From the Post-Second World War Period to the 1980 Modernization Law

This chapter presents the historical evolution of the Italian higher education (HE) system from the end of the Second World War to 1980. This reconstruction shows the failure of the reforms that, during the 1960s, attempted to cope with the ‘massification’ of universities. This failure forced the Italian university system to deal with the challenge of universal access to HE and of new societal demands, with old, inadequate organizational and institutional arrangements. Also, the problems of the academic staff’s careers became of central importance to the governance of universities. Finally, during this period, the political debate over the university system became radicalized in ideological terms: in particular, the idea that this system necessarily has to be homogeneous and capable of offering students exactly the same ‘services’ throughout the country became a sort of taboo.