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Join Tiffany MacLennan on the World of Higher Education Podcast as she interviews Alex Usher, President and CEO of Higher Education Strategy Associates, about their comprehensive report: The World of Higher Education — Year in Review 2025. This episode delves into the major global forces affecting higher education, including politics, demography, technology, and policy neglect. Understand the impacts of U.S. political upheavals, demographic declines, and rising private education in Western Europe. Learn which countries are emerging as bright spots and the fault lines to watch for in 2026.
👉 Episode Links:
👉 Episode Links:
- Read the free report: The World of Higher Education — Year in Review 2025 by Higher Education Strategy Associates
- Register for free: Focus Friday December 5 | What is the Future of Work?
Creators and Guests
What is The World of Higher Education?
The World of Higher Education is dedicated to exploring developments in higher education from a global perspective. Join host, Alex Usher of Higher Education Strategy Associates, as he speaks with new guests each week from different countries discussing developments in their regions.
Produced by Tiffany MacLennan and Samantha Pufek.
Tiffany MacLennan: Hello and welcome back to the World of Higher Education Podcast. I'm your host this week, Tiffany MacLennan. Today, we're doing something a little bit different. With this podcast, as you know, we look at some of the major stories shaping the higher education sector around the world. This year, that reflection has also taken form, not just as a podcast, but as a written report as well. A global year-end review that examines how politics, demography, finance, and technology have reshaped the sector in 2025.
If you're a loyal listener to the podcast, you know that if I'm your host, our guest is Alex Usher, President and CEO of Higher Education Strategy Associates, and also the author of this report.
The full document can be found on the website but the themes are already very clear. From the political upheavals in the United States, to the growing effects of demographic decline, to the quiet, but dangerous rise of policy neglect in many countries, 2025 was the year in which global higher education felt unusually fragile, and in some places on the edge of quite a reckoning.
We're gonna unpack some of those themes over the next 25 minutes and explore some of the stories that you may not have heard about. So I'm gonna pass it over to Alex.
Alex, you opened the report by saying 2025 was a year of monsters. Can you walk us through why that metaphor felt right for this moment in global higher education?
Alex Usher: So I have a bad answer and a good answer, and the bad answer is that, the year of monsters, that's a, a riff from, Antonio Gramsci who wrote in the mid 1920s. He said, The old world is dying and, and the new cannot yet be born. Now is the time of monsters. And, I'm, I'm an old Antonio Gramsci fan. He was a communist and a social theorist, I guess. And I, I named my first ever blog after him. I used to blog about soccer. Not many people know that about me, but I, I did, used to have a football blog and, and it was called Gramsci's Kingdom. So I've always had a, an affinity for that term. But I think, you know, the, the Gramsci quote is true in the sense that I think higher education is, like a lot of institutions in modern life, is largely a, a post World War II response that made sense at the time. You know, like the way that we organized higher education, it made sense in the sixties and seventies and eighties, and I'm not sure it makes sense the way we're organizing it anymore. We're, we're facing a very different world. And like a lot of institutions, uh, in Western society we're having trouble getting rid of the old and bringing in the new.
And so it does feel like a time of monsters. It does feel that we're caught trapped between, an old system and a new system. And, uh, it seemed like a pretty useful way to think about, uh, the situation that we're in. And so I talked about what are the, the main areas that are being, um, I guess the forces that that are impacting higher education, and I think I said, you know, it was, it was fascism, and it was neglect, and it was, uh, demographics, and it's technological change.
And those four areas I do think kind of sum up, the mega forces that we see impacting on the sector right now. Fascism is, is mostly the United States, but not all. You know, neglect is, is widespread in the west. Demographics affects both the east and the west. And technological change is pretty universal as well.
You put those four together, those are the things that, higher education is wrestling with.
Tiffany MacLennan: On the train of fascism you call the United States, the story of the year, maybe the decade, for higher education. We have Rob Kelchen coming in next week to talk about his top 10 American higher education stories, and I'm sure we probably could do a hundred this year easily, but when you look across global reactions, what struck you most about how other countries interpreted what was happening in the United States?
