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The Origin of the Research University
Universities have existed for more than a thousand years — and for almost all of that time, they weren’t centers of research. What changed in 19th century Germany?
Cameralist reforms involved finding new ways to monitor university activities, standardizing qualifications, and ending professorial nepotism — which also meant bringing those hiring decisions under much tighter state control. In his short tenure as a Prussian educational administrator, from 1809 to 1810, he developed a plan for an institution to be built in Berlin, modeled on the pedagogical vision of Schelling, Fichte, and Schleiermacher, but also inspired by his own alma mater, Göttingen. This document spends less time on the value of academic freedom than it does on the advantages to the state: the cost savings from locating the university in Berlin, the necessity of restoring national pride after years of war, the boost to Friedrich Wilhelm's own reputation.
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