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The government and the public often view universities as no more than generators of wealth and training centres for key professionals of the future. This attitude does a disservice to the educational contribution of universities, as it has gradually eroded the notion of universities as cultural projects that serve wider society or as institutions that work in the public interest.

The third report of the Global University Network for Innovation (GUNI) analyses the contribution made by higher education to human and social development in the context of globalisation. This study is aimed at broadening the vision of the vital social function performed by higher education institutions in providing a space for debate, proposals and reflection on the role of knowledge in society.

Universities are currently immersed in one of the most interesting and challenging periods in their history, since globalisation offers a series of major opportunities but also raises serious problems for the future by questioning the feasibility of what should be the guiding value of higher education: serving the common good, in an era in which the definitions of "good" and "common" have become increasingly unclear. The changes brought about by globalisation are so pronounced that we now need to reconsider the relationship between higher education and the society around it.

Resources are being channelled into education and knowledge creation like never before: so much so, in fact, that we are embarking on the creation of what is known as the knowledge society.

Against this backdrop, universities remain the key institutions in producing and disseminating knowledge and constitute the backbone of economic and social development. Higher education is responsible for training future professionals who will occupy strategic positions in society and the labour market. Consequently, it plays a fundamental and decisive role in transferring the knowledge, values and skills that it imparts into the public domain.