Trust, Accountability, and Higher Education

The main topics of the article are two phenomena that play an important role in (modern) higher education: accountability and trust. The author claims that we should not carry out just any accountability but rather only intelligent accountability. The aim of this paper is to contribute to the knowledge about intelligent accountability. In this framework the author wants to illuminate the key importance of trust for cultivation of intelligent accountability, the "dialectic" between trust and accountability and the importance of the proper understanding of the university. He argues that trust in teachers and faith in educational institutions is a necessary condition for their proper functioning. This faith demands that we comprehend (educational) institutions as paradigms. The author concludes that the implementation of non-intelligent accountability in education is an important factor of developing of the economicist model of education which however is incompatible with the personalist vision of education and society in general. Hence we should refute its implementation.