Hierarchy of Higher Education System in Germany: Historiographical Analysis

The paper considers the development of hierarchical features in the German higher education system and studies the historical background of ongoing processes of differentiation among German higher education institutions. The widespread ambition to establish internationally competitive ‘world-class universities’ as ‘flagships’ stimulates the differentiation processes of national higher education systems. The objective of this research is to examine the institutional stratification of the German higher education system in its historical development. We use historiographical methods and analyze the accessibility and selectivity of the higher education system as stratification criteria. The paper overviews methodological approaches to the differentiation of the higher education system developed by leading Russian and German researchers. The applied methods let us explain the homogeneity of the German higher education system by the historical role of universities and the influence of their principles and educational standards. The research demonstrates that the current challenges for the German higher education system (internationalization, increasing competitiveness and massification) lead to institutional differentiations. The research results indicate that processes of informal vertical and horizontal stratification are occurring in the German higher education system, regarding both research and education activities. The hierarchy of German higher education sections is based on general vectors in developing, management and national policy of higher education and reflects the most effective interaction between higher education institutions and other stakeholders of higher education. Finally we conclude, that it is useful to project studied experience of institutional development of German higher education system to Russian realities.