Alex Usher: I thought we would, so there's a couple of things that are interesting. I mean, number one, uh, I would say there's a lot of countries in Asia who assumed that Trump had a policy in mind. Like it wasn't sort of, they didn't interpret this, you know, the, the, the many, many things that happened in the US as being you know, separate manifestations of a diseased mind, which I think is how a lot of people in both the United States and the rest of the West understood. They thought there was a policy behind it. They didn't understand it necessarily, but they didn't assume that it was, um, you know, just the actions of a, of an autocrat trying to bring a sector to heal.
I think, what I found disappointing in most of the world was that, you know, in those first few months when it was clear that Trump and Musk and to an extent Kennedy were really trying to wreck American science, that, that there were huge data sets that were just not gonna get collected anymore in areas like health, you know, global measles monitoring, or climate data. The emphasis was less on how do we save global science, right? Because the US and you know, give, I think, you know, you can give, Trump his due here. I think there were lots of ways in which many countries were and do free ride off American science in the big investments they make. The emphasis was less how do we save global science and much more, how do we exploit the situation for our own benefit, right? So you know, at least a dozen countries set up some kind of fund to attract American researchers, and it just portrayed a profound ignorance, I think, of how American science work and how powerful American science really is. The amount of money that the National Institutes of Health throw at health researchers in the US is absolutely, there's no other country in the world that can match that. Maybe China in mathematics and there, there have been a lot of Chinese scientists going back from China to the US this year for sure. And um, you know, I just think, I've seen, I think a successful country has been one like Austria, which threw you know, 50 million euros at the problem and they got 12 scientists out of it.
You just can't expect, the universities or the academics in the United States really to move on the basis of one year or two. I think things would need to get a lot worse before there were really a genuine exodus, you know, like you saw out of the Soviet Union in the nineties, or you saw out of Nazi Germany in the thirties.
It's just not, it's not happening.
Tiffany MacLennan: Another one of the themes in the introduction is neglect, or the idea that many governments are kind of drifted, uh, into the assumption that universities can kind of run themselves indefinitely. How widely did you see this pattern across the 25 systems that you were examining?
Alex Usher: I don't think it's so much run themselves indefinitely, it's that they can be run with no new money, right? I mean the policy neglect is largely just, yeah, we'll, we'll just tell 'em to keep doing the same thing, but with 5% less. And where that's been, you know, expressed most arrogantly I think is is Mexico, where Claudia Scheinbaum, the President, just told institutions, well, you're just gonna, this work with Republican austerity. She meant public spirited in this case. You know, I think this is an issue that higher education shares with many institutions in western society. Uh, democracy being one of them. You know, people just think democracy will take care of itself and we don't need to worry about its threats from people like, you know, uh, the make America great again crew, or AFD in Germany or, you know, reform in the UK. I mean, these are profoundly anti-democratic forces that we're seeing across the world. Fascism in many cases. Um, and we just assume that we don't need to upgrade how we protect democracies. And it's the same with universities. You know, people just assume, oh yeah, they'll, they'll continue producing science, they'll continue educating people. We don't need to care about their upkeep. And, and really that's, I wouldn't say I saw it everywhere, but I think it's pretty prevalent in developed economies that higher education, we, we, higher education's just been there and produced such great things for so long, we can't imagine them not doing it and therefore it's safe to ignore them.
And I see that pattern repeating itself over and over across the OECD with very few exceptions.
Tiffany MacLennan: If you had to identify one country right now that you think kind of illustrates maybe some of that financial pressure that universities are facing, which would it be?
Alex Usher: Yeah, there's definitely not one. 'Cause I think there's, there's different kinds of financial pressures. I mean, I think the neglect episode, which is, you know, we can cut 2% here, we can cut, you know, three or 4% here, we are seeing that in a lot of countries, France, Canada, Australia, UK. Um, I think that's, that's pretty common in the developed world.
