74 Book R e v i e w s / C o m p t e s R e n d u s Some of the key issues on funding would be better understood if a more thorough analysis of the data were undertaken. Second, treatment of some important issues is somewhat superficial or even ignored. For example, the discussion on the rationale for federal funding of postsecondary education is inadequate, and needs to be developed further. More importantly, the fiscal impact of the Established Programs Financing on provincial postsecondary education expenditures is not explored despite the availability of data for such an analysis. Finally, the study lacks a concluding or summary section. One does not learn a great deal about the financial plight of Canadian universities by reading the last two sections of this report. A reader would have been better served with a brief summary of the major conclusions with particular emphasis on policy implications. It is just too fallacious to end abruptly with a discussion of the co-operation between the federal and provincial governments on matters relating to postsecondary education. Despite its drawbacks, this report serves as a useful reference in providing higher education data for politicians and researchers. It is a serious attempt to provide relevant information on the financing of postsecondary education and relating this to the future existence of our universities and colleges so vital to the well-being of our country. Governments and Higher Education: The Legitimacy of Intervention. Edited by Cecily Watson. Toronto: Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, 1987. Reviewed by Benjamin Levin, Executive Director, University Grants Commission of Manitoba. This book is a compilation of papers originally presented at a conference, held at OISE in 1984, on the theme of the legitimacy of government intervention in higher education. A second volume is to apppear containing further papers from the conference. Before commenting on the volume, it is appropriate to give a brief overview of the contents. There are three sections, following a keynote address by Harry Arthurs of York University. The first section contains seven papers on Canadian higher education and government. The second section includes papers on Britain, Australia, China, and a combined report dealing with Guyana and Tanzania. The third section has six papers dealing with the theme in relation to the United States. As might well be expected in a book of papers from a conference, even one with a relatively circumscribed theme, the papers cover a wide variety of subjects from a wide variety of perspectives. Section one includes an historical overview by 75 Book R e v i e w s / C o m p t e s R e n d u s Blair Neatby, Lee Southern's view of the impact of politics on governments and universities, Michael Skolnik's paper on state control of degree granting, an account by L.A. Watt of the regulation of graduate programs in Ontario, John Dennison's look at government-community college relations, a discussion by John Holland and Saeed Quazi on the roles of universities and governments' view of them, and a piece written by Kenneth Rea on postsecondary policy since 1945. The papers in the second section are broader in scope. Maurice Kogan describes the Thatcher government's higher education policy in Great Britain. Grant Harman reviews shifts in effective power in Australian tertiary education. Ruth Hayhoe focuses on the impact of foreign aid on university education in China, while Vivian Patterson confronts the different meanings of government intervention in Tanzania and Guyana. The American pieces include Walter Hobbs on church-state issues in higher education, a review by Jane Adams Lamb of state funding formulas for higher education, an analysis by Harland Bloland of the role of higher education associations as lobbies, a study by Catherine Cornbleth and Don Adams of recent issues in the reform of teacher education, Maureen McClure's analysis of governments' interests in research and economic development, and a paper with Richard Lonsdale as the senior author which describes five cases of government intervention in New York State. There is, as editor Cicely Watson notes in her Preface, "a paucity of published material on Canadian higher education". This collection, then, containing as it does well-prepared and interesting papers, is most useful and a welcome addition to the literature. Particularly valuable is the comparative element introduced through including material on other countries. Paradoxically, the comparative purpose seems better achieved in section two, in which each paper covers an entire country (two in the case of Patterson's article), than in section three, which deals with the United States. This is because the papers in section two do provide an overview of the situation in each country, whereas the six papers in the last section each deal with only one element of the American setting, leaving the reader with no comparable overview. (In section one, Blair Neatby's and Kenneth Rea's historical pieces do provide, to some extent, a Canadian overview.) A difficulty with any collection of readings is to provide some coherence to them as a set. Unlike some collections of readings, all the papers in this volume do deal with the theme in one way or another. It is, of course, particularly difficult to impose continuity on a set of papers already written and presented. Nonetheless, one is left with a bit of a sense of wandering around the subject rather than approaching it very directly. Perhaps an introduction which tried to provide a framework through which the various papers might be seen would have been helpful, albeit difficult to prepare. Although all the papers do address the title theme, only a few of them attempt to ask directly whether, and under what circumstances, government intervention in higher education is appropriate. Arthur's keynote address does so, arguing that 76 Book R e v i e w s / C o m p t e s R e n d u s "government intervention is inevitable once we accept the basic premise of government