The crisis slowed down the implementation of the Lisbon Strategy (for the EU to become the most competitive region in the world). The crisis has aggravated the divergence between the North West of Europe and Southern Europe in labor productivity imparted by the knowledge economy. At the same...

Higher education is in the position to save Europe by rendering a substantial contribution to sustainable economic growth. For that purpose higher education must strengthen its innovative power in entrepreneurship education and by focusing research more on societal problems, while being better...

This paper compares higher education policies across thirty two European countries, using the contribution to economic innovation as a benchmark for the comparison. We suggest that an increase in university autonomy and public funding, that we qualify as ‘empowerment’, positively affects the...

University autonomy and funding is an important aspect in university-level education due to its impact on graduates’ competencies, and on the quality and quantity of research produced. Political factors influence the amount of autonomy allotted to public universities in specific countries....