The ecology of higher education

Abstract

Ecology is the study of plants, or of animals, or of peoples and institutions, in relation to environment.2 Sir Eric Ashby is a botanist, turned administrator, and he has written his recent massive and important book in association with Dr. Mary Anderson, who is an historian. They are thus well equipped for an ecological study of universities. And such studies are altogether too scanty. "The core of the book" (I quote from the introduction) " is a history and analysis of ideas about university education in the English-speaking countries of tropical Africa, with special attention to the evolution ... of that body of intentions, beliefs, and prejudices which together are recognised as ' British policy '. We describe the influence of the United States on this policy. We discuss concepts of academic freedom and autonomy3 as they have developed in Britain and as they have fared in Africa. We have comments to make on relations between the university and the state. We try to cut a path through the tangled controversies which surround content of curricula and standards of achievement" [p. x]. This "core" is Part Three of the book, much the longest part, in fact two thirds of the whole. It is preceded by a quite short Part One, which gives the British background of the earliest " export models ", namely, Queen's University in Ireland, 1846, and the two earliest Australian universities, Sydney, 1850, and Melbourne, 1853. Part Two deals with India 4 and begins by showing why it was inevitable that the first