The Silent Treks of Transformative Thinkers and Successful Reformers in Higher Education: A European Experience

Abstract

The existence of exceptional individuals and individual contributions in higher education can hardly be denied. This is particularly true for, and accelerated in, the last five–six decades, which are special and unprecedented times in higher education, given in particular the shift to mass enrollment and the key role acquired by advanced knowledge, thus by university education and research, in furthering economic and social progress. And yet, the existence and contributions of exceptional individuals are not systematically studied by social scientists, including the scholars of higher education, irrespective of the disciplinary perspective that informs their approaches. These individuals and their contributions are largely ignored in the public arena and not acknowledged in public imaginary. In the age of massification, formidable thinkers, reformers of higher education, or just initiators of new and remarkable “technical” initiatives that impact the lives of millions of people work mostly unnoticed. If we choose to look at higher education policy, as an area of public policy, that is, outside the universities themselves, we can observe an interesting new phenomenon: changes of unprecedented magnitude have taken place according to a pre-defined, explicit design – as planned public policy reforms. In this paper, instead of “treks” we could as well talk about “traces”. More precisely, we can study traces that are left by those individuals (living human beings) who initiated, led or contributed decisively to consequential reform programs, policy blueprints or major actual transformations in higher education. Rather than continuing to talk about them in abstracto, we can illustrate with a representative example. Pavel Zgaga, to whom this volume is dedicated, has been one of the major reformers of the post-Cold War period in Europe. His contributions are at multiple levels and in many areas. They can be still traced in the otherwise unwritten, and for this reason uncertain and fading, recent history of higher education in this part of the world.