Education policy is a key devolved policy arena in which there are considerable tensions between and within institutions, within and across Scotland and the UK, and in relations with Europe. It may be assumed such tensions could increase during the process of Brexit and the implementation of the 2016 Scotland Act (Arnott 2016; Arnott and Ozga…

Commoditization seems immutable and unstoppable but, like other social processes, its prevalence is context dependent. The enabling context for commoditization has been cheap fossil fuels, economic growth, and ever-increasing energy and material throughput. In fact, the scientific findings of ecological, climate, footprint, and material flow…

The logic behind international aid to development has typically centered on economics. Notwithstanding the variation in focus--from macroeconomic monetary and trade policies, to economic wealth programs aimed at creating jobs, to supply- and demand-side reforms--the central discourse on international aid has been dominated by a political…

With fewer than three years until the planned end-date of the United Nations Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), attention is rapidly turning to what will follow. The elaboration of the next global development agenda is a complex, multipronged process that is academic, political and practical, involving experts from a myriad of social and…

How are professors paid? Can the "best and brightest" be attracted to the academic profession? With universities facing international competition, which countries compensate their academics best, and which ones lag behind? "Paying the Professoriate" examines these questions and provides key insights and recommendations into the current state of…

Over the past decade, policymakers and business leaders across New England have been concerned that the region's slower population growth and loss of residents to other parts of the country will lead to a shortage of skilled labor--particularly when the baby boom generation retires. Prior to the Great Recession, the concern was that an inadequate…

Human Capital development through education is a long time investment made by the state to enhance the well being of her citizenry. By investing in education, well educated individuals bring to bear their talents, knowledge, skills and experiences as they function in the various sectors of the economy. Human Capital development is therefore a…

In terms of political liberation and constitutional democracy, Americans cannot help but think back to 1776 and the Declaration of Independence. For the English, the mind reaches back to the English Declaration of Rights of 1689, and for those with somewhat longer historical memories, to Magna Carta of 1215. But the true origin of political…

The influence of globalization on institutions of higher education is one of the leading topics in educational policy today. As the nexus of innovation increasingly moves from labor-intensive "smokestack industries" to "mind work," education is becoming critical to policy discussions on economic growth. Tracing current discourse on the…

Contemporary test-based reforms are often grounded in the claim that test performance is the key to international economic competitiveness. However, this oft-repeated assertion lacks empirical support. According to the World Economic Forum, the United States' recent loss of economic competitiveness standing is due to macroeconomic instability…

In the introduction to his article, "Aid, Development, and Education," Klees (2010) poses the question, has the "hundreds of billions of dollars in international aid... loaned to [or otherwise targeted to "assist"] developing countries through bilateral and multilateral mechanisms... helped?" He then posits the question to be "too complicated to…

The United States holds a preeminent position in science and engineering (S&E) in the world, derived in large part from its long history of public and private investment in S&E research and development (R&D) and education. Investment in R&D, science, technology, and education correlate strongly with economic growth, as well the development of a…

The youth-led revolutions that rocked the Arab world earlier this year have refocused attention on the region's 100 million-strong youth demographic and its critical role in the transformation of existing political, economic, and social structures in the Middle East and North Africa. Youth under the age of 25 represent an estimated and…

A global revolution has been taking place in higher education during the past half-century. In the educators' view, four fundamental and interrelated forces have impelled the current academic revolution: the "massification" of higher education, globalization, the advent of the knowledge society and the importance of research universities…

With the dollar's continued swoon and grim news on the job front, American economic competitiveness has become a central theme in the presidential election. Stumping in Ohio and Pennsylvania, old-line industrial states hit hard by the flight of manufacturing jobs, Democrats Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama have called for renegotiating the…