The External Dimension of the Bologna Process: Higher Education in South East Europe and the European Higher Education Area in a Global World Reforming the Universities of South East Europe in|sq| View of the Bologna Process

Although the Bologna Process expresses the conviction that the higher education systems of the countries signatory to the Bologna Declaration (1999) should become increasingly comparable and compatible, it leaves higher education as a national responsibility and protects and encourages cultural and educational diversity. Given this statement of principle, the author discusses the special problems involved in adapting the higher education systems of South East Europe to the Bologna Process, citing his own country, Slovenia, as an example. He examines the issues of diversity versus integration, the modernization of curricula, the development of a proper balance between institutional autonomy and the national co-ordination of higher edu cation, the links between university and non-university higher education, and the preparation, in higher education institutions, of teachers for primary and secondary school education.