To say that higher education in Muslim societies is in need of extensive reform is an understatement. The recent uprisings in the Arab world underscored elementary problems related to governance, economics, education, and employment, among other issues. In spite of being challenged by the growing gap in educational standards and achievements between highly industrialized nations and Muslim countries, most Muslim societies continue to produce mediocre results in higher education, as is only too apparent in the latest world university rankings. Notwithstanding some justifiable reservations regarding these rankings, one could at least agree that they provide a widely recognized and largely reputable measure of the quality of education at university level. According to the QS World University Rankings 2013/2014, the highest-ranking university in a Muslim-majority country is Universiti Malaya (Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia) in 167th place. Next is King Fahd University of Petroleum & Minerals (Saudi Arabia) in 216th place. The Times Higher Education World University Rankings 2013/2014 have Boğaziçi (Bosphorus) University in Turkey as the highest-ranking university in a Muslim-majority country in 199th place. More than a billion Muslims in Muslim-majority societies do not have a single university in the top 150 universities in the world. In comparison, Singapore with its 5.4 million inhabitants has two universities in the QS top 50 and Times Higher Education top 100, respectively.
Back to top
