Inverted U-shape of Estonian Higher Education: Post-Socialist Liberalism and Postpostsocialist Consolidation

Abstract

This chapter provides a description of the basic features of the higher education system in Estonia in the historical perspective, paying special attention to the period during the Soviet time right before the USSR collapse and exploring the developments during the following period up to 2015. It is understood that both the social and political system during the period of socialism, as well as changes in the society during the postsocialist period right after the country became independent, have an impact on the current period. On the other hand, changes in the Estonian higher education system are greatly impacted by external factors, especially processes of Europeanisation and internationalisation of higher education. Tendencies towards standardisation of higher education provision, on the one hand, as well as maintaining differentiation between higher education institutions will be highlighted. The analysis distinguishes four periods of the postsocialist higher education system in Estonia, characterised by different traits. 1988–1992 can be considered a period of chaotic, individually and institutionally driven changes; 1993–1998 saw the major expansion of the higher education system in combination with the development of legal frameworks and quality assurance mechanisms; 1999–2005 indicated the wave of reforms, including following the principles of the Bologna process; from 2006 onwards, new measures are put in place to strengthen the (international) competitiveness and sustainability of the shrinking higher education sector. The main strand of differentiation between the higher education institutions largely follows their formal statuses that stem from the soviet period: the applied higher education institutions on the one hand and the academic universities providing bachelor, master’s and doctoral level education on the other. The further differentiation can be made based on the research intensity of the universities as well as based on their legal status, with some being declared national universities by their dedicated laws.