You get a couple of, you mean you have some countries where the, the government is actively working to destroy higher education, which would be the United States and possibly the previous government in the Netherlands, although they got voted out in October. I think there's a number of countries where you have governments which are having trouble keeping up with very high inflation. And obviously, uh, you know, Argentina is one of those, Pakistan is one of those. And then I think you have countries where it's not, the governments are not spending more, but demand is so far outstripping, uh, higher education that we are seeing crunches. And of course Kenya is the obvious example there. It's a, you know, a country where we've had, the institutions had have a lot of difficulty paying their staff. We saw a nine week strike in the fall. Um, I mean, it just, there are a number of countries like that. I think Nigeria is a little bit like that. But again, those are not a single type of financial crisis. There are multiple types.
Tiffany MacLennan: Another theme that shows up quite prevalently in this report is demography, uh, with nearly half of the large system seeing really stagnant or even declining enrolments.
Alex Usher: Mm-hmm.
Tiffany MacLennan: How much of decline actually is due to demography versus what is due to something else?
Alex Usher: Well, again, I think the, so again, there's a few, few different categories here. I think the most interesting stories are the places where the declines are not based in demography. So Turkey and Pakistan in particular have seen some pretty abrupt drops in student numbers in the last five years that are not driven by demography. I mean those are countries where they probably reached the demographic peak four or five years ago. But the, the drop in student numbers far outstrips the drop in in youth population. Um, Iran is another one. Uh, Iran has had a, a much bigger demographic transition in the last few years. Uh, but still even there, the, the drop is bigger than what you would expect given demography. That's a big deal. 'Cause I don't think we've seen that In higher education history, right? Like participation rates always increase, that's been the story for 60, 70 years. And, and so we're starting to see some examples where that's not the case.
You know, there's, there's what I would call normal demographic disasters. The ones we've been seeing for a long time. South Korea's one, uh, you know, the government had to pass a law to close what they call zombie universities in the private sector. Taiwan is declining fairly steadily. Russia's starting to stabilize after a very long, demographic decline. The interesting numbers, I think is, is Poland, which has seen a very big demographic decline, but numbers are starting to come back up and they're coming back up specifically because private, higher education is doing such a good job. So that's a really interesting story and I think it's one of the reasons people need to watch Poland. There's something different going on there. Other than that, what you're seeing are places like, uh, you know, Colombia, maybe Malaysia, certainly Canada, Australia, UK, places where even local demographics are flat. Um, and so we're not seeing an increase in domestic enrollments. And what's interesting is, this is starting to spread outside the anglosphere. People are saying, Hey, what about getting international students in to, to, you know, to, to backfill those maybe slightly declining, domestic numbers.
We'll see how that goes. But boy, I think there was at least a dozen countries out there who, who, uh, declared record highs in international students. And uh, and I would say it's largely, it's not because demand is increasing. Maybe that's a little bit of it, but it's because there are increasing the supply of spaces to international students, and the prime mover is domestic demographics.
Tiffany MacLennan: We're going to take a break.
Advertisement: Skip the inbox. Grab your coffee and join us for Focus Friday. Every other week, higher Education Strategy Associates is Tiffany McClennan hosts a one-hour webinar that brings people together to talk about what's next in higher ed, from enrollment to AI and everything in between. No slides, no lectures, just ideas, insights, and good conversation. Register for the next focus Friday for free. See the episode description for the link.
Tiffany MacLennan: And we're back. Alex, beyond the monsters, the report also highlights places that do actually continue to invest and expand their higher education systems. Which countries emerged as genuine bright spots this year.
Alex Usher: So I think there's some long term bright spots, right? I mean, I think India, uh, you know, the excitement that Indians have for higher education and the belief they have that they can copy China's science driven route out of poverty, I think is pretty impressive. I think China itself, although uh, it's not necessarily investing a lot of money right now, if you read their roadmap to 2035, that's a very ambitious document about, you know, talking about what kind of system they want to build, uh, what are the values they want to build into the system. And, and just a general, how do I put this, commitment to data driven improvement in higher education. I mean, the, the China report is, and, and they do a lot of experimentation. They're trying new fields of study, they're trying to build new types of institutions, and you just don't see anybody else doing that.
