The Position of Higher Education Institutions in a Changing European Context: An EU Law Perspective

Abstract: The article analyses an enigma of EU higher education institution (HEI) policy; while Member States are reluctant to use the ‘Community Method’ to actively shape a supranational legal framework, their national policy choices remain subject to directly effective EU law, following the Court's tendency to let it spill over into any policy field. This unidirectional legal integration can have unintended consequences on HEIs' research and educational strategies, which may ultimately drive the sector towards more commercialisation.
The article, first, sets out the conceptual framework. Its main part is then dedicated to analysing the tendency of directly applicable EU law to assert influences on education and research, the main areas of activities of HEIs, which have been largely kept out of the supranational EU hard law framework.