Expansion and contraction of higher education in eastern Europe 1950-2000

Comparative research in the sociology of education, based on the new institutionalist "world polity" approach finds that the expansion of education has universalistic character. Considering these research results, our study compares the expansion of higher education in Eastern and Western Europe in the period between 1950 and 2000. We demonstrate that in the East European countries there was a specific pattern of inclusion, different from the global model. Here, phases of expansion and contraction come one after another. During the period of state socialism, governments tried to subject higher education development to political programs. These programs resulted from different and sometimes even conflicting ideologies and finally led in all socialist countries to a halt of higher education expansion. During the post-socialist transformations, the expansion of higher education in Eastern Europe is approaching that in the Western part of the continent.