Informe sobre reformas universitarias

Abstract

The Faculty of Philosophy and Letters in Madrid commissioned Marcelino Menéndez Pelayo and Nicolás Salmerón to write a report on the royal decrees that reduced university staffing levels, given by virtue of the authorisations granted by the Budget Law of 30 June 1892. The text of the opinion is reproduced together with some extracts from a well-known book by the professor from the Central University (Historia de los heterodoxos españoles) which help to understand the context of the message. It thus serves to document the extent of an opinion, which is not confined to a single group - the Krausist group - but is shared by other sectors that conceive of the university as something more than an administrative office. The key ideas are: the immobility of the teaching staff; an ideal of family life geared towards scientific research; the demand for autonomy - freedom of action - for the university body; the conception of the university as the representative of national culture; the promotion of scientific and not only professional faculties; the intervention of the university in the choice of its staff; the elimination of course exams... In short, it rejected "the trampling importation of the French centralist regime" and called for emancipation from excessive official tutelage.