Sooner or later? The impact of child education on household consumption

We study the impact of one more year of child’s education on household (non-durable) consumption. We exploit an exogenous shock generated by a university reform in Italy in the early 2000s. We find that families responded in a way that is consistent with education as a production good. The higher child’s education produced household positive, permanent income innovations. Hence, family non-durable consumption increased. Our findings suggest that education can be an insurance device against adverse permanent income shocks. The 2001 reform not only positively affected offspring’s years of schooling, but it also had a positive effect to boost household consumption.

University Reform of 1918: Establishment of the Continental Network of Scientific, Educational and Student Community in Latin America

The transformation of the university system in Latin America, initiated by the reform in Argentina in 1918, marked the beginning of a period of democratization and modernization of society. The university reform was the result of a stubborn and dramatic struggle of students against the clerical-aristocratic order in the universities of Argentina. Ideologically, the movement was based on radical anti-clericalism, on the ideas of the conflict of generations, the special role of the young, on the Kulturtraegerism, on the concept of Arielism — a term coined by Enrique Rodo. The student movement, supported by progressive intellectuals and left-wing political parties, almost from the point of its inception, created a network of contacts and solidarity with other countries of the continent, which showed its high efficiency in disseminating ideas, political programs, and forms of struggle. This ability of the intellectual movements to create cross-border networks of influence and activism is relevant today and not only in Latin America. Thanks to this, the reform spread throughout the continent with various and sometimes contrary results, somewhere very successfully, and somewhere met with fierce resistance. The further ideological evolution of the movement and its leaders led to the emergence of new ideological and political currents, such as revolutionary nationalism, which became the dominant political trend in Latin America in the 20th century world. The spread of revolutionary nationalism, the main ideologist of which was the student leader in Peru, Victor Raul Haya de la Torre, relied on the same network of youth structures that led to the spread of the movement for university reform. The reform movement also resulted in the emergence of powerful left-wing movements of the intellectuals, such as the Latin American Union, closely associated not only with the student movement, but also with the labor movement. University reform was not only a political, but also a cultural phenomenon that marked a profound change in Latin American society, which chose the path of modernization of all spheres of life. This work is devoted to the study of this process.

Hacia un marxismo cubano. El Departamento de Filosofía de la Universidad de La Habana en sus primeras etapas (1962-1965).

El Departamento de Filosofía de la Universidad de La Habana fue creado fruto de la Reforma Universitaria (enero de 1962) que introducía la obligatoriedad de enseñar filosofía marxista en todas las carreras universitarias y socializar la teoría científica adoptada por la Revolución cubana. Existiría hasta 1971, año en el que cambió de denominación, programas y profesorado. El artículo arroja luz sobre el proceso de creación del Departamento y la evolución de su visión respecto a la enseñanza y teoría del marxismo-leninismo en sus primeras etapas: desde un marxismo ortodoxo y manualista hacia la búsqueda de un punto de referencia cubano, antiimperialista y tercermundista. A través de fuentes orales y de archivo, el trabajo pretende analizar cómo y por qué nació el Departamento, sus objetivos y fuentes teóricas, y el cambio de perspectiva que experimentó su profesorado desde su creación hasta 1965, así como los principales factores que lo incentivaron. The Philosophy Department of the University of Havana was created as a result of the University Reform (January 1962) that incorporated the obligation to teach Marxist philosophy in all university degree programmes and to socialize the scientific theory adopted by the Cuban Revolution. It would exist until 1971, the year in which it changed its name, programmes, and teaching staff. The article casts light on the formative process of the Department and the evolution of its conception regarding the teaching and theory of Marxism-Leninism in its early stages: from an orthodox and manualist Marxism towards the search for a Cuban, anti-imperialist, and Third-Worldist point of reference. Through oral and archival sources, this work aims to analyse how and why the Department was born, its objectives and theoretical sources, and the change in perspective that its teaching staff experienced from its creation to 1965, as well as the main factors that encouraged it.

Can managerialism promote organisational transformation in private universities?

Used as a method of university reform, new public management (NPM) involves an ideology of managerialism that conflicts with collegiality and causes ‘hybridisation’. In management organisations, when organisational goals are not shared at the individual level, this adjustment mechanism shifts to the organisational level. This study aimed to examine whether there are coordination mechanisms at the organisational level in universities by focussing on those in Japan, particularly private universities that require autonomous management. Multi-level analysis results revealed that although there is hybridisation associated with increased managerial pressure, there are no organisational-level mechanisms to reduce conflict. In conclusion, the authors point out the difficulty of organising private universities based on managerialism and suggests that university reform in Japan may be ‘hollowing out’ in the public sector as well. Further, the study emphasises the importance of undertaking a comparative study of governance arrangements in China’s private universities in the future.

Reform universities, revolutionize societies. The Expansion of a Latin American Student Movement

The article reconstructs the student intervention during the first decades of the 20th century to link the University Reform, movement started in the middle of 1918 in Córdoba, Argentina. By highlighting the students’ revolutionary enthusiasm and the continental spread, the article seeks to show that the newness of 1918 was the inscription in the left of the student demands, until then in agreement with the oligarchic republics. So it proposes that the well-known Latin American and anti-imperialist identity of the Reform, as characterized by the historiography on the subject, only takes shape in the middle of twenty decade.

THE REFORM OF SPANISH UNIVERSITIES DURING THE SECOND REPUBLIC: INFLUENCES, OBJECTIVES AND ACTIONS

At the beginning of XX Century there was a great advance in Spanish science and culture, but not in universities. The Second Republic launched a great university reform inspired by other European and American universities. The introduction of research, new studies plans, and the proliferation of university colleges, were some of the keys to the new Spanish university model. The project of the university reform of the Second Republic was actively developed until the summer of 1936, when many faculties, engineering schools, research laboratories, residences and other institutions of the Madrid Campus were already opened. The experience of Madrid was adopted by other Spanish uni-versities. In some cases, pedagogical and research methodologies have been at the forefront internationally. Access to university education and research for women has become ubiquitous. Among the university teachers were leading representatives of the Silver Age of Spanish sci-ence and culture. However, this project of reforming Spanish universi-ties was thwarted by the mutiny of July 18, 1936, one of the goals of which was to stop the modernization process launched by the Second Republic. The mutiny led to a bloody civil war, during which the new-ly opened faculties of the university campus became a zone of fierce fighting, buildings were destroyed, as was the entire university reform project.