A Global Market for Higher Education or a Global Research Area – What does the EU Contribute?

The paper discusses the influences the EU exerts globally in the areas of research and education from political science and legal perspectives. At first glance, it is not obvious that a regional organisation would have any role beyond coordinative support in sensitive policy domains such as higher education and scientific research. The EU has, however, been playing a role since the very early years of integration which has been expanding since the 1990s with new initiatives being increasingly developed and centralised at the supranational-level. The paper will examine European knowledge policy cooperation against growing regionalism in the global knowledge market and the unique institutional arrangement and actor constellation that make up the EU. Further, from a legal perspective, the paper will discuss the values which are inserted into the EU market as regards education and research and on how these could be transposed globally through legal means (e.g. trade agreements).