Luc E. Weber and Sjur Bergan (eds)
Council of Europe higher education series No.2, Strasbourg, 2005
Public responsibiloity for higher education and research is a cornerstone of the European university heritage. Yet our societies are changing rapidly, and clinging to old solutions will not further the very values that these solutions were originally designed to protect. The claim on public attention and public funds is growing, but public funds are not, or at least not at the same rate. While public funding of higher education and research is still important, the concept of public responsibility must be understood much more widely. Different degrees and levels of public responsibility as well as the instruments available for exercising such responsibility should be examined.
The publication, which builds on the results of a Council of Europe conference, aims to explore what pubic responsibility means in the complex societies that have just crossed the threshold to the twenty-first century. It examines both overall policies on higher education and specific aspects of it, such as higher education for a democratic culture, access to research results, financing, equal opportunities, the approach to regulations and new trends in higher education.