Regional cooperation in higher education

Regional cooperation in higher education has grown in recent decades due to political drivers and the increasingly salient role of knowledge in economies and societies. The term ‘regional cooperation’ in this chapter signifies the multi-directional and multi-level coordination of higher education collaborations that are mediated through the regional space. Set against this backdrop, this chapter offers an overview of how regional cooperation has emerged and evolved in the higher education sector. It first details the motivating factors that drive key policy and institutional stakeholders to take up regional higher education agendas. In particular, this chapter specifies five sets of rationales: human resource development; political development; social-cultural development; commercial trade; and academic development. The second part reviews the various regionally-based collaborations that have been organised in regions across the world, including Europe, Asia-Pacific, Africa, and Latin America. It showcases the different forms of regional developments that have taken place, including those that have been instigated and promoted by global actors such as UNESCO. The next part maps out the outcomes, impacts, and effects of these regional collaborations and includes both constructive and critical reviews. A cautious assessment is offered, taking into account the difficulty of measurements, moving targets, the complexity of higher education policies, attribution problems, and lack of comprehensive studies. The last part reflects on the chapter’s findings, discussing the possible futures of regional cooperation in higher education amidst a growing complexity of policy challenges. In summary, this chapter shows how the regions have become an accepted governance level for higher education cooperation between states, higher education institutions, stakeholder groups, and supranational agencies.