funding...and...such intervention is by no means wrong in principle", although he certainly expresses reservations about the forms it could take. Holland and Quazi appear to be arguing that government intervenes to protect the monopolistic position of universities in rationing social rewards. Patterson, discussing two third world countries, believes that there can be no easy separation between the needs of the state and the tasks of the university, and that the very meaning of terms such as intervention will change in cultural contexts which are themselves quite different from those in Canada. Most of the papers, however, describe government's role in some particular sector or case, without specifically addressing the broader implications. An overall impression from the book about intervention would be that most of the authors have accepted the reality of a government role in higher education, whether or not they regard that role as legitimate, and that they therefore advocate making the best of the situation. Since intervention there must be, let it be the kind of intervention we want, seems to be the tone. Of course, it is difficult to take issue with such a position. Despite the question posed by the title, there can be little doubt that there is and will continue to be a major state role in higher education. Indeed, one wonders what universities would be without the sanction of the state to award certain kinds of credentials, not to mention the provision of vast amounts of money. It might be suggested that a change in subtitle, from "the legitimacy of intervention" to "an appropriate role" would perhaps clarify the parameters for a useful debate on the matter. One interesting omission from the book is the government point of view. With the exception of Lee Southern, who was with the now-disbanded Universities Council of British Columbia, all the authors are from the academy. There is practically no attention in the entire collection to why governments are interested in higher education, what their motives might be for intervening (or, to use another term, providing direction), and whether government's views and policies are justifiable. Southern does, indeed, comment on "politics as protection in higher education". For the most part, however, governments are treated as strange and mysterious interlopers, who do not understand the academy and are themselves not easily understood. If higher education is to be able to cope with government, such a perspective simply will not do. Government is as old and legitimate an institution as are colleges and universities, as well as being considerably more powerful, at least in the short term. It is essential that institutions of higher education, the associations they form, and researchers interested in these matters give serious thought to why governments behave as they do. Since almost every government in the western world is taking an increased interest in higher education (meaning more intervention, in most cases), there must be some grounds for their actions. Simply citing academic freedom and university autonomy as ultimate values is unlikely to be effective in deterring governments, although these values do have real power. The OECD has just published a major study by William Taylor (1987) on 77 Book R e v i e w s / C o m p t e s R e n d u s universities which does a fine job of describing some of the issues which prompt government attention and action, while being highly sympathetic to the traditions and needs of universities. That report, together with this book, would be a good starting point for a further collection of essays on this important and timely subject. REFERENCES Taylor, W . (1987). T h e Role and Functions of the Universities. Paris: O E C D . (Report ED (86)4). A Profile of Postsecondary Students in Canada. Ottawa: Department of Secretary of State, 1987. Reviewed by John D. Dennison, Professor of Higher Education, The University of British Columbia. This report, published in 1987, presents a summary of national data on postsecondary students from 1983-84. The stated purpose of the report is "to highlight some of the main characteristics of the Canadian student population". In particular, the issues which are addressed include students' income and expenditures, mobility, language usage, socio-economic background, and interest in Canadian studies. For some reason, not all objectives are covered in the body of the report. There is much in this report which is both interesting and valuable and any reader, even with a very general interest in higher education, would gain considerable insight into the kinds of individuals who pursue advanced education in Canada, and the many qualities which distinguish them. However, as is often the case with national surveys and massive data files, there are certain deficiences in the study which for serious students of higher education might constitute an ongoing source of frustration. Part of the latter lies in the timeliness of the data. For reasons which are presumably explainable, it appears to take three years to reproduce important information into published form. The characteristics of 1983-84 students do not have the same appeal to contemporary researchers in 1987. While, as already noted, the study objectives were somewhat selective and the results provided through the various tables were even more so, some readers may well wish that, given the size of the survey, other important research questions might have been included. There are, of course, several "pluses" in the study. The size of the data base (45,000 useable returns for a net response rate of over 70 percent) is impressive in itself and lends credibility to the results. Furthermore, for the first time, a national study of this kind has attempted to provide data on part-time as well as full-time students at the community college level. Given the importance of part-time students as a target population in the college sector, this is a welcome innovation. For some reason, the data on these two groups of students is not comparable. For