Malta University venturing offshore

A few weeks ago more than 300 senior officials and academics from 203 foreign universities gathered in Malta for the third University Mediterranean Forum. Its main aim was to discuss the construction of the Euro-Mediterranean Higher Education Area. IVAN CAMILLERI interviews Dr Joseph Mifsud, director of the EU office at the University of Malta and the brain behind the organisation of this international forum.

Why did you organise the forum in Malta? Who were your partners and why did you choose them?

The Bologna Declaration (1999) puts the attempt to create the European Higher Education Area in a global context, mainly by stressing its role to pursue "the objective of increasing the international competitiveness of the European system of higher education". The Malta forum, co-financed by the Jean Monnet Action of the European Union, focused on the image of European higher education in the Mediterranean. The idea was to propose Malta's regional dimension as a relatively new member state in the context of the Euro-Med Dialogue on Higher Education.

The other partners for this initiative were the Anna Lindh Euro-Med Foundation, which has been working since its inception on 'branding' the Euro-Med concept among civil society.

The third major partner was the British Council. During the CHOGM (Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting) in Malta last November, the idea of joining forces with the British Council was explored and I must say that we secured their total commitment.

In my opinion, Malta's roles in the EU and as a long-standing member of the Commonwealth are complementary. This is also acknowledged by the Strategic Document of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Malta. It is our ability to bridge, that should be our main priority and help us bring dialogue to a region that is full of contradiction, walls and often insurmountable obstacles to peace and dialogue.

What was the spirit of dialogue experienced in the forum? Bringing people from the Euro-Med region is a restrictive or an open exercise?

Firstly, the participants came from all EU countries, from most of the signatories of the Bologna Process, and from all the partners of the Euro-Med Process. I was also pleased to meet a large delegation from our immediate southern neighbours Tunisia and Libya, who also had talks with the University and the Minister of Education, Youth and Employment.

The feeling among the international contact points in Tunisia, Libya, Malta and Italy is very close in terms of joint initiatives. The fact that the British Council joined the initiative opens the possibility of dialogue with other regions and can be fuelled by added expertise to intercultural higher education dialogue.

In terms of the Bologna Process, Ministers of Higher Education, including Malta's, welcomed the interest shown by other regions and encouraged co-operation with them by opening Bologna seminars and conferences to their representatives. In 2005, in Bergen, Ministers of Higher Education showed their eagerness to balance the competitiveness/attractiveness agenda with a partnership and co-operation approach in which "academic values should prevail".

The Malta forum saw the Euro-Med Higher Education Area as a partner of the Bologna Process and the need to stimulate balanced student and staff exchange and the building of an infrastructure for a higher educational dialogue. And in this, in my opinion, the Anna Lindh Foundation is and should remain the main player.

What has been the real effect on the transformation of European universities?

Changes in Europe along the lines of Bologna (harmonisation and transparency) in higher education have largely depended on the political will of governments to nurture the pan-European dream. This has to do with a common view of the future, the attainment of a regional-based globalisation and a political will to reach a strong international presence of the region as an entity. We still do not have anything similar in the form of a Euro-Mediterranean higher education landscape, although the attempt by 13 of the Euro-Med Higher Education Ministers last January in Catania was a first step in the right direction.

From the Malta forum it transpired however that most universities in the region still require a strong political mandate to produce changes in the academic structures and on the duration and design of the curricula. Labour mobility, north to south, and student mobility is still very small in the Euro-Med context, and therefore most comprehensive academic reforms in our region have been dominated by the need to build a system more compatible with that observed in the EU and the USA/Canada, which are still seen as the major destinations for academic exchange.

What did the major discussions focus on during the Malta meeting?

The major discussions targeted the creation of a Euro-Mediterranean space of higher education and research. There was a general consensus on establishing a permanent Euro-Med Rectors' Conference. Instead of a new Euro-Med University Network that adds to those already in existence, it was felt that a forum for networks should be set up with the support of the Anna Lindh Euromed Foundation and of other partners, such as UNESCO, ISESCO and the Council of Europe.

