Four Obstacles to Improving the Quality of University Education: The Case of Hungary

It is a widely shared view among policymakers, as well as among higher education specialists that the development of the higher education sphere is a key to foster economic growth and to reduce the gap between Hungary and the more advanced Western countries. It is also believed that the underfunding of the Hungarian universities is the main reason why the Hungarian universities cannot climb higher up at the international ranking lists. This chapter takes issue with both of these propositions. It will be shown that at the current level of development more money will not help much. There are (at least) four structural obstacles in the way of improving the quality of Hungarian higher education.