Same same, but different? Comparing the politics of higher education policy in Western Europe, Canada, and the U.S.

Higher education policy has become a more salient issue in modern states as universities are increasingly important for societal and economic development. This leads to an increased politicization of this policy area. At the same time, there is a lack of comparative scholarship studying the politics of higher education policy on both sides of the Atlantic. This is the gap that this paper addresses. In doing so, it presents the main findings of an upcoming book on the politics of higher education policy in Canada, the US and Western Europe. It introduces key results from each of the three contexts, and discusses the status-quo of the respective research communities including considerations of salient research themes and conceptual approaches in the study of higher education policy.The study focuses on five key aspects regarding the politics of higher education policy, namely the politics of governance as well as funding reforms, the role of interest groups, policy diffusion, and framing of higher education policies. Through a structured comparison across the three contexts, we also provide an answer to the conceptual question whether higher education policy dynamics are characterized by convergence or path-dependent divergence. We also highlight what researchers working in one of the three contexts can learn by looking at the other environments and conclude the paper with an outlook on potential future challenges for higher education policy-making.