The steering of higher education: a Hungarian case study (original) (raw)

Government Continues to Do Its Job. A Comparative Study of Governance Shifts in the Higher Education Sector

Public Administration, 2011

Governance in higher education has undergone certain substantial shifts in recent decades. In order to analyse this process from an empirical point of view, a specific understanding of governance, based on the role of the public power in question (state, government or another such power, depending on the context) has been assumed. Changes in systemic governance (and consequently also at the institutional level) are a product in particular of governments' responses to changes in their respective environments. This theoretical assumption, which in this particular study takes the form of a specific typology of governance modes, is employed to analyse those changes witnessed in higher education over the last 20 years. It does this by focusing on four specific national cases (England, Germany, Italy and The Netherlands). The empirical evidence shows that government continues to govern, and has not lost any of its policy-making power, but has simply changed the way it steers higher education.

Governance trends in European higher education

De Boer, H. & J. Huisman (forthcoming), Governance trends in European higher education. In: D. Jarvis & G. Capano (eds), Convergence and diversity in the governance of higher education: Comparative Perspectives. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2019

Reforming Higher Education in Europe: From State Regulation Towards New Managerialism

2000

The present study describes the changes in the traditional European model of higher education, its successes as well as failures. The remarkable expansion of higher education in Europe during the postwar period was the result of a shared belief in the virtue of higher education per se. The traditional m odel of higher education assumes a stable relationship of fair exchange between the State and the academics: the State gives power to the academics in the belief that in this way it will receive in return the forms of knowledge, basic research, and advanced education that will be of most value to itself.

The pendulum strikes back? An analysis of the evolution of Hungarian higher education governance and organisational structures since the 1980s

European Educational Research Journal, 2017

Higher education in Central Europe has been scrutinised from many different perspectives during the last 30 years. In our analysis, we focus solely on Hungary and specifically on two key areas: governance and organisational structure. Using an analytical model proposed by Leisyte (2014), we analyse how the governance and organisational structure of institutions have changed between 1985 and 2015, and consider what the driving forces might be behind these changes. Through our analysis, we found that the pendulum effect observed in organisational culture and leadership in Eastern Europe (Bakacsi, 2014) in periods of transition could also be identified in the governance models in Hungary. Despite evidence of a convergence of higher education policies in Bulgaria, Romania, Poland and the Czech Republic (Dobbins, 2011) towards the market-type model of higher education governance, we found that in Hungary the model is much more state-controlled and there is already an apparent move away f...

Towards Post-Bureaucratic Modes of Governance : A European Perspective

2012

In G. Steiner-Khamsi & F. Waldow (2012). Yearbook of Education. Policy Borrowing and Lending in Education Traditionally, in a legal and political sense, regulation is considered as the totality of institutional arrangements and control mechanisms and the framing of actions by a recognised political authority. Thus regulation is classically implemented through legislation and the directives of elected and appointed officials and is assimilated into rules and procedures. In other words, regulation is exercised through what is called in French règlementation. Accordingly, for almost 30 years, resulting from the impact of various factors (a public financial crisis, neoliberal critiques, globalisation, and individualisation of society), the welfare state has experienced crises of rationality and legitimacy and has sought new forms of action and intervention in society. Consequently, multiple practices and processes (decentralisation, deconcentration, contractualisation, evaluation, public-private partnerships, etc.) are developing to face the deficiencies of state bureaucratic interventions. Furthermore, we are witnessing the advancing of 'liberalisation', or privatisation and the market. It is in this context of public action's changing modalities that the notion of regulation extends beyond just rules and procedures. As a concept, the notion of regulation allows for the consideration and implementation of new forms of intervention and roles for the state (Commaille and Jobert 1998) in a context of governance (Stoker 1998). In this new context, political regulation is thus much greater than the actions of control and administration stemming from the 'top' regulation results from an intertwining of actions and coordinating measures, in continuous interaction. Regulation relies on varied institutional arrangements (rules and incentives established by public authorities, market mechanisms, hierarchical organisation, coalitions of organisations, and communities more or less sharing

The policy of school autonomy and the reform of educational administration Hungarian changes in an East European perspective

International Review of Education, 1993

The paper presents the background, the main elements and the contradictions of the reform of educational administration in Hungary in the late '80s in a Central and East European perspective. It also tries to provide an analysis of the challenges that have emerged with the political changes of the '90s. The introductory part of the paper analyses the differences between policies of decentralization in Eastern and Western Europe. In the second part, the most important changes introduced by the 1985 Hungarian Education Act are summarized, and the policy background of these changes is presented. It is assumed that the policy behind the decentralization measures had a negative character: it intended more to abolish the existing structures of control than to establish new ones. In the final part of the paper those factors are presented which may play a role in the future for or against the policy of decentralization. Zusammenfassung-Dieser Artikel befal3t sich mit Hintergrund, Hauptelementen und Widersprtichen der Reformen der ungarischen Bildungsverwaltung in den sp~iten 80ern aus zentral-und osteurop~iischer Perspektive. Er versucht aul3erdem, die Herausforderungen zu analysieren, die mit den politischen ,~nderungen der 90er Jahre einhergingen. Der erste Teil des Artikels untersucht die Unterschiede in der Dezentralisierungspolitik in Ost-und Westeuropa. Der zweite Teil fal3t die wichtigsten vom ungarischen Bildungsgesetz von 1985 eingeftihrten ,~nderungen zusammen und geht auf den politischen Hintergrund dazu ein. Es wird vermutet, dab die Politik hinter den Dezentralisierungsmagnahmen negativen Charakter hatte: man wollte eher die bestehenden Kontrollmechanismen abbauen als neue einftihren. Der Schlul3teil des Artikels stellt die Faktoren dar, die sich in Zukunft positiv oder negativ auf eine Politik der Dezentralisierung auswirken kSnnten. R6sum6-Cet article pr6sente le contexte, les 616ments majeurs et les contradictions de la r6forme de l'administration de l'6ducation introduite en Hongrie ~ la fin des ann6es quatre-vingt dans la perspective de l'Europe centrale et de l'Est. I1 tente, par ailleurs, d'analyser les d6fis qui ont 6merg6 avec les changements politiques apparus dans les ann6es quatre-vingt-dix. L'introduction de l'article analyse la diff6rence entre les politiques de d6centralisation en Europe de l'Est et de l'Ouest. La deuxi~me partie renferme un r6sum6 des changements majeurs introduits par la loi sur l'6ducation hongroise de 1985 et une pr6sentation du contexte politique de ces 6v6nements. L'auteur pr&end que la politique sous-jacente aux mesures de d6centralisation avait un caract~re n6gatif: elle visait davantage ~t abolir les structures de contr61e en place qu'~ en 6tablir de nouvelles. La derni~re partie de l'article pr6sente les facteurs pouvant jouer un r61e ~ l'avenir pour ou contre cette politique de d6centralisation. The political transformation in most Eastern and Central European countries has been accompanied by changes in the governance of education. Looking