The Great Brain Race: How Global Universities Are Reshaping the World »

Ben Wildavsky is a senior fellow in research and policy at the Kauffman Foundation. Previously, he was education editor of "U.S. News & World Report", economic policy correspondent for the "National Journal", higher education reporter for the "San Francisco Chronicle", and executive editor of the "Public Interest". He has written for the "Washington Post" and the "Wall Street Journal", among other publications.

"The Great Brain Race takes the reader to university campuses around the globe in order to powerfully make the case that open borders are as--and perhaps more--important in education as they are in trade and economics. You can't understand the way the world will work in this coming century without understanding the phenomenon Wildavsky reveals here. The Great Brain Race is an enormous contribution to the discussion."--Judy Woodruff, PBS Newshour

"Ben Wildavsky has given us the most thorough and penetrating account to date of how globalization is transforming higher education around the world. The details are rich and compelling, and Wildavsky's judgments are, in my opinion, unerring."--Richard C. Levin, president, Yale University

"In this masterful account, Ben Wildavsky documents the emergence of a global academic marketplace that will inevitably kindle protectionist anxieties in the established powers--but that will also spur research and innovation, boost economic growth, and solidify meritocratic values in emerging nations. At last this aspect of globalization gets the attention it deserves."--Sebastian Mallaby, Council on Foreign Relations

"No leader in a global business can ignore the increasingly international brain exchange that this book describes. Wildavsky convincingly contends that the spread of academic excellence internationally and a free trade in minds is to be celebrated rather than feared. This is a must read for anyone in the global race for talent."--Andrew Witty, CEO of GlaxoSmithKline

"Ben Wildavsky has written an engaging primer on the world of international higher education."--Philip G. Altbach, Director of the Center for International Higher Education, Boston College

Andrew Kelly - The American

The book is an excellent and thought-provoking work, one that raises many important questions about where globalized higher education will take us. . . . In the end, The Great Brain Race is very convincing: the world is a far better place when we embrace the transnational flow of people and ideas, limit the urge to engage in academic protectionism, and expand the reach of the global meritocracy.

Acknowledgments ix Introduction: What Is Global Higher Education--and Why Does It Matter? 1
Chapter One: The Worldwide Race for Talent 14
Chapter Two: Branching Out 42
Chapter Three: Wanted: World-Class Universities 70
Chapter Four: College Rankings Go Global 100
Chapter Five: For-Profits on the Move 141
Chapter Six: Free Trade in Minds 167
Afterword 194
Notes 199
Index 221