This collection of essays addresses the question of the role of research and higher education in society, both today and in a historical perspective.;The contributors discuss the intellectual impact, moral responsibility and social role of German higher learning from the mid-19th century to the present days of reunification. Others discuss some of the "eternal" problems in higher education: the relations between different forms of knowledge on the one hand and teaching/education on the other; the precarious and delicate interdependence, interaction and competition between teaching, study and research in modern higher education and research; and the impact and role of professional knowledge in modern society.;The contributions discussing the American and British systems of higher education and research and the critical analysis of the role of the OECD in higher education and research are comparative and international in scope, while contributions devoted to Swedish conditions focus on problems which confront all systems of higher education.