The New University Model in the Knowledge Economy of Today – Between Corporatism and Monism

Abstract

The purpose of the presented analysis is to position the new university model introduced by the Act of 20 July 2018 – Law on Higher Education and Science in the field of knowledge economy, which is a segment of the dynamically developing digital economy as seen today. Right now, we can see the paradigm of the resource determining economic development becoming redefined. While in the past it was land, followed by capital and labour later on, at present it is more and more about knowledge – but in an institutionalised form. Such knowledge increases the significance of intangible assets as the factor behind development, i.e. intellectual technologies. Research-education institutions play a prominent part in generating and accumulating this knowledge. Therefore, the position and the significance of universities in the structure of acquisition and transmission of knowledge becomes redefined. This calls for new methods of managing quality, staff, projects, and university funds to be implemented – which means, in general, a new operating model for universities With its origins in a social-economic diagnosis, the article has been based on a normative analysis of the provisions establishing the new university model and uses this analysis to attempt to reconstruct the methods of knowledge management and to verify its suitability for the requirements set by the development of the digital economy and of the knowledge-based society.