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  • Higher Education and Civic Engagement: Comparative Perspectives edited by Lorraine McIlrath, Ann Lyons, and Ronaldo Munck
  • Valerie Osland Paton
Lorraine McIlrath, Ann Lyons, and Ronaldo Munck (Eds.). Higher Education and Civic Engagement: Comparative Perspectives. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012. 268 pp. Hardcover: $81.00. ISBN 978–0–230–34037–4.

Irish editors Lorraine McIlrath, Ann Lyons, and Ronaldo Munck offer an important contribution to the literature of higher education and civic engagement, assembling authors from Argentina, Australia, Canada, Ireland, Lebanon, Spain, the United Kingdom, and the United States of America. McIlrath serves as the director for the Community of Knowledge Initiative (CKI) at the National University of Ireland Galway; Lyons coordinates EPIC—Engagement People in Communities at CKI; and Munck holds the Civic Engagement chair at Dublin City University in Ireland. In this volume, the editors bring together the voices of leaders of civic engagement in higher education from across the world.

“Globalizing Civic Engagement,” a foreword by Ahmed Bawa and Munck, comments on the skew of higher education and civic engagement literature to the northern hemisphere, and addresses the need to acknowledge the “realities of North-South differentials” (p. xi). The authors assert that civic engagement is a knowledge-intensive activity, and must be understood in the local context, as well as affirming the interconnectedness of the world. Thus, civic engagement may take on a different role in light of local cultural, economic, political, geographical, or societal contexts, and these experiences offer important contributions to the largely Northern views published to date.

Three sections organize the book’s chapters, moving from theoretical or philosophical approaches to manifestations related to and issues rising from civic engagement. The volume concludes with applied or practical narratives about higher education and civic engagement in Latin American, Lebanon, Spain, the United Kingdom, and Ireland.

Section 1, “Context and Concepts,” includes four chapters. In Chapter 1, Munck, Helen McQuillan, and Joanna Ozarowska discuss global [End Page 422] austerity and the impact of neoliberalism on higher education. They examine the “web of interactions between education, enterprise, and community” (p. 22) and challenge universities to prepare students for “global citizenship” (p. 28).

Brenda M. Gourley, in Chapter 2, speaks to the mission of universities as forces for social transformation and the balance between the “dual imperatives” (p. 3) of competitiveness and social relevance. As an exemplar, she offers the University of KwaZulu Natal in South Africa, which provided physical shelter to more than 80 non-governmental organizations advocating for social causes during a time when the apartheid government suppressed their views. These organizations stimulated strategic conversations and supported the institution’s goals to model a democratic culture. Gourley also discusses global collective initiatives and statements, such as the Talloires Network’s “Declaration on the Civic Roles and Social Responsibilities of Higher Education” (p. 35) and UNESCO’s “Declaration on Higher Education” (p. 37).

From her research on the policy, process, and practice of civic engagement in Irish higher education curriculum, Josephine A. Boland shares strategies to sustain civic engagement in Chapter 3. Boland examines key concepts of civic engagement, including a “diversity of activities ranging from community-based/service learning (CB/SL) volunteering, community-engaged research, scholarship of engagement, public engagement, advocacy and intellectual leadership” (p. 42). She suggests alignment opportunities through the European Qualifications Framework and the Bologna Process (p. 46) and the Irish National Framework of Qualifications (p. 47).

In Chapter 4, Hans G. Schuetze argues that engagement and service are central to the mission of higher education. He discusses three expressions of engagement: knowledge transfer, continuing education, and community engagement, including service learning and community-based research. He briefly discusses the historic relationship between communities and universities in England, Europe, Canada, and the United States, enumerating global trends that have impacted regional development and community service missions of higher education institutions (pp. 62–63).

Section 2, “Manifestations and Issues,” provides an overview of major components of civic engagement: community-based participatory research (CBPR), service learning, student volunteerism, and community partner perspectives of service learning experiences. Michael Cuthill describes the historical context for the scholarship of engagement, and advances the idea that higher education is “but one of many knowledge producers”. Referring to...

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