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Higher Education System Differentiation, Horizontal and Vertical

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Encyclopedia of International Higher Education Systems and Institutions

Key Issues in the Diversity Discourse

The key activities within higher education – teaching and learning, research, and possible others, for example, service – are undertaken within every higher education system in diverse institutional “settings” – also called “shapes,” “configurations,” or “structures.” And these settings of a higher education system vary substantially between countries. We note a perennial debate since about the 1960s about the extent, the major modes, the causes, the major trends – increasing diversification – as well as the “benefits” or “problems” of the various diverse institutional settings.

In looking at the institutional settings of higher education, we refer to the macro-level of society. A higher education system, as a rule, is understood as comprising all respective institutions within a country. Although the character of some academic disciplines is universalistic, international cooperation and exchange is widespread and many scholars harbor cosmopolitan...

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Universität Kassel, Kassel, Germany

    Ulrich Teichler

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  1. Ulrich Teichler
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Correspondence to Ulrich Teichler .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Education, Seoul National University, Seoul, Korea (Republic of)

    Jung Cheol Shin

  2. CIPES, Faculty of Economics, University of Porto, Porto, Portugal

    Pedro Teixeira

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Teichler, U. (2017). Higher Education System Differentiation, Horizontal and Vertical. In: Shin, J., Teixeira, P. (eds) Encyclopedia of International Higher Education Systems and Institutions. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-9553-1_36-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-9553-1_36-1

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  • Print ISBN: 978-94-017-9553-1

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