ABSTRACT
Higher education systems, in many developing as well as developed countries, including in Asia and the Pacific, are characterised with a continuing crisis, with overcrowding, inadequate staffing, deteriorating standards and quality, poor physical facilities, insufficient equipment and declining public budgets. More importantly, higher education is subject to neglect and even discrimination in public policy. The World Bank policies that discouraged investment in higher education for a long period, improper use of estimates of rates of return, and excessive, rather exclusive, emphasis on Education for All (EFA) in the recent years, adverse economic conditions in many developing countries, following structural adjustment policies, etc., are some of the reasons for the neglect of higher education. Besides, the view that higher education has no significant effect on economic growth, equity, poverty and social indicators of development reduction in developing countries has also contributed significantly to this neglect. Based on the evidence in Asia and the Pacific countries, the paper reviews some of these widely held presumptions, the relationship between higher education and development, including human development and reports significant effects of higher education on development. It pleads that no nation that has not expanded reasonably well its higher education system could achieve high-level economic development. Quickly reviewing the level of development of higher education in the region, and public policies, including select policies on financing higher education and privatisation, it underlines the need for increased public financing and warns against excessive reliance on cost recovery measures and privatisation of higher education.
