Quality and complexity – lessons from English higher education

Debate over the extent to which commercially derived concept and practices of quality can be applied to English higher education has continued unresolved for more than a decade. An obstacle to progress is the lack of consensus on the purpose of the higher education system – with views ranging from the utilitarian response to economic needs to the liberal idealist focus on learning for learning’s sake. Likewise, there are divergent opinions on the roles of individual stakeholders within the system. These differences and uncertainties persist and are evident in a detailed empirical “Voice of the Stakeholder” investigation of a specific degree programme. However, there is also some evidence, at both local and national level, that the differences may be reconcilable and that a model of educational quality, different from but capable of being related to commercial models is beginning to emerge. Such a model focuses on education as an interactive process, allows multiplicity of purpose and accepts the possibility of individual actors in the process simultaneously playing multiple roles. As quality theory continues to evolve, there is the interesting prospect that the higher education experience may have advanced that theory rather than proved its limitations.