Higher education at a time of transformation: new dynamics for social responsibility

This publication is a synthesis of the three reports published so far by GUNI, which explores key issues facing higher education in the twenty-first century: - Higher Education in the World 2006: The Financing of Universities - Higher Education in the World 2007: Accreditation for Quality Assurance: What is at Stake? - Higher Education in the World 3. Higher Education: New Challenges and Emerging Roles for Human and Social Development. The publication analyses the current and future challenges to be faced by higher education institutions (HEIs) in the context of globalization and offers a perspective on the financing of higher education and on existing accreditation mechanisms to guarantee quality. It also examines emerging challenges and roles of higher education in relation to its contribution to human and social development. The publication includes an introductory piece, which, departing from a brief reference to today's state of the world, analyzes the principal characteristics that have shaped the systems of education in the world in the last decade, states the current challenges of higher education in the world and proposes concrete measures to orientate the role and the missions of HEIs to strengthen their role as agents of social change in the globalized world. It also states the necessity that HEIs contribute to a systematic and proactive analysis to develop critical discourses with which societies can continually reflect on its evolution for a positive social transformation. It also considers the way HEIs should strengthen their role as agents of transformation, contributing to meeting both local and global challenges and proposes that they should reorient their vision and mission towards the creation and distribution of socially relevant knowledge and a complex understanding of reality, strengthening their social responsibility contributing through knowledge, to a harmonious global development.