Europe’s university alliances must go further to truly integrate HE

Europe’s universities are among the world’s strongest, but they still do not function as an integrated continental system. Despite decades of cooperation through initiatives such as Erasmus and the Bologna Process, students moving between European universities continue to face fragmented curricula, inconsistent recognition of courses and administrative barriers.

A student can spend a semester abroad through Erasmus, for instance, but too often return to find that the credits they earned do not fully count toward their degree. This does not diminish the importance of Erasmus, one of the most successful European Union programmes and a cornerstone of European integration. But it does highlight that much more progress is needed.

The European Commission has taken important steps towards establishing a legal basis for a European degree – a diploma that would be uniformly recognised throughout the European Union. But there is still a long way to go before the so-called European Higher Education Area could be realised. We need an accelerator – and, with more impetus, the European Universities initiative could fit the bill.

Launched following Emmanuel Macron’s Sorbonne speech in 2017 and supported by the commission, the initiative is an ambitious attempt to address higher education fragmentation by building cross-border bridges between specific institutions. In practice, the now 73 alliances are pursuing greater cohesion in different ways, and the overall system is still being explored and constructed through a combination of bottom-up and top-down initiatives.

Some alliances prioritise joint or double degrees. Others focus on intensifying research collaboration. Still others seek to build strong partnerships beyond Europe, promoting European values, democratic traditions and Enlightenment principles to other parts of the world. But unless European university alliances move beyond symbolic cooperation toward genuine, comprehensive academic integration, they risk falling short of their transformative potential.

In my view, the central goal should be simple: seamless student movement without obstacles related to the recognition of individual courses. While joint degrees may contribute to this objective, they will, at best, reach only a relatively small number of students. To achieve genuine cohesion and enable large-scale student mobility, the more important objective should be to align at least parts of selected study programmes across universities within alliances.

One can easily imagine a study programme in which students spend one year or semester in Venice, another in Paris, one in Ljubljana, yet another in Barcelona, alongside periods in other major and attractive European cities. Such an offer would likely be appealing to many students from beyond as well as within Europe’s borders, including those from countries with strong higher education systems such as the US and Canada.

None of this is to downplay the importance of research links. An excellent university cannot function without excellent research, which provides students with opportunities to engage in frontier knowledge and contribute to the advancement of society. Hence, it would be reasonable – albeit politically sensitive, given that not all European universities are members of an alliance – for the commission to dedicate a limited portion of its research funding to supporting research collaboration within European university alliances. This could strengthen the alliances, enhance their internal cohesion and foster deeper institutional integration.

Even in the absence of dedicated commission funding, alliances themselves can do much themselves, and many have already begun to act. Providing seed funding for collaborative research projects could support joint applications for European funding and help build long-term research initiatives. Given how universities function, these research collaborations would naturally spill over into education.

Another important but still underused instrument is the co-tutelle arrangement for doctoral students, allowing joint supervision by supervisors at different institutions. This could be expanded relatively easily, without excessive administrative or legal complexity.

A third, often overlooked, pillar of a more unified European higher education area is stronger exchange and collaboration among university support staff. While such exchanges already exist within Erasmus programmes, they remain underdeveloped and should be promoted more systematically. Universities can learn a great deal from one another, not only in research and teaching but also in the organisation and delivery of essential support services. But administrative and professional staff currently tend to be far less mobile than academics.

A significant structural obstacle to further integration remains, however. Education, including higher education, does not fall within the competences defined by the European treaties, and each member state maintains its own accreditation systems for study programmes. These regulatory differences are often cumbersome and create significant barriers. While politically sensitive, the EU should begin considering common European accreditation mechanisms, at least for joint and alliance‑based study programmes.

Europe now stands at an important crossroads. As its geostrategic influence diminishes in an increasingly complex and multipolar world, the continent can restore its relevance only through greater internal cohesion. A more unified higher education system represents one of the most powerful instruments for achieving this.

This is about identity as much as administrative convenience. Macron’s primary motivation in calling for university alliances to be formed was the hope that they could help foster a stronger sense of European belonging. But that has weakened in recent years. Higher education needs to step up.

By enabling genuinely seamless mobility, cross-continental recognition of qualifications and deeper research collaboration, universities can help cultivate generations that experience Europe not as an abstract political project but as a lived academic and intellectual space – and that carry their sense of pan-continental belonging into the future.

Gregor Majdič is rector of the University of Ljubljana, a member of the EUTOPIA European University Alliance.