Access versus Quality Trade-off: How Citizen-Centered Is the Public Policy Making in the Expansion of the Turkish Higher Education System?

In this study, we focus on the central question of how Turkey managed the expansion of its higher education system in terms of public policies and public interest over the past 20 years. We analyzed public policy documents, academic papers, and written records such as news websites and newspaper columns to evaluate how the recent expansion in Turkish higher education evolved and impacted the quality of Turkish universities. Our findings indicated that during the third expansion era starting in the early 2000s, the Turkish higher education system was successful in improving access to higher education immensely. The government’s openness to expansion and the pressure from the members of Parliament for different areas of Turkey were effective in this process. On the other hand, after the expansion period, the quality of instruction, student services, and research were impacted negatively in many newly founded universities. In conclusion, with a citizen-centered public policy making perspective, the relevant literature and the written records from different sources show that the expansion was a correct policy decision; however, all stakeholders of the higher education system had question marks about how this process was managed.