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Curriculum Trends in European Higher Education: The Pursuit of the Humboldtian University Ideas

  • Chapter
Higher Education, Stratification, and Workforce Development

Part of the book series: Higher Education Dynamics ((HEDY,volume 45))

Abstract

In this chapter we focus on how the restructuring of European higher education is manifested in curriculum policies with particular interest in the consequences for universities. By critically analyzing some core European higher education policy documents, we discuss how initiatives taken by the European Union (EU) and the Bologna Process may influence universities and challenge the Humboldtian ideas traditionally defining most European research-oriented universities. We concentrate the analysis and discussion on implications for educational purposes, educational knowledge and the notion of students. The analysis shows that the new architecture of European higher education implies new models of management and governance which implies new forms of controlling institutional processes of curriculum making. The new policy stands in sharp contrast to the ideas and principles of the Humboldtian tradition. As a consequence, and despite the fact that we need more empirical evidence, there are strong indications that universities move towards stronger entrepreneurial ideas and a utilitarian ethos defined by the employment market. This new orientation has consequences for staff and student formation, notions of academic freedom, priorities in curriculum development and teaching-learning. Our analysis suggests that current academics need to be more aware of the implications of current policy and critically discuss what we mean by academic freedom and which values worth fighting for under current circumstances – particularly with regards to the relationship between educational purposes, content and students.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Cf. Article 149 of the treaty on European union and of the treaty establishing the European community ”the community shall contribute to the development of quality education by encouraging cooperation between member states and, if necessary, by supporting and supplementing their action, while fully respecting the responsibility of the member states for the content of teaching and the organization of education systems and their cultural and linguistic diversity (European Union 2006).

  2. 2.

    Bildung is derived from bilden, to form or in some instances, to cultivate. It is conventionally translated as “education” although this does not cover the connotations the word has in German. Therefore, we leave the term in German. However, Gert Biesta’s way to approach the concept seems fruitful to remind us of the complexity and situatedness of the concept: ‘The concept of Bildung brings together the aspirations of all those who acknowledge – or hope – that education is more than the simple acquisition of knowledge and skills, that it is more than simply getting things “right,” but that it also has to do with nurturing the human person, that it has to do with individuality, subjectivity, in short, with “becoming and being somebody.” (Biesta 2002, p. 343). From 1810 Bildung was a key concept in German university teaching and education where the main purposes were to give the students advanced teaching based on research, ability to carry out scientific research on their own, and a large amount of scientific and philosophical knowledge within all academic disciplines such that they could act with dignity as members of the learned and academic society (Olesen 2010, p. 1).

  3. 3.

    Although the semantics of this text also includes a concern about the role of the societal responsibility of the university, e.g., “they must also serve society as a whole; and that the cultural, social and economic future of society requires, in particular, a considerable investment in continuing education”, we do not see this text as an merger between a Humboldtian discourse and a service discourse the way Fairclough and Wodak (2008) argue because the dominant vocabulary clearly can be connected to the core of Humboldtian ideas.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway

    Berit Karseth & Tone Dyrdal Solbrekke

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  1. Berit Karseth
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  2. Tone Dyrdal Solbrekke
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Correspondence to Berit Karseth .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Higher Education, University of Georgia, Athens, Georgia, USA

    Sheila Slaughter

  2. College of Education, University of North Texas, Denton, Texas, USA

    Barrett Jay Taylor

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Karseth, B., Solbrekke, T.D. (2016). Curriculum Trends in European Higher Education: The Pursuit of the Humboldtian University Ideas. In: Slaughter, S., Taylor, B. (eds) Higher Education, Stratification, and Workforce Development. Higher Education Dynamics, vol 45. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-21512-9_11

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-21512-9_11

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