Programska knjižica - Hrvatsko filozofsko društvo

in Britain. Since then there have been plenty of statistics published, but they
are not easy to evaluate, because criteria and methods of counting have been
changing. Accordingly, these statistics should only be used as giving an approximate
idea. It is helpful to remember that over the period under consideration
the population of Britain has hardly changed in number.
Full-time students in higher education
1960 just under 200,000
1970 just over 400,000
1980 almost the same
1990 about 650,000
1997 about 1,160,000
Figures for the number of universities vary bewilderingly. In 1997 the
Dearing Report wrote: “Today there are 176 higher education institutions in
the UK of which 115 are titled universities…” (para.3.83). The figure I have
given for membership of the CVCP, 132, is more up to date but may slightly
over-estimate the number of universities.
Chapter 3 of the Dearing Report has many statistical tables and charts,
some with interesting international comparisons.
C) Appendix 3: Competition
There is no free market competition in British higher education, but disjointed
fragments of policy have introduced certain competitive elements. Let
me illustrate.
As part of a pay settlement for academic staff in the late ‘80s, it was prohibited
by Mrs Thatcher’s government to pay a flat rate at a given grade. Hitherto, all
professors (in the British sense: the top academic grade) at Oxford and Cambridge
had been paid the same salary. This peaceable arrangement saved much time, energy
and emotional turmoil, and at Oxford a vote in Congregation confirmed that
at least a majority preferred it. However, the government now forbade it. In the
United States there is a free market in professorial salaries, so senior professors
often move to more highly paid jobs, or use higher offers elsewhere to lever raises
from their own universities. Since British universities cannot afford the cash to
run such a system (which would also expose them even more blatantly to American
competition), various compromise systems have been tried.
At Oxford there are now seven professorial salary grades. When a chair
is being offered, the Vice-Chancellor has the power to negotiate the salary.
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