This forum would be, as Professor Giliberti from Urbino University pointed out, a common point of reference, which encourages the ongoing experiences to communicate with each other. It will thus be possible to start a bottom-up approach of a real Euro-Med area of Higher Education.

The declaration from the students' MEDNET and from the president of ESIB (the organisation that represents students in Europe) indicates that there is the will to make the first step.

Another proposal that must go to the EU is the setting up of an Erasmus programme for the Mediterranean. This, in the opinion of many, is a real instrument to bridge the Euro-Med intercultural dialogue. The Anna Lindh Foundation is an excellent partner in this exercise and has the right people to communicate the strategy of dialogue. I was very pleased to organise the event in Malta with their support. They are proving to be instrumental in their actions to promote the Barcelona Process realistically.

What can be learnt from the forum?

The Mediterranean has been since its discovery the birthplace and meeting place of different cultures, which produced values representing today a heritage not only for the region but whole of humanity.

Universities and higher education institutions by their very nature have always been places of dialogue and a meeting place among different cultural, ethnic, religious and social identities. With the awareness of the historical inheritance, as Education Minister Louis Galea rightly points out, the universities of the Mediterranean must rebuild this unity in diversity and those that already belong to the European Higher Education space should actively contribute to the extension of this space to include all the Mediterranean countries - a view also expressed by Dr Joanna Drake, head of the Commission's permanent representation in Malta.

President Emeritus Guido de Marco in his contribution spoke on the common priority joining the Euro-Med region, the need to create across the region greater opportunities for higher education, research and access to knowledge as a basis for a peaceful and democratic development in a regional society open to cultural pluralism, a society that offers the opportunity to study and I add, work, in a multiethnic and multilingual context of equal opportunities and dignity.

The idea put forward by outgoing Rector Professor Roger Ellul-Micallef that all Euro-Med universities must strengthen their relationships for reciprocal exchange of knowledge and to promote institutional dialogue among rectors in the region was unanimously endorsed.

I add that mobility of teaching and technical staff at higher education institutions, coupled with the mobility of researchers both those at the early stage and the more experienced, together with undergraduate student mobility through partnerships that lead to reciprocal recognition of qualifications and credits, is a must for the region. There is honestly no other way forward to build trust.

Entrepreneurship and ICT are seen as excellent paving stones for this trust and fertile ground for joint projects and programmes. The Barcelona Encuentro organised by the British Council, putting together British and Spanish researchers, was an excellent model to be implemented with the neighbours from the South.

Other countries are building on the model. France, Germany, Italy, Slovenia are EU member states that have been attracted to such collaboration, and I can see the Malta forum being replicated in the near future starting with the Finnish Presidency of the EU. Spain, Portugal and the Netherlands have also supported this initiative and one looks forward to their initiatives.

Don't you think that you are over-ambitious in your proposals?

I sincerely believe that universities and institutions such as the Anna Lindh Foundation can help to create a Euro-Med area of higher education that is person-centred. Universities often do not have the 'political' barriers that divide communities in regions of turmoil. Higher education institutions are built on the premise of academic dialogue, on exchanging information and knowledge on co-existence. The Malta forum helped create an atmosphere where academics and university representatives could meet, discuss and plan the future.

As Professor Richard Gillespie from the University of Liverpool noted during the forum, a decade after the founding Barcelona conference, many aspects of the Euro-Mediterranean partnership (strategies, policies and structures) are in need of renewal. It is clear, as Dr Assia Bensaled Alaoui from Morocco and a 'Prodi Sage' declared, new ideas and strategies must be inspired by the past.

Research collaboration is itself a partnership-building instrument, helping to shape the minds, perspectives and values of fellow Euro-Med researchers. This view was shared by Dr Abdouli Touhami, Supervisor-General of Khadmous University in Syria, who declared that the South must recognise the North as a partner in higher education.

The battle for an education for all means an education of quality for the Knowledge Society. This is the inherent message of the Tarragona Declaration signed last year by universities in the Euro-Med region, including Malta. Thirty-six new partners were added this year in Malta, a good omen for future North-South, East-West collaboration. Next year the forum will go south. The Anna Lindh Foundation will organise it in Alexandria.