Employee funds were used in the early 1990s when two higher education institutions, Jönköping University and Chalmers University of Technology, were transformed into foundations. The issue was then examined as part of the Alliance government’s reform agenda around 2010. After a largely negative consultation process, none of the proposals put forward at the time to create a special form of authority for higher education institutions were implemented. It was back again in the mid-2010s, but then the proposals for the transformation of foundations were not even put out to consultation, but were scrapped after an internal departmental review.
Here we are in 2025 and the government, this time with a liberal education minister, is again launching an inquiry into the governance of higher education institutions. It is not really clear what direction the government has in mind, nor is it clear whether there are any particular challenges or problems that the inquiry should focus on this time.
But the inquiry is important. We need to get out of the sometimes overly restrictive clothes we are wearing now. This can include regulations for government agencies that bind us in ways that are not appropriate, and difficulties in acting fully in academic collaborations, nationally and internationally. So I thought I would take the liberty of suggesting some possible directions for the forthcoming inquiry.
An important starting point might be that not all higher education institutions need to change in the same way at the same time. Let us say that the government takes this opportunity to clearly articulate the different roles and missions of different institutions in the higher education landscape, which may require different forms of association. The most important thing is not to automatically assume that ‘one size fits all’, but to seriously try to link the form of association to the role in the higher education landscape and for Sweden.
There should also be money involved. We are talking about much more than a few billion kronor, but from the government’s point of view it is not a cost but an investment in the foundation’s balance sheet, which the institution must manage while maintaining its purchasing power.
Inspiration may be found in Finland, where higher education institutions received so-called matching funds in their foundations: for every euro the university received in donations, the state added a few euros to the university’s endowment. A new form of authority could also be a way of dismantling our model for the provision of premises, for example by transferring the property portfolio to foundations or companies controlled by the university.
Finally, I hope that the inquiry will be conducted in interaction and perhaps cooperation with both higher education institutions and political representatives. If there are good ideas, it would be good if they were discussed widely and intensively along the way, rather than having a consultation round that effectively kills any ambitions for change, because we need change.