CHERPE · Cuban Higher Education Reform: a Policy Ethnography

Cuban Higher Education Reform: a Policy Ethnography

CHERPE was designed to study Cuban higher education reforms through the lens of the anthropology of policy, situating the role of universities within the broader political and social transformations that followed the 1959 Cuban Revolution. Higher education in Cuba has been both a tool and an arena of revolutionary change, influencing citizenship formation, access to social mobility, and the production of knowledge in ways distinct from many other national contexts. Yet, despite its significance, Cuban higher education has received limited attention in comparative and anthropological scholarship. The project addressed this gap by combining historical analysis, ethnographic fieldwork, and documentary research to trace how policies on university access, organisational restructuring, and the universalisation of higher education have reshaped institutions and individual trajectories across generations. The research objectives were: • to contextualise Cuban higher education historically; • to analyse university access policy since 1959, including the universalisation reforms of the 2000s; • to describe how the role of universities has changed within the Revolution; and • to explore how university actors enact and adapt policies in their everyday practices. In methodological terms, the project advanced the anthropology of policy approach through ethnographic fieldwork, textual and discourse analysis, and interviews across three generations of students and university staff. These interdisciplinary methods linked social sciences and humanities (SSH) perspectives—particularly anthropology, education studies, and history—into a coherent analytical framework. Pathway to Impact The pathway to impact was structured around three dimensions: a) Scientific and academic contributions: By generating new empirical material on Cuban higher education, the project contributes to underexplored fields in anthropology of education, policy studies, and Latin American studies. The findings have been disseminated in international conferences, seminars, and forthcoming open access publications archived in the project’s Zenodo community and via the dedicated website (cherpe.site). b) Policy and societal relevance: The analysis provides insights into how higher education policies function as instruments of state-building, equity, and ideological formation. These findings are relevant not only for understanding Cuba but also for broader debates on access, equity, and the role of universities in shaping citizenship and social transformation. The project thus contributes knowledge that can inform policy dialogues in the Global South and within European comparative higher education research. c) Capacity building and sustainability: The fellowship strengthened the researcher’s independence, international networks, and methodological expertise. By embedding dissemination in long-term infrastructures (the Aarhus University CHEF project page, the independent website, and the Zenodo community), the outputs remain accessible for scholars, policymakers, students, and the general public beyond the project’s duration. In scale and significance, the project has helped position Cuban higher education as a valuable case study for global debates on the intersection of education, ideology, and social change. Its interdisciplinary perspective underscores the importance of SSH integration in addressing contemporary challenges in education policy and governance.

Текст от CORDIS, на английски · Данни: CORDIS, © Европейски съюз