The ideas of 'prestige' and of a 'prestige economy' are coming into wider use in discussion of higher education. The terms are here set against the background of an enduring interest in issues of status. A current theoretical context is provided through Bourdieu's analyses of academic work and ideas in the field of cultural production, together…

This article questions the existing understanding of how global university rankings work to coordinate higher education policy. Rankings are often analyzed as accelerators of reform processes while their differences are overlooked. We suggest studying the particular encounters between rankers and national policy contexts as occasions for friction…

This article explores the strategies think tanks (TTs) from Brussels, London, Paris and Ljubljana use to exert influence on European Union (EU) policy-making. The paper argues that European TTs mobilise symbolic, political and network forms of capital built at the European level to enhance their legitimacy, credibility and visibility in the…

In the present study we provide an interpretation of a general narrative of transnational governance of higher education. All the elements of the narrative--competition, ranking autonomy and accountability--are visibly present in contemporary higher education policy agenda. We examine these not as separate ideas and practices but as an interlinked…

Higher education is considered by some to be synonymous with learning gained in an institution named as a university. The credentials gained from learning in such locations allow the holders to enter into the elite, which reproduces social exclusion to the benefit of that elite. In England, policy reform has opened up access to higher education to…

This paper comprises a brief examination of the approach taken by the Welsh Language Board, as the principal language policy and planning body in Wales, with regard to aspects of prestige planning and the Welsh language. It describes how devolution and the recent, and first ever, national review by the Welsh Assembly Government of Welsh language…