Reforming University Studies

This chapter is a case study of a change of “legislation,” the formal conditions under which degree programs operate at “classical” research-driven universities. Before setting up our analytic and conceptual tools a brief history of our case:

The pressure was on at the Science Faculty at the University of Copenhagen in the middle 1990s: the Faculty had trouble making economic ends meet, and had been forced into budgetary cuts that reduced the scientific staff, in some departments by a quarter; the science degree programs were experiencing a drop in recruitment numbers; a large evaluation of these programs, covering the mathematical, physical and chemical fields, and all Danish universities who produced candidates with a Master of Science degree, had revealed rather high drop out rates, in some cases more than 50% (Danmark's Evaluerings Institut, 1999). There was an impression, among politicians, perhaps even among voters in general, and certainly voiced rather forcefully by influential lobbying organizations, such as the Confederation of Danish Industries (Dansk Industri), that many educational institutions were not fulfilling their share of the responsibility for educating the Danish youth, and that these universities were too costly, as well as too far removed from modern educational demands