Higher education and research: multiple negative effects and no new opportunities after Brexit

Ludovic Highman; Simon Marginson; Vassiliki Papatsiba

doi:10.1080/21582041.2023.2192044

Higher education and research: multiple negative effects and no new opportunities after Brexit

Ludovic Highman
, Simon Marginson
, Vassiliki Papatsiba

University of Oxford
Cardiff University

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

31 Citations (SciVal)

Abstract

Brexit has weakened collaboration between UK higher education institutions and their EU counterparts, with negative implications for UK resources and capacity, without leading to new global strategies and opportunities. In 2020 the UK government withdrew from the Erasmus student mobility scheme and introduced the Turing scheme. While Erasmus had supported both outward UK student mobility and inward movement from Europe, Turing supports only outward mobility. In 2021–2022 the cessation of UK tuition fee arrangements for EU citizens entering UK degrees led to a sharp drop in numbers. Collaborative European research programmes have been crucial in building the infrastructure and network centrality of UK science and in attracting EU citizen researchers, but at the time of writing future UK participation as a non-member country was unresolved. The long uncertainty about this, coupled with the cessation of free people movement, have triggered the exit of some UK-based researchers and declines in UK researchers' competitiveness in European grants, EU doctoral students and established researchers entering UK, and EU country citizens as a proportion of UK academic staff. In addition, the loss of access to European structural funds has slowed the modernisation of UK higher education institutions and reduced their social contributions.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	216-234
Number of pages	19
Journal	Contemporary Social Science
Volume	18
Issue number	2
Early online date	6 Apr 2023
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1080/21582041.2023.2192044
Publication status	Published - 31 Dec 2023

Funding

Empirical research used in this article was conducted in the ESRC/RE Centre for Global Higher Education (awards ES/M010082/1, ES/M010082/2) and funded by the U.K. Economic and Social Research Council as a Brexit Priority Project coordinated by the UK in a Changing Europe (award ES/R000166/1). Prior to the completion of Brexit,, in addition to the Framework Programmes for research, UK universities drew support from various EU funding programmes that foster economic and social development, such as the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and the European Social Fund (ESF). These programmes funded UK policies for innovation, SME competitiveness, low carbon, broadband, urban development, social inclusion, skills and employment. EU funding was critical for investment projects and services for local authorities, development/enterprise bodies, and the voluntary sector. In higher education these funds supported long-term investment and provided opportunities to participate in projects that contribute to the economic and social development of regions and populations. The evaluation of Research Impact and Knowledge Exchange activities has played a significant role in driving UK universities towards greater engagement and active contribution beyond just generating new research knowledge. Two significant European Union (EU) funding schemes for research and innovation that foster flows of research talent are the European Research Council (ERC) and Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA). The ERC grants are awarded to outstanding researchers with a track record of research excellence in any field of research, while the MSCA awards are open to talented researchers of any field, including both early-career and experienced researchers. Both schemes provide long-term funding for excellent research projects, ranging from basic research to marketable innovation. Prior to Brexit the UK excelled in winning these prestigious grants. Data from FP7 (2007-2013) show that it was the top performing country, receiving €1.665 billion in ERC grants and €1.086 billion in MSCAs. Next most successful was Germany with €1.087 billion and €0.564 billion respectively (EEAS, ). As well as being a vital second source of funding alongside UK research council funding, European funding has been especially important in those specific disciplines where research is more strongly supported in relative terms in Europe than in the UK, fields such as Archaeology, Classics and Computing (Technopolis, ). Between the commencement of ERC grants in 2007 until its exit from the EU in 2020 the UK retained the position of leading recipient nation in relation to ERC grants (European Research Council, ).

Funders	Funder number
Framework Programmes for research
Economic and Social Research Council	ES/R000166/1
European Research Council
European Social Fund
European Regional Development Fund

UN SDGs

This output contributes to the following UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

SDG 4 Quality Education

Keywords

Brexit
Higher education
higher education policy
international student mobility
research
science

ASJC Scopus subject areas

History
General Social Sciences

Access to Document

10.1080/21582041.2023.2192044Licence: CC BY

Cite this

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abstract = "Brexit has weakened collaboration between UK higher education institutions and their EU counterparts, with negative implications for UK resources and capacity, without leading to new global strategies and opportunities. In 2020 the UK government withdrew from the Erasmus student mobility scheme and introduced the Turing scheme. While Erasmus had supported both outward UK student mobility and inward movement from Europe, Turing supports only outward mobility. In 2021{\textendash}2022 the cessation of UK tuition fee arrangements for EU citizens entering UK degrees led to a sharp drop in numbers. Collaborative European research programmes have been crucial in building the infrastructure and network centrality of UK science and in attracting EU citizen researchers, but at the time of writing future UK participation as a non-member country was unresolved. The long uncertainty about this, coupled with the cessation of free people movement, have triggered the exit of some UK-based researchers and declines in UK researchers' competitiveness in European grants, EU doctoral students and established researchers entering UK, and EU country citizens as a proportion of UK academic staff. In addition, the loss of access to European structural funds has slowed the modernisation of UK higher education institutions and reduced their social contributions.",

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Higher education and research: multiple negative effects and no new opportunities after Brexit

Abstract

Funding

UN SDGs

Keywords

ASJC Scopus subject areas

Access to Document

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Cite this