, of numbers, but also of young age and adolescence make serious demands on its organizational context. I will therefore in the remainder of my contribution focus on these first three years of university education. I will sketch 64

HANS ADRIAANSENS

some essential elements of a context that meets the criterion of being supportive to the individual qualities with which vwo graduates enter university. It is my conviction that implementing these conditions will bring us closer to excellence in higher education. And it is also my conviction that by doing so we will return our university to the very people it belongs to, i.e. students and faculty. 5. A first condition I’d like to mention relates to the ‘Bologna’ distinction between the undergraduate and the graduate phase of university education. Although much has been said, thought and written about the Bologna distinction, its implementation has still a lot to be wished for. So far it has often resulted in a mere splitting up of an already existing program into two parts: Etikettenwechsel this is called in good German, and in Holland it often boils down to a reproduction of the former kandidaats en doctoraal. The additional – and more interesting – possibilities the Bologna distinction provides us with have only partly been used. Let me mention one of these extra chances. For me the most interesting aspect of the Bologna distinction is that the three major goals of universities could get their own organizational setting. Academic formation or Bildung, the specialization for research and the specialization for various professions: these three goals have always been difficult to balance in the traditional unphased system of Dutch universities. But with ‘Bologna’ they can get their own place: the goal of academic formation or Bildung will constitute the center of an undergraduate school of liberal arts & sciences; the research tasks form the focus of a graduate research school specifically meant for university Nachwuchs and corporate R&D, and the professional tasks can be implemented in a graduate professional school for doctors, lawyers, engineers, businessmen, journalists, priests and teachers. Given the three goals, their own organization would be advantageous to all three, for they don’t need to compete anymore within one and the same unphased and undifferentiated organization for attention and money. But while it is good for all aspects of university education, it is particularly advantageous to the undergraduate or bachelor phase. For the lack of distinction between goals and corresponding phases has had its worst effects on the first three years of academic study, the part that we now call the bachelor phase. Academic formation or Bildung hasn’t been given the same measure of importance as the other two goals. Research and professional education came first. University teachers were stimulated to put as much energy as possible into research. Undergraduate teaching was likely to be seen as a ‘load’, and many colleagues were tempted to take the easy way out – and often have done so. This phasing of goals into different organizational units or schools is the first of three conditions for adequate university education. A more or less autonomous undergraduate institute should focus on the goal of academic forming or Bildung, and prepare students for further (graduate) study in either a research or a professional specialization. There should be no misunderstanding about the most important educational objective of this undergraduate institute, preferably called ‘college’ or ‘academy’: it should offer an acadeTHE CONTEXT OF EXCELLENCE

65

mic/scholarly platform from which its graduates can be launched into various specialized graduate schools, into research or the professions. It is, in fact, the backbone of all university programs. 6. With the phasing secured, another important condition for adequate university education could take shape as well. Next to the phasing of goals into different organizational units, the scale of such units is also important. Ever since the massification of higher education had started in the early seventies, it became obvious that we have lost the ability to organize mass volume on a small-scale basis. Under the flag of the welfare state, many organizations in the public and semi-public domain have adopted an organizational model which I have once called the ‘episcopalian model’ in contrast to the ‘congregational model’ of organization: mass volume we could only organize here by layering the organizations themselves, not by transforming them into networks of relatively small and autonomous business units. Many American and some of the English universities have divided themselves up into a great number of schools and colleges. Such universities are not bundles of different studierichtingen (specialized degree programs) and faculteiten(faculties), like in Dutch universities, but networks of small schools and colleges. Good examples are the Oxbridge Universities: Oxford, in effect, has its 18,000 students distributed over 39 colleges; 39 almost identical colleges that have the same objectives but exist next to one another in relative autonomy, and – most importantly – they also compete with one another; Cambridge, for instance, has 31 colleges. At University College Utrecht and Roosevelt Academy Middelburg we have copied the scale of the (undergraduate) Oxbridge colleges: an average number of 600 students, enabling students and teachers to become acquainted with one another. We know that in a modern, knowledge intensive, institution being acquainted with one another constitutes an important production factor. It helps to maintain the motivation and drive with which students come to university. And particularly when these 600 students also gather in a residential setting instead of having to commute from distant places in the region or even the country, something like an academic community then emerges with the prospect for mutual stimulation. Within such a model, the university itself serves as the back-office of such colleges, as the facilitator that helps colleges and schools to concentrate entirely on their primary educational tasks. The advantage is that the college itself can suffice with only a marginal overhead. My personal ideal has always been that only one committee is responsible for the governing of a college, because if there is only one committee, it can’t write letters to other committees and there is no need for an endless circus of largely unproductive meetings. In this manner, space is created for professionals and students alike to literally ‘do their own thing’. 7. A further condition for streamlining undergraduate education has to do with the freedom that students as well as faculty need have to perform in an optimal way. 66

