Quality Assurance, Accreditation, and Recognition of Qualifications as Regulatory Mechanisms in the European Higher Education Area

This article discusses the intricacies of the role and methods of application of quality assurance, accreditation, and the recognition of academic qualifications in the European Higher Education Area in formation. It analyzes the many-faceted meanings and measurement of quality in higher education, the means of its assurance at institutional and system levels, the links of quality assurance to accreditation and of both to recognition, the latter of which is also analyzed in detail. Quality assurance, accreditation, and recognition are inseparably linked and basic to the Bologna Process.