University Competition

Today, a university like the LSE certainly has to acknowledge that it is in competition for the best students, all of whom have choices they can exercise, and many of the choices which run across national and continental borders. We are in competition, too, for staff. The academic job market is one of the most global 25 there is. And in the 21st century, English is the new Latin, so universities in English speaking countries are exposed to more intense competition than those elsewhere. We are in competition for government funding, through the assessment of research quality. We are in competition for research contracts, from public and private sector sources, and indeed we are in competition for the philanthropic pound. Many of our own donors were at more than one university and indeed think of the LSE's requests alongside those of other charities to which they are committed. That is a competitive environment that is particularly visible to a vice-Chancellor.