The French University: What happened after the revolution?

This paper examines the nature and significance of the changes introduced in the French university system since the passage of the Orientation Act of Higher Education in 1968. The process of higher education change is conceptualized in terms of a slow and disjointed process in which the political limits of legitimate change have been somewhat expanded through a succession of incremental adjustments. French universities have thus followed certain trends also apparent in other Western European nations; their operation and governance have been democratized, bureaucratized and politicized; their social functions are shifting toward greater vocationalism and professionalism; curriculum issues have tended to overshadow structural problems.The modernization of the French university, however, is by no means a completed task and much remains to be done to adapt its economic and research functions to the needs of a modern, mass, industrial society. In spite of a bleak economic outlook, the university system is most likely to continue its sluggish adaptation primarily as a result of its internal contradictions.Preliminary drafts of this paper were originally presented at the Seminar on European Higher Education, Center for European Studies (CUNY, Graduate School) and the Columbia University Seminar on Higher Education on March 4, 1976 and May 5, 1976, respectively.