A historical lens on higher education staffing: UK and France

These trends were cross-examined with socioeconomic data to establish relations between economic fluctuations, social change and the evolution of the higher education workforce, including the transformation of work and practices within the sector.

The key research questions were the following: What are the key trends in the development of academic staffing in higher education since the 1920s in the UK and France? To which extent are those changes related to socioeconomic fluctuations and particularly economic crises? The project will develop a historical and comparative analysis of the origins of the historical connections and tensions between trends in funding, enrolment and staffing within HE and assess their wider implications.

CGHE working papers

• Expansion and differentiation in higher education: the historical trajectories of the UK, the USA and France
  (CGHE working paper 33, Vincent Carpentier, April 2018)

Additional publications

• Universités : comment les inégalités se sont renforcées en France et au Royaume-Uni.
  The Conversation, October 2023
• Academic workforce in France and the UK in historical perspectives.
  September 2023
• Carpentier, V. (2021) Three Stories of Institutional Differentiation: Resource, Mission and Social Inequalities in Higher Education. Policy Reviews in Higher Education.
• Carpentier, V. and A. Courtois (2020) Public Good in French Universities: Principles and practices of the “Republican” Model of Higher education. Compare.
• Carpentier, V. (2017) Postface: Logiques d’expansion de l’enseignement supérieur, modèle de financement et professionnalisation : une approche historique. Formation Emploi, 138: 185-202

Other outputs

• 2023: “Looking back at the funding and development of higher education systems in France, UK, USA and Canada: prospects and challenges, Society for Research into Higher Education Annual Research Conference, Aston University, 7 December.
• 2023. “Academic profession and higher education systems in France and the UK: Historical and prospective perspectives, Conference of the French Network of Research in Higher Education, ENS Lyon, 19 October.
• 2023. “Historical perspectives on funding, expansion and institutional differentiation of higher education systems in hard times in France, the UK and the USA, Congress of the French Association of Political Economy, 7 July.
• 2023. “Long-term trends in funding and staffing, Centre for Global Higher Education Annual Conference, UCL IOE, 22 May.
• Dynamics of public/private funding and the historical differentiation of higher education systems: the case of the UK, USA and France, Nordic Fields of Higher Education in International Comparison, Sciences Po Paris, 12-13 April 2018
• Expansion and institutional differentiation in higher education: historical trajectories of the UK, USA and France, Society for Research into Higher Education Annual Research Conference, Newport, 6-8 December 2017
• Higher education and socio-economic crises: lessons from 1929, 1973 and 2008
  Society for Research into Higher Education Annual Research Conference, Newport, December 2016
• A historical perspective on professional and vocational education and higher education systems in France and the UK
  Keynote for the Conference on Professionalisation and Higher Education: a comparative perspective, RESUP and GTES, Université Toulouse – Jean Jaurès, June 2016
• A historical perspective on the origins of the transformation of the public-private funding structure of higher education and its implications
  Conference 435 Higher education and its mutations, 84th Annual Congress of the Francophone Association for Knowledge, UQAM, Montreal, May 2016
• The question of funding and the historical transformations of logics, spaces and contours of higher education systems (video)
  Colloquium 449 Administration in University Governance: progress or retreat?, 84th Annual Congress of the Francophone Association for Knowledge, UQAM, Montreal, May 2016