Higher education policy dynamics in turbulent times-access to higher education for refugees in Europe. Studies in Higher Education, online first, 1-12.

The study provides an insight into student perspectives on quality in higher education, using Harvey and Green conceptualizations as the point of departure, and exploring the linkages between the views on quality, the developments of the Bologna Process and related national reforms, as well as students' motivation for and expectations from higher education. Using the data collected in a survey of the student population in several European countries, the study shows that students have a multifaceted perception of quality in higher education, very homogenous with regards to 'quality as transformation/added value' perspective, but rather polarized with regards to 'quality as value for money' perspective. Students seem to prefer perspectives that put them in the centre of the process, though not necessarily only as active participants and cocreators of the higher education experience, but potentially also as passive consumers. The results show some blurring of the boundaries between the more traditional Humboldtian and the consumerist views on higher education among students.

This series aims to explore the globalization of higher education and the impact this has had on education systems around the world including East Asia, Africa, the Middle East, Europe and the US. Analyzing HE systems and policy this series will provide a comprehensive overview of how HE within different nations and/or regions is responding to the new age of universal mass higher education.

Several university alliances have been established in Europe in an attempt to influence the development of policies in research and education. As such, these alliances can be seen as being new players in the increasingly complex multi-actor, multi-level governance in this policy domain. The paper compares two key university alliances in Europe; in particular, how membership differences are related to their positions in the policy arena, their policy agendas and their policy formation and lobbying practices. The study contributes to understanding of, first, the role of university alliances in European level policy processes concerning higher education and research; and, second, the implications their involvement might have for future shaping of European initiatives in the knowledge domain.

This thematic issue introduces the multifaceted nature of contemporary public policy-its multi-level, multi-actor and multiissue features-using the case of higher education policies from around the world. To do so, this introduction first describes how higher education as a policy sector should be garnering far more attention from scholars interested in political, economic and social transformation. A framework for identifying and accounting for how the 'multi-s' characteristics configure and re-configure public policy is then introduced. Next, this thematic issue's contributions are summarized with highlights of how they bring to life the different 'multi-s' features. This introduction concludes with a discussion of what the proposed framework of the 'multi-s' offers to studies of higher education policy coordination. In so doing, the objectives of this thematic issue are to highlight what the case of higher education policy coordination offers to studies of public policy and to initiate a dialogue between all social scientists and practitioners interested in the increased complexity of governing, producing and using knowledge today. This thematic issue of Policy and Society focuses on the increased multifaceted characteristic of contemporary public policy (Peters, 2015). Using the case of higher education policies from around the world, we highlight the multi-level, multi-actor and multi-issue-'multi-s'nature of public policy in areas of growing international and political attention. The global shift towards knowledge-based economies and societies has placed 'knowledge' at the core of contemporary public policy and policy-making. The governance of knowledge, however, is not a neatly contained policy coordination exercise: it requires collaboration across multiple policy sectors that may have previously experienced very little or less interaction. A non-exhaustive list of relevant policy areas includes higher education, research, trade, foreign policy, development and home affairs (migration). Higher education policy coordination is thus permeated with respective sectoral concerns, with discussions taking place across distinct policy arenas, sometimes in silo, both inside and