Fit for Purpose?

The following sections are included:

• Preface
• Contents

In the last half of the previous century, and even more so in the past twenty years of this century, the world seems to have moved into a mode of accelerating change. That change has many drivers, like the growth of the world population, the increasing speed of the development of new technologies, the intensifying global connectivity, the unexpected consequences of collective human consumption and behavior, not to mention the synergies among those drivers. The impact of these changes manifests itself in threats to human societies like climate change, an accumulating soup of microplastics in the ocean, pandemics, resource scarcity and inequality, and an enormous variety of other problems that play out on a local, regional, and global level. Because of the uncertainties generated by the dynamics of these changes, the connection between science, universities and society is losing the stable context within which it evolved for most of the last few hundred years. That context enabled a system of reduced reality to take hold of the western world and, through western domination, to infest a large part of the non-western world with it…

The following sections are included:

• From then to now
• Towards the future
• Challenges to universities
• Epilogue

The following sections are included:

• Universities in early civilizations
• Mesopotamia
• Egypt
• China
• Japan and Korea
• India
• Minoan, Classical and Hellenistic world
• Greco–Roman times
• Persia
• Early Islamic world
• Europe
• Pre-Columbian Americas
• Sub-Saharan Africa
• Final thoughts

The future of the university — the singular rather than the plural! The subject of this volume is the future of the archetype, not of its many manifestations. Specific universities come and go, but the general idea of an institution dedicated to the pursuit of knowledge has demonstrated considerable staying power. Is there any reason to fear for its future?…

The following sections are included:

• An extraordinary moment
• The purpose of higher education
• Implications for the future role[s] of universities

Universities are social constructs, created to address the human need for knowledge to address the challenges from nature and other men. As social constructs, universities inevitably face the question of who do they serve — the individual, elites, state or humanity/planetary needs? This paper suggests that we need to think about universities as complex adaptive systems coevolving within their society, influenced by fashionable thinking about universities as businesses that should be managed as such. The paper examines the Chinese experience in rapidly building up universities to serve national/global roles, as well as how globalization of university education raised issues of geopolitical competition and university business models.

The following sections are included:

• Societal mandates for universities
• Global megatrends and formidable challenge for humanity
• Strength of the universities
• The economic impact of universities
• Challenges for the universities
• The formidable challenge of the mega trends: What needs to be fixed?
• Initiatives and examples of how to overcome some of the challenges
• Lead into the future
• Annex: Cases Discussed in this Chapter

The following sections are included:

• Introduction
• Conclusion
• What can be done?

The following sections are included:

• Preface
• Introduction: the need for change
• ASU 2003–2021: achievements and challenges
• Redesigning higher education
• The context of academic reorganization
• How to foster organizational change
• Conclusion

When Jan Vasbinder asked me to contribute to the book about futures of universities (“futures” as plural) I decided to ask young colleagues about their ideas and remain silent myself. Here are 18 opinions of present or former male (m) or female (f) students and colleagues from different countries. In each case it is indicated in which country at which university that they gathered their personal experiences. Most of them asked to remain anonymous for good reasons. It is important to note that hopes for the future and expressions of frustration are very similar although personal experiences come from many different countries across the globe…

The following sections are included:

• Bibliography
• Notes on the authors