中欧社会论坛 - China Europa ForumWhite Paper on the University of Catalonia
Authors: the Associació Catalana d’Universitats Públiques
University means the generation of knowledge; it means new scientific, social and humanistic models that stimulate progress, coexistence, cohesion and the desire to improve. It means being conscious of the mission with which we have been entrusted; it means the autonomy of knowledge.
These are the reasons behind this White Paper, which was drafted after a lengthy process of meetings, proposals, presentations and work involving all of the public Catalan universities under the University of Catalonia brand. Beyond the symbol lies the spirit. The decided, firm, incorruptible concept of cohesion. We introduce ourselves as the University of Catalonia because we believe in it and because we wish to change the Catalan University landscape through a joint pact, a watertight agreement arising as an inheritor of medieval tradition, and which forcefully and responsibly enters the contemporary world.
We believe we must speak about what lies on the horizon for the University of the 21st century, but we must not forget that Catalan and European tradition are a reference of a past in which we locate the origin of what we understand by University, the concept according to which we work and to which we devote our efforts. Going back ten centuries, we find one of the oldest institutions, with the greatest prestige and the greatest capacity for renewal in the history of humanity. An institution, the University, that understands that knowledge is a universal, moving, dynamic good and that the
essence of knowledge, of research, and of science lies in the ability to transmit ideas from generation to generation in order to broaden and consolidate the rule of rationality and progress.
The White Paper on the University of Catalonia is the crystallisation of a process. On the basis of the wealth represented by autonomy, the capacity of decision, the right to speak in one’s own voice to define the role to be played by the universities in today’s society, the University of Catalonia hereby publishes a diagnosis of the present, establishes the aims for the future and presents a set of strategies that go far beyond merely intended programmes or words. This document, the White Paper, is open to constructive dialogue at the very heart of the University and with all of the other institutions and social agents. At the same time, however, it is a tenacious spearhead, fashioned from rigour, for us to be different and become better.