The Top of the Pile Academic Order as a Quality Benchmark

Abstract

Just like Humboldtian universities at the turn of the 20th century, Top of the Pile institutions — ToPs — embody the absolute academic quality benchmark at the beginning of the 21st century. They account for less than one to three per cent of the world total. Policy-makers strive to develop higher education institutions under their jurisdiction to embrace the ideal in the hope that they will be able to compete sooner or later on an equal footing with those at the top. This chapter stresses how ToPs assign central importance to academic talent as the ultimate added value for creating, maintaining and certifying quality and attract talented faculty members and graduate students. It describes financial and administrative governance characteristics that these institutions display, which support academic leadership in a variety of topics and fields. What makes ToPs apparently so successful is how they combine academic talent, administrative efficiency and financial resources to build a virtuous circle that simultaneously generates excellence and reputation-based quality (Salmi 2009).