Higher Education In Developing Countries

Explores the current crisis in higher education in developing countries and outlines a coherent vision of future progress. Authored by a body of experts from 13 countries convened by the World Bank and UNESCO to explore the future of higher education in the developing world.

This study is founded on several case studies which examine countries, including Thailand and Uganda, where impact analyses were done on World Bank loans dedicated to the expansion of higher education in science and technology. These two countries were chosen because they are in two different regions with dissimilar colonial histories and their loans are relatively recent. A case study on crossborder university partnerships also provides a model which other universities and development agencies may utilize when positioning higher education as a poverty reduction strategy. Delivering extensive frontline information on education, international development, and the challenges that follow, this book also includes a review of poverty reduction strategies as well as a theoretical framework that covers colonialism, development, and indigenous knowledge. This research conducted on the World Bank and the impact of its policies in two developing countries offers primary source information on work related to the topic. A major portion of the book looks at the effort put forth by U.S. universities in partnership with universities in developing countries for the purpose of using knowledge creation and dissemination as a poverty reduction strategy. The policy recommendations presented are useful for international development agencies like the World Bank, and the model demonstrated can be used by universities interested in cross-border partnerships across lines of economic development. This book will be invaluable to educational researchers, qualitative and ethnographic researchers, international development specialists, and scholars in international education.

This book focuses on how politics shapes the capacity and commitment of elites to tackle the learning crisis in six developing countries. It deploys a new conceptual framework to show how the type of political settlement shaptes the level of elite commitment and state capacity to improving learning outcomes.

This volume is the result of a policy seminar on Improvement and Innovation in Higher Education in Developing Countries, organized by the Economic Development Institute and the Population and Human Resources Department of the World Bank in collaboration with the Institute of Strategic and International Studies of Malaysia. The seminar was held in June 1991 in Kuala Lumpur. Twenty-two participants attended from Eastern Europe, Africa, Asia, the Middle East, Latin America, and the Caribbean. The first paper provides a report on the seminar, with discussion of five quality issues: access to higher education, financing of higher education, the relationship between government and higher education institutions, the role of higher education in developing science and technology, and the role of evaluation. Recommendations are listed, and appendixes to the paper list participants, the program, seminar papers, and session papers. The volume also includes the texts of the three session papers, including: "Keynote Address: Higher Education and Economic Development" (I. G. Patel); "Improvement and Innovation in Higher Education" (Adriaan M. Verspoor); and "The University System: Engine of Development in the New World Economy" (Manuel Castells). (References accompany two of the papers.) (JDD)

In addition to reducing geographical isolation, distance education, thanks to its more favourable cost structure, allows the monitoring of social and economic remoteness. It may thus have much to offer for developing countries. Digital technologies not only bring remote populations closer, they also permit the development of adapted and diversified pedagogical models, with an economic approach aiming at more than just economies of scale. This book examines some of the ways developing countries - in particular on the African continent, where needs often exceed resources - might benefit from distance education. The authors give particular attention to the development of higher education, its quality, productivity, and cost control.

This title was first published in 2001. Universities in developing countries have followed their counterparts in developed countries and adopted quality assurance to improve the quality of their activities. This text examines the wisdom of such a move when many of the conditions necessary for its success are not present. It concludes that quality assurance can be useful in developing countries because it shows how a university's seemingly disparate activities are related to one another to serve a common goal and how the quality of these can best be improved by using an integrated approach. Quality assurance also provides more focus and direction to the work of the traditional university system. However, it must be modified to suit the conditions prevailing in developing countries by being simple in design, modest in expectations and realistic in requirements.

Identifies five critical issues with which higher education institutions in the developing world must grapple as they respond to changing external contexts, offers examples of institutional responses to these issues, and considers these within a systems perspective which recognizes that each response impacts how institutions handle other critical issues. Half of the students enrolled in higher education worldwide live in developing countries. Yet, in many developing countries, government and education leaders express serious concerns about the ability of their colleges and universities to effectively respond to the pressures posed by changing demographics, new communication technologies, shifts in national political environments, and the increasing interconnectedness of national economies. This book identifies five critical issues with which higher education institutions in the developing world must grapple as they respond to these changing contexts: seeking a new balance in government-university relationships; coping with autonomy; managing expansion while preserving equity, raising quality, and controlling costs; addressing new pressures for accountability; and supporting academic staff in new roles. These papers offer examples of institutional responses and consider these within a systems perspective that recognizes that each response has a rippling effect impacting institutions' responses to other critical issues. Only as government and education leaders understand the interwoven nature of the problems now facing colleges and universities and the interconnections among the intended solutions they seek to implement can they offer effective leadership that strengthens the quality and improves the relevance of higher education in their countries.

Discussions on globalization now routinely focus on the economic impact of developing countries in Asia, Africa, the Middle East, the former Soviet Union and Latin America. Only twenty-five years ago, many developing countries were largely closed societies. Today, the growing power of “emerging markets” is reordering the geopolitical landscape. On a purchasing power parity basis, emerging economies now constitute half of the world’s economic activity. Financial markets too are seeing growing integration: Asia now accounts for 1/3 of world stock markets, more than double that of just 15 years ago. Given current trajectories, most economists predict that China and India alone will account for half of global output by 2050 (almost a complete return to their positions prior to the Industrial Revolution). How is higher education shaping and being shaped by these massive tectonic shifts? As education rises as a geopolitical priority, it has converged with discussions on economic policy and a global labor market. As part of the Routledge Studies in Emerging Societies series, this edited collection focuses on the globalization of higher education, particularly the increasing symbiosis between advanced and developing countries. Bringing together senior scholars, journalists, and practitioners from around the world, this collection explores the relatively new and changing higher education landscape.