HANS ADRIAANSENS

Within the confines of a rigorously determined mission statement, this means that students and teachers must have the chance to optimize creativity without being harassed by bureaucratic rules and procedures. Rather than an enforced (and almost) compulsory set of courses, it should be possible to offer students a range of courses which permit flexibility of study. Only a very simple set of choice rules is needed to guarantee that every student’s program is worthy of a good bachelor’s degree. At University College and Roosevelt Academy we have four of those elementary choice rules: students are supposed to declare their major by the end of their first year; they can’t register for a 200-level course if they haven’t completed the corresponding 100-level course; they should spend 50 percent of their course load on a broadly defined major; and in at least three disciplines they should have reached the highest 300-level. A trajectory system of study, the studierichtingen system that is common practice in the Netherlands, would not fit into this new setup. Fixed studierichtingen are typically an aspect of the graduate, not undergraduate school. The same applies to faculty: they are asked to show their professionalism within a well-defined course program. The better the mission and goals of the organization are defined, the more the possibility for creativity to form. This is different from what we are used to in this country. Within a Dutch setting it has always been difficult to operate from sharply defined rules, the more so in a university context where bending the rules seems to have grown into a national sport. 8. Finally, there is a fourth condition which needs to be fulfilled to be able to offer high-grade undergraduate education. That condition I have called the ‘culture of variety’. What I am referring to also relates to the term ‘university’, to be seen as a blending of ‘unity’ and ‘diversity’. This works both ways. An institute with a welldefined goal should have the opportunity to make clear to prospective students what exactly is expected from them and what they in turn can expect from the institution. Some people call this selection. I see it mainly as matching, as making a serious contract between student and faculty. In the case of the two colleges I already mentioned, University College and Roosevelt Academy, it wouldn’t make sense if students or faculty would not comply with the mission statement of these institutions. While the participants, students and faculty, need to be ‘cut from the same mold’ (this is the unity aspect), they can be different in all other dimensions: gender, nationality, ethnicity, academic pursuit, ambition and so on. 9. When I look at the conditions for improving university education (the phasing of goals into separate organizational settings, the attempt to create institutions of adequate scale, the promotion of professional freedom for both students and faculty, and the contract between students and faculty at the start of one’s study career), I believe that, in the last five years, and particularly from the Dutch point of view, a beginning has been made. Four points are particularly worth summarizing: THE CONTEXT OF EXCELLENCE

67

a. The phasing of goals and their institutionalization in separate organizational units has already led to the existence of undergraduate institutions such as University College Utrecht, University College Maastricht and Roosevelt Academy Middelburg; these initiatives are now being imitated in several places in our country. b. In the near future the ‘small-within-large’ idea that I introduced, will replace the traditional ideas about large-scale efficiency. In this respect, it is to be expected that the undergraduate or bachelor department of the university will greatly deconcentrate in the coming decade. There will be more colleges within and outside of the traditional university centers. I expect that, next to the existing colleges in Utrecht, Maastricht and Middelburg, more of these small-scaled front-offices will take shape. c. Per school, college or academy a well-defined mission is necessary to give students and teachers optimal freedom. This idea is diametrically opposed to the ‘culture of compromise’ in our country. Students as well as teachers will – once and for all – finish with the sloppy, ‘anything goes’ culture that has defined the Dutch university for so long. The differentiation of schools and colleges accommodates a variety of ambitions and study habits d. Finally, the saying: Good research is necessary for good education, however true it is, can also be reversed. Only with good education at the undergraduate level can foundations be laid for what later will be good researchers and professionals. The undergraduate is first of all the domain of educators who will do research as well and know how to stimulate students to pursue interesting queries. The graduate level, then, is for researchers and professionals who will share their expertise with students and educate at the same time. To the extent that these recommendations are going to be taken into account, I believe that the final answer to the question ‘whose university is it?’ can be short and simple: students and faculty!

