International conference – Visible and Invisible Universities

Sofia University “St Kliment Ohridski” will host the international conference Visible and Invisible Universities on June 18–19, 2026, bringing together scholars from across Europe and beyond to reflect on the paradoxes shaping contemporary higher education.

Universities today are increasingly required to enhance their visibility through rankings, performance indicators, and international competition, while simultaneously fulfilling missions that often remain invisible, such as social inclusion, cultural dissemination, civic education, and regional development. This conference proposes a critical examination of how visibility and invisibility are produced through governance choices, evaluation frameworks, communication strategies, and digital tools, and how these dynamics reshape academic life, institutional legitimacy, and public value.

The call for papers welcomes interdisciplinary contributions from fields including sociology, political science, management, communication studies, economics, geography, education, and law. Submissions may address, among other topics, global university rankings, performance indicators, governance and resource allocation, communication and branding strategies, digitalization and AI in higher education, or comparative and historical perspectives on university visibility across national contexts.

Proposals (title, 150-word abstract, 4–6 keywords, and author presentation) should be submitted by April 25, 2026, in English. Selected papers will be presented at the conference and considered for publication following the event. The conference language is English.