ABSTRACT
The idea of giving special support to the intellectually gifted and to the education of an elite has enjoyed substantial attention in Germany since the beginning of the 1980's. This chapter compares the internal organization and hierarchicalization of universities in several countries. Many private schools invested heavily to transform themselves into boarding schools in order to accommodate elite pupils from greater distances. In a country the size of the United States such private boarding schools played an important role in the social and cultural integration of the upper strata, bringing together those who otherwise would never have met and furnishing them with a common educational background. Differentiation in terms of hierarchicalization (elite sector), subject, and geographical segregation are functional equivalents, and nationally specific traditions play a crucial role in determining the form which the differentiation in any given setting takes.