68

HANS ADRIAANSENS

Bas Haring, philosopher, computer scientist Leiden University

The university of the willing Bas Haring

Before I actually deal with the question of whose university is it, I would like to briefly comment on two earlier speeches we have heard today. I would like to start with the speech by Professor Van Vught in which he uses a very interesting phrase in my opinion and his phrase is the reputation race. That phrase of reputation race reminds me of the little creature called the dancing mosquito. Actually I don’t think this creature is actually a mosquito but that’s how you should translate it in Dutch. It is a little insect and the males of that particular insect attract women by giving the women a little present and this happened already zillions of years ago. So these males gave the women a small little insect that they caught and presented to the women and if the women liked this particular present, then they could have sex with that particular woman. Then one smart mosquito, a while ago, a long while ago, and presumably this mosquito was not smart at all, but this mosquito was able to pack the little mosquito in some hairy stuff. So he made a wrap around the little package, so to make the package more beautiful and as a side effect, it took quite a while for the women to unpack the insect and in the meantime the male could have sex with the particular woman. In the end actually nowadays these little creatures do the same thing, however there is nothing in the package. So really they just give a little wrap that has to be unwrapped by the women and they are fooled. I do not hope that the reputation race is for an empty package. That is the first comment I would like to give. The second comment is actually a personal dilemma, and it has to do with Elselijn’s story. At a certain stage she discusses the following picture: you have eight boats and you have eight very good rowers, what do you do? Do you put them in one boat or do you distribute them over the eight boats? I will now tell you a personal story, a little personal story. When I was eleven years old, I went to I think it’s called pre-university education. I came from preliminary education and I went to a school that was very uncompetitive, all the students in the class had their own personal level of education, they did their own things and they were individually stimulated. But to give you an example, I was way further with mathematics than many others in the class, but I didn’t feel that was something you should strive for. So I came at this new school and the biggest thing at that school was a tournament in baseball and that was the biggest thing that could happen. I actually proposed in my class, when I was eleven years old, to distribute the best baseball players over the two teams that our class could make and my class didn’t understand me. They said no, the best players go into one team and the not so good players, of which I was one, they had to go into another team. And I THE UNIVERSITY OF THE WILLING

