Academic civilization: a macro-sociological framework for rethinking higher education beyond academic culture

This article examines the theoretical relationship between academic culture and academic civilization and develops a macro-sociological framework for understanding higher education as a transnational institutional order. Building on an earlier conceptualization of academic civilization and its six defining dimensions, the article investigates how shared institutional principles coexist with multiple national, regional, and institutional academic cultures. Drawing on historical and sociological scholarship, it develops a conceptual analysis of the relationships among academic culture, the global expansion and development of higher education, institutional flexibility, openness, and diversity, center–periphery relations, institutional autonomy and academic freedom, and professional education. The article argues that academic civilization constitutes a transnational institutional formation in which these interconnected dimensions contribute to the development and reproduction of higher education across national boundaries. Unlike approaches that focus primarily on the cultural dimensions of academic life, the civilizational framework integrates institutional, normative, structural, and cultural processes within a single analytical perspective. It contributes to the sociology of higher education by clarifying the distinctive analytical value of academic civilization and its relationship to academic culture.