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The Bologna effect: the emerging European management Masters market
The Bologna process, along with European–specific accreditation and ranking systems, is revolutionizing the European ‘market ’ in Masters degrees and giving it global competitiveness. European business schools are in a much better position to compete in world education markets than was the case ten years ago.
Beyond the qualitative improvement of many institutions individually, a number of factors of a systemic nature have contributed to this stronger competitive position. The general background to this change has been the gradual emergence of a European market for management education that has impelled schools and universities to internationalise their activities beyond the borders of their home countries. This movement has itself occurred in a context in which a more structured world market has been steadily taking shape, reinforcing the need for European institutions to internationalise. Three factors have accelerated this process of change.
First, rankings in the European press, notably in the Financial Times, have raised awareness within schools of their externally perceived positioning in international markets and encouraged them to improve their standing. European schools were used to the idea that, with a few exceptions they carried little weight in American rankings and were mostly concerned about their position in their own national environment. However, this all changed when the first serious and credible rankings began to appear in Europe itself. Not only were they able to see how they stood in comparison with American schools, but they were confronted with their competitive standing on the European scene. “Being in the top 10 (or 15 or 25) in Europe” has become a popular strategic objective among university leaders as a first step towards establishing an international brand.
Second, the arrival of accreditation ten years ago, when the AACSB first began to assess schools internationally and when EQUIS was launched as an alternative, transformed the competitive environment in Europe. EQUIS in particular has turned a searchlight on a broad spectrum of quality criteria ranging across key areas such as effective governance, better qualified academic staff, improved programme quality, increased concern for the professional development and employability of students, stronger research capacity, and, of course, internationalisation. The fact that Europe has been successful in establishing its own respected accreditation system has contributed to the global credibility of European management education.
A third, and decisive, factor in this strengthening of the international positioning of European schools has been the impact of the Bologna reforms in higher education. Forty-five European countries have now committed themselves to the creation of a more coherent European Higher Education Area with a target date of 2010 for completion of the structural reforms.
All the signatory countries have agreed to converge on a two-cycle system with a bachelors degree of not less than three years and a second, Masters level of an unspecified length,
the objectives being to create “readable” degrees, to facilitate student mobility and to raise the competitiveness of European higher education on world markets.
However, at the Masters level, this clarification of degree formats and the introduction of internationally “readable” degree titles are proving to be significant marketing advantages, not only in Europe but on international markets generally.
For the business schools and universities, these reforms have generalised for the whole of Europe an officially recognised Masters market that previously only existed in a few countries, notably in Britain where the two-tier undergraduate/postgraduate, bachelors/Masters organisation of higher education has been the norm. In continental Europe, the most common structure was formerly a four- or five-year curriculum leading to an advanced degree but with no significant intermediate degree after three years.
In the absence of any clear distinction between undergraduate and graduate levels, it was very difficult to argue that a degree obtained after five years of study was in reality the equivalent of a Masters. As a result, these advanced degrees were often downgraded in international perception to the undergraduate level. In their negotiations with their American partners, for example, the French grandes écoles have struggled for decades to obtain graduate-level recognition for their five-year degrees.