71

really sincerely thought that distributing the good players over two teams would actually give the best results. I thought these people could stimulate each other, we could learn from each other and it was really something, I really wanted it to happen. The best team of my class was actually the Dutch champion of baseball a year later so that’s how it ended. I don’t know if this proposal that I did in class was a good proposal; it was really a personal dilemma. But actually if I look back at that particular proposal, there is some wisdom in it, I would say, and to strive for the best boat all the time is not necessarily a wise thing to do, not necessarily; it’s a personal dilemma I am struggling with actually, so I actually don’t know what I want in this. But anyway the topic of today is “whose university is it”. This is a question that you can ask a scientist, since it’s a question about facts, whose university is it, and it’s the kind of question scientists deal with. Actually this is not the kind of question I want to deal with today, I want to deal with an unscientific question, namely: whose university should it be? That is an unscientific question and I can only give my own personal opinion in that, so I am going to do that. The first question actually that you should have, if you hear the question “whose university should it be”, the first question actually is, “Oh, should there be an owner of the university then?” I mean why should there be an owner of the university? Apparently it seems very natural to think in ownership relations and that kind of thing if you ask this particular question. Do you know what a university is? Well that topic has been covered today, but do we know the meaning of this word “whose” and that is actually what I want to start with, since we have this interesting question whose university is it or whose university should it be. Well, whose hand is this, it is my hand, I possess this hand and I control this hand; it’s not the other way around, that my hand controls me. So there is a very evident and clear relation between me and my hand and there is a very evident ownership relation there. I have a girlfriend, her name is Chantal, and if you should ask someone whose girlfriend she is, then the answer will be, it is my girlfriend, it’s not your girlfriend luckily. But I do not control her in the way that I can control my hand. So the ownership relationship between me and my girlfriend is not so evident as is the case between me and my hand, and it is getting even more complex if you ask the question, whose brain is this in my head for example. Again, it is not your brain, it seems to be my brain. Well where is this I, who posseses this brain? Well that’s in the brain again, my I is in my brain. So actually you can also turn it around, my brain is owning me and there is not so much an evident ownership relationship between me and my brain. It seems to be evident, but actually it is not so evident at all. So this whole ownership question which we actually ask for if we ask the question, whose university is it, is a very complex question that seems to have answers but very often does not have answers at all. For example, you can ask the question, who owns our country? I have no clue. Who owns all the shared knowledge that we have? I don’t know who that who is. So how come we want an 72

BAS HARING

answer to that question? It’s not for nothing that we have this question, being the topic of discussion for a whole day. So apparently it is a topic that is of interest to us. Well, one of the reasons to ask the question is that an answer on that question is handy. It is handy to think in ownership relationships, it’s convenient to simplify the world that we have around us and to identify some main structures and to give them a name, that’s very convenient. But there is a danger in doing that, and to show you the danger, I will tell you a little story. When I finished my PhD a couple of years ago I worked for Shell, you know the oil company, and I had no clue what my business was. I had just worked for universities, I didn’t even study economics, I had no clue what a business was. So there I was at this huge corporation and I was being trained like everyone at Shell. They have a very luxurious training, I think it took eight weeks or something like that and you were being trained in everything how to drill for oil, what oil actually is and also what a business is and in this training we got a case, a business case, and in this particular case there was a fictitious department of Shell. This department made money, it was a profitable department and there were five people working in this particular department. It was indicated that if you would get rid of one of the five people, then this department would make the same amount of money and then the question was, “Who do you fire?” I thought, that is odd, if you fire one person and you make the same amount of money, then you just don’t fire someone, since you have one extra mouth to feed and that is wise so why not just have these five people there and give them their jobs. Well my teachers at Shell did not understand my question and they thought I was stupid since I didn’t have the right business instincts, namely people are a risk and the more people you have, the more risk you have, so you get them out as quickly as possible, since who owns the company, they said, that is the shareholders. So in their perception mine was an oldfashioned perception of ten years ago. In their perception the owner of a company is the shareholders and the result of that perception is that they, in my opinion, made a strange decision to fire someone or at least in this game. In my perception a business is not only owned by the shareholders but also by the people working there, they also own the company. That was not the perception of Shell. What I wanted to tell with this little story is that the ownership relationship that you think exists, has consequences for the decisions that you make. You think that there is some ownership relationship there, but actually it is not there, we only use those terms to structure the world around us and the consequences can be huge. To make my point clearer, I have to quote Jean Jacques Rousseau. Jean Jacques Rousseau is a French philosopher. I will quote him in English, since I do not speak French very well. I have it written down here so I will just read it: “The first man who, having fenced a piece of land, said, this is my land, and found people naïve enough to believe him, that first man is the true founder of civil society.” So we have a man who said, OK, this piece of land is mine. There is an ownership relationship between me and this piece of land and I control the piece of land. That’s this guy THE UNIVERSITY OF THE WILLING

