^aDepartment of Public Administration, Leiden University, PO Box 9555, 2300 RB Leiden, The Netherlands E-mail: steunenberg@fsw.leidenuniv.nl

¹I would like to thank the contributors to the panel discussion at the 2005 ECPR General Conference in Budapest, Antoaneta Dimitrova, David Lowery, and Gerald Schneider, for their stimulating comments.

Abstract

One reason for the low productivity of European political science and public administration departments could be a high level of national regulation, which shields departments from the forces of international competition. Higher education in Europe is not yet a single market in which students and staff compete for resources. In this article, I discuss a number of problems related to the current situation of limited competition and suggest ways to improve European political science and public administration. These include, among others, national deregulation of higher education and a Europe-wide system of assessment and accreditation.