We've got one page in the document that talks about what we call outstanding policy movers. You know, places that, that did something really important and the three that I like to highlight are Uzbekistan. Uzbekistan has done some really interesting stuff around, uh, around international education, around expanding their higher education system. This is a system that has quintupled in size in the last 10 years or so. I mean, it really, and you know, they're just trying everything and they're good to go with that because again, like India, they think they can, they can pull off a Chinese style change in their society and their economy as a result of this.
I think Greece is really interesting. Greece has finally made steps to move towards the European norm. Um, they've gotten rid of a quarter million, what they call permanent students. So people who, uh, stay registered as students to get student benefits, but don't actually take courses. Uh, quarter million people. Greece is not that big a country, quarter million people got kicked off the rules. They're bringing in, uh, private universities. They are changing security laws so that, in effect universities are not havens for anarchists. I mean, these are big changes to the, to the Greek system and that's really important.
And then there's Vietnam. Vietnam, you know, they, it's not just that they're making big statements about let's, uh, you know, let's have another five universities in the top 100. I mean, they've done that before and lots of other countries have done that before, but now the kinds of, of policy things they're putting into place, they're paying attention to admission systems, they're paying attention to how to partner with, institutions from other countries, they're talking about institutional mergers. Like there's a lot of stuff going on. It's one of the most hyperactive policy environments in the world, and I think it's really exciting. So, so I, you know, those three in particular, Greece, Vietnam, Uzbekistan, those are places that are really showing up in the higher education field these days, and I think it's really promising.
Tiffany MacLennan: I think that leads well into this next question, but was there a particular region or even country where, you know, the higher education story diverged pretty sharply from what you would've expected when you started this report?
Alex Usher: Um, I would say the most surprising thing I learned in the process of this was, uh, was around private higher education. I know we just had Dan Levy on the show, a couple weeks ago and, and I think I referenced this, is the extent to which Western European systems are host to growing private higher education sectors.
Uh, you know, and I think back to our discussion with, uh, Nicolas Badré a few, uh, I guess it was a few months ago now, but, uh, Nicolas, you know, he was telling us about how private sector systems are, you know, are moving in, in France and in Europe. You know, the American system, we always think of the American system as being, oh, that, you know, so many big, bad privates, but American system is 70% public, 30% private, and France and Spain could pass that 30% number in the next couple of years, right? Those are really big systems, they're growing fast. Are they taking advantage of loose regulation? Maybe a bit. But I just think you've got in those countries what you have, and we're seeing it to a lesser extent in Italy and Germany as well, and as I said, in in Poland, it's, it's about 35% private. What we're seeing is there is a demand for a very different type of higher education that isn't classical, three or four year undergraduate degrees. There's a lot more demand for professional master's degrees. There's a lot more, you know, demand for mid-career learning. And the public sectors are not in, in these countries are not in the least equipped to do for it. They're not incentivized to do it. I think if you look at the way that their funding system works, they have no incentive to do it, but the privates do.
That's really interesting, right? So, so this is, I would argue it's very, and it's a very different process than what Dan talks about, you know, that mass private, higher education that was demand absorbing, you know, countries where they were rapidly increasing systems and it was just easier to let the private sector take some of them, that's not what's going on here. Like what we're seeing in European private higher education is something qualitatively different and, and there's not many people looking at it. I think Christine Musselin in France is doing so right now, but there's not many people looking at it. And yet, arguably it's one of the most interesting things in global higher education right now.
Tiffany MacLennan: If you take a step back from kind of the global view of the report, take a thousand foot, uh, step here, what do you see as the biggest lessons for Canadian Higher Education, the Canadian Higher Education Sector, or Canadian Higher Education Institutes to take away from what's in this report this year?
Alex Usher: Well, I think the threat from private institutions is important. I don't think it'll happen here. I mean, I think our institutions are usually incentivized to go after some of these markets, but it's worth remembering there are countries with very dominant public sectors, where the public sector is losing its dominance. And it can do that if it doesn't change fast enough. So I think that's, that's one lesson.
