Issues in Brief, No. 15, May 2010

Mapping the Complexity of Higher Education in the Developing World
By Muhammad Hamid Zaman, Adil Najam & David K. Campbell

May 2010 (8 pages)
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On October 27 and 28, 2009, a workshop of experts on higher education in developing countries was convened by the Boston University Frederick S. Pardee Center for the Study of the Longer-Range Future. The meeting was supported by a grant from the National Academies Keck Futures Initiative with additional support from the Pardee Center and the Office of the Boston University Provost. The meeting brought together experts in economics, public policy, education, development, university management, and quantitative modeling who had rich experiences across the developing world. These experts offered a variety of conceptual tools with which to look at the particular complexities associated with higher education in developing countries.

The meeting was convened by the authors of this paper. This policy brief builds upon and reflects on the discussion at this meeting, but is not a meeting report, per se.

Muhammad Hamid Zaman is Assistant Professor of Biomedical Engineering and Medicine in the College of Engineering at Boston University and a Pardee Center Faculty Fellow.

Adil Najam is the Frederick S. Pardee Professor of Global Public Policy at Boston University and Director of the Pardee Center for the Study of the Longer-Range Future.

David Campbell is the Provost of Boston University and Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering and Physics.

A report of the meeting is available here.