Abstract
This chapter addresses certain presuppositions which, the author argues, undergird the Bologna process. These epistemological assumptions are considered in light of the theoretical and practical arguments concerning the legitimate aims and appropriate means to achieve them that were made in conjunction with the founding and expansion of the modern research university. In particular, this chapter focuses on the Enlightenment idea that the aim of higher education is primarily to cultivate the capacity for autonomous judgment. This ideal is then compared to the tools implemented in accordance with the Bologna Process, which explicitly aim at standardization, measurability, and predictability of both process and product (“outcomes”). In particular, the term “expected outcomes” and related notions are examined, and it is demonstrated that these indicate a shift of focus from training in a discipline as necessary for the capacity for judgment, to the form, where subject matter is conceived as extraneous to the achievement of desired outcomes (“skills” and “competencies”). This chapter argues that the Bologna model undermines the goals of liberal education by training students not to exercise independent judgment but to follow blindly formal protocols.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.
Buying options
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Learn about institutional subscriptionsNotes
- 1.
“Appropriez l’éducation de l’homme à l’homme, et non pas à ce qui n’est point lui. Ne voyez-vous pas qu’en travaillant à le former exclusivement pour un état, vous le rendez inutile à tout autre […]. Vous vous fiez à l’ordre actuel de la société sans songer que cet ordre est sujet à des révolutions inévitables, et qu’il vous est impossible de prévoir ni de prévenir celle qui peut regarder vos enfants.”
- 2.
One might be inclined to think that the current emphasis on “critical thinking” would constitute an example of this ideal. But, as I will argue, the automatized systems that have been introduced to train critical thinking as a general skill display in their conception and construction an instrumentalist interpretation of that goal which is remote from the ideal described here, and even at odds with it.
- 3.
This was an explicit concern, for example, in John Dewey’s classic Democracy and Education (Dewey 1916).
- 4.
For Mill, astronomy, biology, physics, and mathematics were as important and even indispensable elements of a general or liberal education as law, political science, and, for reasons that can be understood in terms of “multicultural awareness,” classical Greek.
- 5.
I have intentionally avoided reference to any of the established theoretical positions regarding the philosophy of education. In my view, the majority of explicitly normative positions (“perennialism,” “essentialism,” “progressivism,” etc.) in the main share the view that higher education ought to contribute something more both to the individual and to society than professional or vocational skills, if we are to justify the existence of institutions such as universities. Where there is disagreement, it has to do with what one takes these higher or broader aims to be and how these are best attained. I have not taken a clearly defined stance in that matter here, although I do suggest that the capacity for judgment (a philosophically difficult concept) is central.
- 6.
For a nuanced exposition and analysis of Gadamer’s idea of Bildung in a philosophical context, see Odenstedt 2008.
- 7.
For a comparison between former academic ideals and contemporary ones in this context, see Rider 2009.
References
Bologna Working Group on Qualifications Frameworks. (2005). A framework for qualifications of the European higher education area. Copenhagen: Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation.
Dewey, J. (1916). Democracy and education. An introduction to the philosophy of education. New York: The Macmillan Company.
Gadamer, H.-G. (1975). Truth and method. London: Sheed & Ward.
Gallie, W. B. (1964). Essentially contested concepts. In W. B. Gallie (Ed.), Philosophy and the historical understanding (pp. 157–191). London: Chatto & Windus.
Humboldt, W. v. (1963). Collected works, 1903. An anthology of the writings of Wilhelm von Humboldt: Humanist without portfolio (Vol. X, pp. 250–260) (M. Cowan, Trans.). Detroit: Wayne State University Press.
Kant, I. (1914). The critique of judgement (J. H. Bernard, Trans.). London: Macmillan.
Kant, I. (1977) [1803]. Über Pädagogik. Werkausgabe XII. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp.
Kant, I. (1979). The contest of the faculties (M. MacGregor, Trans.). New York: Abaris Books.
Kant, I. (1996 [1784]). Answer to the question: What is enlightenment? In What is enlightenment: Eighteenth-century answers and twentieth-century questions. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Kant, I. (1997 [1797]). Die Metaphysik der Sitten II: Metaphysische Anfangsgründe der Tugendlehre. In Werkausgabe VIII. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp.
Magna Charta Universitatum (1988). http://www.magna-charta.org/library/userfiles/file/mc_english.pdf. Accessed 11 Nov 2011.
Mill, J. S. (1984). Inaugural address delivered to the university of St. Andrews 1867. In J. M. Robson (Ed.), The collected works of John Stuart Mill, volume XXI – essays on equality, law, and education. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. http://oll.libertyfund.org/title/255/21681. Accessed 12 Apr 2011.
Odenstedt, A. (2008). Hegel and Gadamer on Bildung. The Southern Journal of Philosophy, XLVI, 559–580.
Readings, B. (1996). The university in ruins. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Rider, S. (2009). The future of the European university: Liberal democracy or authoritarian capitalism? Culture Unbound. Journal of Current Cultural Research, 1(3), 83–104.
Rousseau, J-J. (1969). Oeuvres complètes IV, livre III, Emile, ou de l’éducation, text établis par Charles Wirz. Paris: Éditions Gallimard.
Weber, M. (1947). The theory of social and economic organization (A. M. Henderson & T. Parsons, Trans.). New York: Oxford University Press.
Weber, M. (2004). Science as a vocation (1917). In D. Owen & T. Strong (Eds.), The vocation lectures. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2013 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Rider, S. (2013). Higher Heteronomy: Thinking through Modern University Education. In: Rider, S., Hasselberg, Y., Waluszewski, A. (eds) Transformations in Research, Higher Education and the Academic Market. Higher Education Dynamics, vol 39. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-5249-8_12
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-5249-8_12
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN: 978-94-007-5248-1
Online ISBN: 978-94-007-5249-8
eBook Packages: Humanities, Social Sciences and LawEducation (R0)