The European and American University since 1800
The European and American University since 1800
Bjorn Wittrock, Göteborgs Universitet, Sweden
Universities are said to be the 'powerhouses' of modern society. They educate leaders and advance our basic knowledge of nature and society. Yet historically they have been vulnerable when meeting the challenges of dynamic industrial democracies or indeed of modern totalitarian states. Today universities are at the centre of society's attention and must therefore balance a great number of contradictory demands and pressures. Can this be done within the structure and ethos of an historic institution called a 'university', or are such institutions now passé and merely part of a bureaucratically managed higher education 'system'? These essays discuss the ways in which universities have coped with complexity since 1800, while retaining their basic 'idea'. Special attention is accorded to the role of the State and the autonomous professions in defining the mission of universities and in their struggle for individuality in the face of mounting pluralistic and bureaucratic pressures.
- Sheldon Rothblatt's name is internationally known and respected: he is the author of several 'famous' books (including The Revolution of the Dons (1968, reissued 1981), and is one of the world's leading historians of education
- The volume is strongly comparative and inter disciplinary, and aims to tackle problems in recent and contemporary university history on a broad European/US front
- A previous comparable volume published by the Press in 1987, The Rise of the Modern Educational System, has sold well over 1100 copies in paperback: there is an excellent professional market for top-quality books of this kind
Product details
November 2006Paperback
9780521031103
384 pages
228 × 152 × 21 mm
0.593kg
Available
Table of Contents
- Notes on the contributors
- Introduction: universities and 'higher education' Sheldon Rothblatt and Björn Wittrock
- Part I. Fact and Ideals in Liberal Education:
- 1. The limbs of Osiris: liberal education in the English-speaking world Sheldon Rothblatt
- 2. In search of Isis: general education in Germany and Sweden Sven-Eric Liedman
- Part II. The State, the University, and the Professions:
- 3. The transformation of professional education in the nineteenth century Rolf Torstendahl
- 4. From practise to school-based professional education: patterns of conflict and accommodation in England, France and the United States Michael Burrage
- Part III. The Ambiguities of University Research in Sweden and the United States:
- 5. Universities, research, and the transformation of the state in Sweden Aant Elzinga
- 6. Research, graduate education, and the ecology of American universities: an interpretative history Roger Geiger
- Part IV. Complexity:
- 7. The problem of complexity in modern higher education Burton R. Clark
- 8. Comparative perspectives on British and American higher education Martin Trow
- Part V. The Ironies of University History:
- 9. The modern university: the three transformations Björn Wittrock
- Index.