73

saying that and you had other people around him agreeing, that is the beginning of civil society said Rousseau. Suddenly he gets control over that piece of land and he is the owner of that piece of land. Only because the other people believed him. You should know that a civil society is a bad thing in the eyes of Rousseau and it is not a good thing at all. So this one man claiming, I own this piece of land, is actually the beginning of the disaster, according to Rousseau. So thinking in ownership relationships is not always wise according to some people. So should we actually answer the question whose university is it, should we do so? There is a risk since if we say, for example, the students and the staff own the university, if I say so and if you agree on that, then suddenly it becomes true and they get power over the university, just by agreeing that they should have the power and that maybe is not what we want. Actually, I think that is not what we want. I don’t think even that the university should own itself. To make my point: I even don’t think that a university should own itself, since there is also a risk if we look at Shell where I worked. Those people at Shell thought that they owned Shell and they could tell what Shell should do, and they said, what we do is make money and that’s what they did. Shell in their eyes was a kind of machine with only one goal, making money. They owned this machine and they could decide what this machine was about. If we think that we own the university, we can decide that this machine, the university, is there for one goal, namely the creation of knowledge. And sometimes it seems as if the university thinks that it is there for that particular reason, sometimes it seems as if the university thinks, well, we have one big goal, we need to create knowledge and that’s what they do like hell, they keep on creating knowledge. I doubt if that really is what the university should be about. I will give a brief reaction to what Rutte said today. He used the word innovation and innovation is about creating knowledge, new things that were not there before. It’s a very hip word, innovation, and we think we should all strive to innovation but I don’t think that is right. Innovation is no goal in itself, why should we want innovation, it is just not true. We want quality, we do not need new things and new knowledge. We want good things and good knowledge, the creation of knowledge in itself is not a goal and the university should not think it is only there for creating knowledge, in my personal opinion. Actually I do not want to give an answer to the question whose university is it or whose university should it be, since I find it dangerous to answer that question. Nevertheless, I will give it a try and I will give it a try by defining, what I think the university should be, that’s the first. So what do I think a university should be? I think a university should be a place, the place, where our ideas and our knowledge come from. There is only one thing that really counts and that is the quality of our lives, that is the only real goal that really counts, knowledge in itself is not valuable, just like money there is only one thing, the quality of our lives. And I think the university should be the place to generate knowledge and ideas to improve the quality of our lives. Moreover, I think the university should realize that it has this particular role. If you look at the influence 74

BAS HARING

of science on our life it is huge, computer science, bio-technology, physics they all have changed the quality of our lives dramatically. I think the university should be conscious of this particular important role and I think also that the university should reflect on this particular role. So these are the what’s, this is what a university should be, I think. Naturally I am exaggerating a little since the university is much more than that, but these are the three points I want to highlight. Now the who, who owns the university then? If I want the university to be this I am going to steal a word. I do the same trick, and actually this trick has been done for me, as the homosexuals did in the seventies, they stole a word and this word was the word gay. Gay meant actually playful and they stole the word; they said, OK, we are the gay people. And we should steal a similar word and I would propose to steal the word bright. I didn’t do that myself, it was proposed to me. I think that the people who are curious, who want to know about the world, who are aware of that particular role, the bright people, that they should own the university. The difference between the bright people and the people in Elselijn’s first boat are the following, that the bright people are maybe in the first boat or maybe in the second, but not because they want to sit in the first boat. They are in this particular boat and they are confident they know what their role is in society. They are aware of their own influence in society and that’s the reason for them to be in the first or second boat. So I would like to end by rephrasing the question who should own our university, and if you would ask me, although I don’t want to answer the question, I would say: the bright people should.

THE UNIVERSITY OF THE WILLING

75

[Foto op linker pagina plaatsen met onderschrift (naam en functie); tekst beginnen op rechter pagina]

Tom Wolfe

Tom Wolfe (via monitor) and students

At the end of the symposium, the writer Tom Wolfe was interviewed by Nienke Venderbosch, Machteld Zee, Sigismund Nelissen, Paula Brenning, Bart de Haas, Ot de Wiljes and Anna Ravensbergen, students who had prepared this live interview on Tom Wolfe’s new novel about contemporary college life, I am Charlotte Simmons. A video of this interview may be found on the University website: www.leidenuniv.nl/ 77