This volume analyzes the impact of public policy on the knowledge economies and higher education systems of Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries, including Australia, Canada, Japan, Finland, Germany, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, and the United States, as well as the overall European Union.

Given that innovation is a national economy’s most valuable asset in today’s global marketplace, countries are investing more than ever in academic research, doctoral education, and the process of knowledge transfer. Policymakers now perceive the academic enterprise as a means of sustaining international competitiveness, and newly implemented national innovation policies represent a marked shift away from traditional science and technology policies.

The contributors examine this new relationship between higher education and national systems of innovation, posing important questions: How is public policy affecting academic research? How are postsecondary institutions responding? The book concludes with a careful assessment of the effectiveness of current national innovation policy on higher education systems.

Bolstered by the latest economic research on higher education, this book will be read by researchers and policymakers worldwide.

David D. Dill is a professor emeritus of public policy at the University of North Carolina and coeditor of Markets in Higher Education: Rhetoric or Reality? and Emerging Patterns of Social Demand and University Reform: Through a Glass Darkly. Frans A. van Vught is a policy advisor at the European Commission and a professor of public policy and former president of the University of Twente, the Netherlands.