IVth Ministerial Conference of the
Bologna Process
Bergen, Norway May 19 2005
Dear colleagues, distinguished guests, ladies and
gentlemen.
Introduction
It is a great pleasure for me to finally welcome you
to the ministerial conference of the Bologna Process here in
Bergen. All participating countries are present, with most
delegations headed by the responsible minister. We also welcome
five applicant countries with their ministers, our consultative
organisations, and a number of observers and guests from other
countries and international organisations. We hope you feel welcome
here in Norway.
The Bologna Process started in
1999, based on the important meeting between some of the ministers
in Sorbonne the year before. It drew up the ambitious goal of
establishing a European Higher Education Area within the first
decade of this millennium. And it pointed at the actions needed to
achieve it.
Today, we are halfway to 2010, and
time is ripe to take stock, to confirm our commitment and to draw
up strategies for the future work. That is, dear colleagues, our
agenda these days. We can be proud of what we have achieved so far!
In all our countries, huge reforms have taken and are taking place
within higher education. The ratio of implementation is quite
remarkable keeping in mind that no supranational element exists in
the Process.
I hope this meeting will contribute
to taking the Process several steps further.
Why is the process so important?
This process is important because it is important to
the people of our countries. I think that also may explain its
success, and the commitment we all feel to it. If not, we would
probably have been somewhere else today. Strong universities with
internationally high quality are in today’s world of knowledge, a
prerequisite for the personal development and success of each
individual. It creates the basis for democratic development,
cultural identity and creativity and future innovation and growth.
We, as responsible ministers strive for the well-being of people
and nations, and want to see higher education to develop capacities
and qualities to take on that task in these changing times.
And I think we all realise that
strong European cooperation in this field, increases the chance of
success. First of all because higher education institutions always
have co-operated across national borders. Scholars and scientists
have always had an international aspect in their work, and students
have always travelled. If we look at the history of the University
of Oxford as an example, the arrival of Emo of Friesland in 1190 is
recorded as the first known overseas student. He set in train the
University's tradition of international scholarly links. So,
mobility of students is definitely not a new phenomenon
The Bologna Process has contributed
to a renaissance for this principle of the old university world, as
mobility is the essential aim of the process. But instead of being
an opportunity for the selected few as was the case in earlier
times, the possibility to travel and study abroad shall now be a
possibility for
all students, regardless of economic and social
background. This is our aim – our modern addition to an old
principle.
Furthermore, this international
dimension of academia is of increasing importance, through
globalisation. Competition and cooperation are in a strange way two
sides of the same coin. It is by sharing knowledge through
cooperation; we will be able to compete at the international arena.
This requires of course a certain balance, to avoid one-way
competence traffic. I will return to this later.
Since Berlin, much of the work
being done in the process has concentrated on creating the
necessary basis for the increased mobility, cooperation and
openness. There has been important development in quality
assurance, through the close cooperation between ENQA, EUA, EURASHE
and ESIB. This is important, because not all cross-boarder higher
education represents high quality. The mutually shared standards
and guidelines for quality assurance that have been developed,
should aim at securing that the education you get abroad is fully
valid also at home.
There has also been important
development in the realisation of an overarching framework of
qualifications. Furthermore, we will learn in this conference that
the degree structure of the Bologna declaration is gaining ground
in all countries of the process.
But we should avoid mixing
necessary coordination with copying. The strength and fascination
of Europe is its diversity; in culture and language, in geography,
and in ways of thinking. When stimulating alternative thinking,
environments have always increased their chances of adapting to
changes, and thus - at the end of the day - surviving.
My expectations for this conference
are high. But I do not think this is the right time to increase the
number of action lines. To keep the momentum of the process we must
even more determined focus on achieving the aims of the action
lines established. Based on these lines, I would like to discuss
three important challenges:
First of all, the social dimension.
Social and economic differences affect both the situation for
students within countries, and the mobility between countries. We
have worked hard to facilitate and remove obstacles to mobility
within the European Higher Education Area. There is, however, still
work to be done to make sure that all students may take advantage
of the possibilities we have created. We will discuss this in the
context of the communiqué later today.
Our countries have different
economic possibilities. But still we may gain from using this
cooperation to explore ways of improving study conditions and
access for all students, regardless of their social and economic
background. The strong student cooperation across Europe should be
seen as an important resource to this end.
Secondly, the external dimension.
The Bologna Process is also about openness and attractiveness. We
should thus be sensitive to the way we are looked upon from
outside. We should be satisfied with the interest from other
countries and regions, some of them represented at this meeting.
And we should listen to their concerns. Let me refer to a
comment made by the secretary general of the African Association of
Universities, Aki Sawyerr. He has said that he was afraid that a
one-way student flow to the European Higher Education Area from a
region like Africa, combined with restrictive immigrations
policies, might result in what he called an “intellectual festung
Bologna”.
This is a concern we have to take
seriously. It reflects an anxiety that Europe is neglecting its
obligations towards the poorer parts of the world. I think we
should signal clearly that such an anxiety is not justified. In
Berlin we stated that “in international academic co-operation and
exchanges, academic values should prevail”. I believe we are all
concerned that the relations between the European Higher Education
Area and the rest of the world should be governed by fairness in a
responsible way.
I welcome the interest from
countries outside Europe for the process. They want to learn from
our experiences and find ways to join us in our efforts. This shows
an increased interest for Europe as a source for co-operation and
sharing of knowledge and competence. This, I think, is a very
promising development emerging from the Bologna process. We
should carefully discuss how we may stimulate this development, and
share experiences with other regions of the world.
Last, but not least, I would like
to focus on the implementation. The work so far has focussed on the
structural elements of the Process. From the stocktaking
report it is quite evident that we have come a long way towards
implementing the structural elements of the Process.
In our future work we may have to
focus more on the
implementation of the elements of the Process. In this
work the role of strong and autonomous universities and other
higher education institutions will be central. Implementation means
change inside institutions, in programmes and in ways of engaging
students in the learning process. I think we all have our national
discussions at both the political and institutional level about
this. We will later in this conference discuss the future contact
between the process and organisations of university staff. We
should here signal that we welcome them as constructive partners in
the process.
Conclusion
Colleagues, ladies and
gentlemen,
At this stage of the process we
should also start thinking on the process Beyond 2010, when the
European Higher Education Area hopefully is in place. I will
therefore invite ministers to discuss different options for how the
process might develop during our meeting. This is meant only as the
start of a discussion, but I believe it may become a crucial point
for our future agenda.
As politicians we must work to
realise ideas, ambitions and hopes. So, to conclude my opening
address, let me convey some of my hopes for this process:
Within 2010, we should
observe a distinct improvement in the quality of European higher
education.
At the same time, the national
systems of higher education should communicate in order to
facilitate mobility for students and staff within Europe.
In addition, we will have systems
of quality assurance and quality improvement in all countries.
In other words, we should aim at
making Europe stronger and more attractive to good students and
researchers. This will be to the benefit of our countries, and will
make a better future for the students and researchers in
Europe.
And, we should do all this in
openness and with fairness towards other and poorer parts of the
world.
I wish you welcome to cooperate
towards these goals, - and once again – heartily welcome to
Norway!