Um, the second lesson is, look, there are countries that do believe that skills and education can make a difference in national competitiveness. And again, I would point to China, I would point to Vietnam, and I would ask Canadian policy makers, why don't, they don't feel the same way about Canada? 'Cause it's quite clear that they don't, right? Like, I think, I think if we, if we look at the last few, few budgets, both, uh, provincially and federally, Canadians just like to dig stuff outta the ground and, and they don't, you know, the idea that we're gonna have a a, a service driven export economy is just not on anybody's radar screen. And so why bother, in, investing in higher education? I just think you have to look around the world and see what other countries are doing and ask themselves why we don't have as future oriented a value system when it comes to education as others.
And I think the last one is, you know, it's the comeback of branch campuses. Like, it's really interesting how many countries are experimenting with importing educational institutions from abroad. So India, for the first time, has decided to move into, uh, to allow branch campuses, and I think they've allowed, if I'm not mistaken, 15 or 16 in the last year. And the number of Canadian institutions was zero.
Um, you know, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan are now the third and fourth, I think largest importers of, of educational institutions. Number of Canadian institutions: zero. Um, I mean, I think the UK and Australia and increasingly some other countries, have decided that if you can't grow abroad, you have to move to the people that, you know, that need education. And where do we need education? It's where populations are still growing. That's not Canada. And so how, how do you create lasting institutions in these countries? We have to start thinking about that. I mean, I know Canadians have been, I know people that dislike it when I say this, but we've been very lazy for a very long time 'cause we could just assume that people would come here and come to us and we wouldn't need to bother with all these relations in foreign countries and developing new institutions. Those days are over and there are clearly other countries that can do this and uh, we need to catch up.
Tiffany MacLennan: You end the introduction of this report by saying nothing is cracked yet, but parts of the system are close to a reckoning. What do you think are the fault lines that you'll be watching the most closely in 26?
Alex Usher: Well, I mean, there's a few systems where literally the, the finances might break. And you'd have institutions going bust or you'd have large scale exoduses out of higher education. Um, Argentina's, one of them, Kenya's another. I think the UK will be very lucky if one or more institutions does not go bust. Um, I think there's, you know, I mean that's, that's the obvious stuff.
Second, you know, I think science as a whole is, in is in trouble, right? I mean, I think we've seen a lot more, uh, quite apart from the attacks on science in the United States, which will probably continue, uh, in a slightly different manner than we saw this year, but the role of scientific fraud. You know, particularly in India, I think these are eventually, these start damaging the cause of science generally. And so I think that research fraud and science fraud and rankings fraud, um, are all things that could end up damaging the system quite a bit next year.
I think those are the key areas that I would be watching for. I mean, you know, demography's not gonna kill anyone overnight. That, that's the point of demography. Um, but I, I do think that those, I, I think, the financing will cause some issues. I think the collapse of an AI bubble might take some pressure off universities, 'cause I think people are being, uh, I firmly believe AI will be a, will change society and higher education enormously over 20 years. But a lot of the short term pressures to which our our industries undergoing as a result of, you know, the sort of the schlock hype cycle, the Gartner hype cycle for AI, are profoundly damaging. So in some ways, an AI bust can't come soon enough for higher education, to take the pressure off a little bit and let us think a little more clearly about how to use that technology and integrate that technology. Um, so we'll see how that happens.
I think, uh, technological change and change in the labor market, and peoples as citizens, uh, faith in higher education to continue to give higher education graduates a boost in the labor market. Um, you know, I think we're seeing cracks in that all over the world and, uh, and that is something that higher education really has to move hard on.
We'll see what happens in the next 12 months. I don't, again, that's not gonna be a 12 month thing, but that's where the, those are the kinds of areas where the fracturing is happening and will continue to happen, I think for the next half decade or so, at least.
Tiffany MacLennan: Alex, thanks for the report.
Alex Usher: Hey, fun as always to be on the other side of the interview.
Tiffany MacLennan: And it just remains really for me to thank this time, Alex Usher, Sam Pufek, and Alex Petit-Thorne for getting this report out into the public. You can check it out at higheredstrategy.com, uh, on our newly formatted website, which is gorgeous, so make sure to check it out regardless. Next week, as mentioned in the very start, Rob Kelchen from the University of Knoxville, Tennessee will be joining us to talk about American top 10 higher education stories. And we have the list in advance and you don't wanna miss that episode. So we will see you next week. Bye for now.