Examination of Witnesses (Questions 780
- 790)
WEDNESDAY 4 JULY 2007
PROFESSOR ALISON
RICHARD AND
PROFESSOR GEORG
WINCKLER
Q780 Mr Marsden: That I understand
very well, Professor, although I have a couple of questions about
Erasmus which I will ask you and Alison in a minute. Let me return
to the central point I put to you. One of the problems has been,
certainly in terms of the UK's perception, that European collaboration
on some of these major projects at R&D and at university level
has been clunky, has been top-down from the European Commission,
and compared to the Americans and elsewhere has not really produced
a great deal. Is that a fair assessment or not?
Professor Winckler: Actually there
has been a change already in the 1990s, that the Erasmus Programme,
for example, should be backed by an institutional strategy. The
University of Vienna is quite free in choosing its partner. Of
course we get certain stipends and so on and we have to meet certain
requirements, but I do not think that this is really top-down.
Q781 Mr Marsden: Professor Richard,
would you like to come in?
Professor Richard: I would just
like to pursue this point that you are making and also implying.
There is barely a day of the week where there is not somebody
knocking on my door wanting a partnership with Cambridge—there
is a feeding frenzy going on in the world at the moment, gathering
up brands, as it were. But actually universities do not collaborate—a
university is an abstraction—it is the people who collaborate,
and if the academics do not want to do it you end up with these
paper collaborations, at worst with an enormous amount of money
being invested. This is not to comment particularly on the European
question, but I think it is a real issue. Certainly I cannot and
do not commit Cambridge to collaborations because it is all about
where the academic find paths of shared interest. Can you open
up opportunities to facilitate those shared interests? Yes. Why
would you, what is the interest in doing that? I think there are
various interests in doing that. You are right to put the caution
in about top-down.
Q782 Mr Marsden: Through you, Chairman,
can I ask both of you about the issue of brain circulation and
particularly as regards British students and in the context of
Europe because, Professor Winckler, you have just talked about
Erasmus and you talked earlier about how it had been very beneficial
in getting continental and European students to travel and to
study elsewhere, but unfortunately the evidence is that it has
not been very beneficial in terms of getting large numbers of
British students to travel and to study elsewhere within continental
Europe, and I wondered if you had any idea as to why that might
be so?
Professor Winckler: First of all,
if I remember the statistics well—and there were actually
very good statistics because we just celebrated, in early May,
20 years of Erasmus—the United Kingdom in that respect is
average or just a little bit above average; it is not, let me
say, one of the countries where the students really are very mobile,
but it is not also at the lower end.
Q783 Mr Marsden: You think we should
not be worried that there are not enough British students going
to study in Europe?
Professor Winckler: Let me put
one point—and perhaps it may not be the right place here,
at the British Parliament—that it is to a certain extent
an advantage to speak English as a native language, but there
are also disadvantages. For example, my mother tongue is German
but I lived and worked for more than one year in France, because
it was very clear for me that you need to learn other languages
to be really aware of other cultures.
Q784 Mr Marsden: Professor Richard,
can I take you up on that issue as well because you referred earlier,
and I think the phrased you used was "unthinking"—and
unthinking is perhaps the wrong word, but not a structured process
of involvement by British students in continental Europe, but
just something that happened. But is not one of the problems,
partly, first of all the language issue to which Professor Winckler
has alluded, but is it not perhaps two things. First of all, when
British students go on a structured basis to continental universities
they do not always want to go for a whole year and that we need
more flexible programmes. Secondly, is there not also an issue
in terms of credit transfer, that we do not have a fully fledged
credit transfer system within the UK and we certainly have a highly
problematic credit transfer system between the UK and other European
universities?
Professor Richard: Correct.
Professor Winckler: Correct.
Chairman: You agree with that? You have
agreement there, Gordon!
Q785 Mr Marsden: Can I finally ask
both of you about Bologna and about the Bologna Process and particularly
about the recent London Summit, because obviously Professor Winckler
you have put a lot of emphasis on institutional autonomy and clearly
the EUA is pushing that. This might be rather unfair but if one
characterised the Bologna Process as a tension between a centralised
approach, wittingly or unwittingly pursued by the European Commission
and the desire for universities in Europe to have autonomy and
to use the Bologna Process for that, who is winning under that?
Professor Winckler: Let me say
that in 1999 when the Bologna Process started—if you read
the first communiqué—the universities and students
were not participating. The first communiqué was just saying
that the universities are expected to take over what has been
decided. So it started as a very centralised ministerial approach,
I agree with you, but that has to be seen in the tradition, let
me say, of the French or German university system where everything
came from above, from the top. The French system is a very centralised
system. So somehow this setting was taken over by the Bologna
Process in 1999. Since then the Bologna Process has changed a
lot. If you look, for example, how EUA has been active in the
field of reshaping PhD education in Europe, I have the feeling
that now governments take over what institutions develop. So I
have the feeling that we are moving within the Bologna Process
to a more decentralised system. This decentralisation will become
stronger and stronger because now it is important to implement
Bologna within the institutions, and that, of course, makes the
institutions stronger. Then, of course, we see that with increasing
internationalisation, national systems are not very competitive
any more and that is the reason why President Sarkozy is now talking
about the university reform a la carte, but that maybe
is still to be seen.
Q786 Mr Marsden: Professor Richard,
very briefly, do you regard Bologna as a help or a hindrance in
terms of your strategic objectives that you have stated today
in terms of internationalising Cambridge and getting Cambridge
students more internationalised?
Professor Richard: As a matter
principle I think how could one be opposed to that because it
should make it easier to flow. If it gets implemented as a top-down
imposition it will be a nightmare. The devil will be in the detail.
Q787 Mr Marsden: Are we mastering
the detail?
Professor Richard: I was very
pleased that you took on the Bologna Process because if we had
had a concern it is that the UK Government in general, that the
UK has not engaged sufficiently in ensuring that the Bologna Process
had the flexibility to it and somehow recognised the need for
the autonomy of institutions. I am actually cautiously more optimistic
than I was a year or so ago when it started to look to me as if
it was going to a very centralised top-down system, but it has
moved a long way and to the better.
Q788 Chairman: We had some very interesting
reaction to the report on Bologna—most of it positive, although
I believe I was attacked by a Dutch professor for something; but
by and large we had a positive response. I feel embarrassed, Professor
Richard and Professor Winckler, that this is the end of the session
now because we could ask you a lot more questions and we have
learnt a great deal. Is there anything that you feel you have
not had the chance to say to the Committee this morning on this
important topic?
Professor Richard: Only about
another three hours of conversation!
Q789 Chairman: Maybe more succinct
than that!
Professor Richard: The important
thing is it is so great that this country has a government with
serious people sitting asking serious questions about this. That
is the only thing I want to say; I think it is just terrific and
very interesting.
Q790 Chairman: The more compliments
the better!
Professor Richard: As you can
see I very much like these discussions and I very much appreciate
that politicians are interested in how the knowledge societies
emerge and what kinds of implications that has for the universities.
Let me just say, we need strong universities otherwise we will
not meet the challenges of the future, and the universities need
to be autonomous with institutional strategies. So as you have
in the world of business where firms strive to development we
need to have the universities which drive the development in the
knowledge societies.
Chairman: That is a very good note on
which to finish. Thank you for visiting us, Professor Richard
and Professor Winckler.
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