Buffer, coupling, and broker: Reflections on 60 years of the UGC

Abstract

The main conclusion of this survey of the way in which the British University Grants Committee (UGC) has acted as an intermediary between government and universities is that the UGC secures the maximum degree of self-government possible at any given time. How great that “maximum” is depends essentially on the power and purposes of the two principals (government and universities) rather than on the limited powers of the go-between (the UGC). Whereas for the first 45 years of its existence the relations between the principals were such as to focus attention on the UGC as “buffer,” changes in those relations since 1963 have emphasised the fact that the UGC is also a “coupling” between state and higher education. The pressures of economic circumstance and government action have suppressed the “euphoria” that accompanied the expansionist fifties and sixties, but to kill the messenger would be inappropriate.