Updating the University

How it all began (under construction...)

Yes, of course I was tempted to call that paper "Re-inventing University". Sounds like much more import and in line with "Re-inventing Organizations" by Frederic Laloux. A book that everybody seemed to know - except me, and which describes how organizations can change to something better. But didn't we have enough change in Universities over the last two decades? The Bologna process which brought a much stronger economic orientation and which put a focus on jobs in the industry. The Universities themselves were suddenly managed like corporations (well, kind of) and put into competition with each other ("Elite-Universities" were stuffed with money) and the fight for students began. The changes were substantial but the process as a whole ended prematurely. Richard Mü, probably the best known german sociologist describes the forces and count erforces nicely in his little book on "Globale Eliten und locale Autoritäten - Bildung und Wissenschaft unter dem Regime von McKinsey und Co." But let's not rush into this and start with the basics: Why and how does one write about changes in the University? Already the "how" is problematic: do I use German or English language? Well, the scientific language nowadays is still English and the many years working in international IT have not told me anything different. It would not be necessary in our institution as basically everybody speaks German anyway. But this will change for sure in the future. Now about the why.