Towards a theoretical framework for the comparative understanding of globalisation, higher education, the labour market and inequality

Abstract

This paper is a theoretical examination of three major empirical trends that affect many people: globalisation, increasingly close relations between higher education (HE) and labour markets, and increasing social inequality. Its aim is to identify key theoretical resources and their contribution to the development of a comparative theoretical framework for understanding countries' responses to globalisation with respect to HE and the labour market, and the significance of such responses for social inequality. The method consists in developing a theoretical reading of Bourdieu's and Brown's theoretical concepts of social inequality in the interrelation of HE and labour market. As a result this paper presents preliminary ideas for the theoretical comparison of current societies' HE systems and labour markets with regard to social inequality in the age of globalisation. It concludes by illustrating the need for further comparative research in this area.

Keywords:

• comparative higher education
• globalisation
• labour markets
• recruitment
• social inequality
• English and German higher education

Notes

1. Since the author could not get hold of a copy of the German edition (1981) Titel und Stelle Über die Reproduktion sozialer Macht in which a collection of Bourdieu's, Boltanski's, Saint Martin's and Maldidier's work is edited and translated by Helmut Köhler, Beate Krais, Achim Leschinsky and Gottfried Pfeffer, references here are only to Bourdieu 2005.

2. In Germany, salaries in public services are governed by state and federal law. Educational degrees are one of the many factors which determine how much a public employee earns.