Stirring the lions: strategy and tactics in global higher education¹

In many parts of the world, higher education is viewed as a prime ‘motor’ for the development of a knowledge‐based economy. Under the banner of this ‘new economy’, higher education policies, programmes and practices have been increasingly co‐opted and shaped by wider geo‐strategic political and economic interests. This paper explores three, interlinked, higher education policy spaces – in Europe, the United States, and Australia. It explores how the growing range of educational initiatives at the European level has affected – both directly and indirectly – American and Australian policymaking in higher education. The European higher education project, which is increasingly perceived as having some significance to the global economy, has set off a series of dynamic reactions in both Australia and the United States, which is leading to multiple new logics and new imaginaries about the global higher education landscape. Through this, a more integrated and relational global system of higher education is emerging.