EUA Council for Doctoral Education

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The doctorate was supposed to be about discovery — what happened?

19 September 2025 | Sónia Cardoso, Lusófona University of Humanities and Technologies

Despite two decades of reform, doctoral education increasingly prioritises performance over inquiry, risking the erosion of intellectual freedom. For Sónia Cardoso, we must reclaim the doctorate as a space of critical thinking, care and epistemic plurality and challenge current systems that value compliance over creativity.

The doctorate was once described as a space for freedom. A time to think deeply, explore boldly and challenge the boundaries of knowledge. Twenty years ago, the Salzburg Principles sought to anchor doctoral education in ideals like autonomy, creativity and social responsibility. A noble vision. But in today’s university system, does this vision still hold?

We should talk about this — not in closed academic seminars or abstract policy reports, but openly, collectively and maybe even uncomfortably.

Because for all the reforms, frameworks and well-meaning checklists, doctoral education in Europe (and beyond) has increasingly come to resemble something quite different: a system of survival. A doctorate today often means navigating bureaucracy, producing publishable results at high speed and proving your worth on metrics that rarely reflect the quality of your thinking. Ask any current candidate — many will tell you the same thing: burnout is common, isolation is real and the question of ‘What comes next?’ looks like a storm cloud.

Is this what the doctorate was meant to become?

We now expect candidates to be researchers, teachers, grant writers, policy influencers, peer reviewers, data managers and outreach specialists — all while earning less than a living wage in many countries and facing precarious futures. Doctoral education is increasingly professionalised, yes, but also dehumanised. Its promises of intellectual freedom, meaningful community and the pursuit of knowledge for its own sake are eroding.

And yet, few within academia seem ready to confront this openly.

So, let’s name the tensions we’re all feeling.

The tension between curiosity and productivity. Between slow thinking and fast publishing. Between the plurality of knowledge and the dominance of a single academic language. Between mentorship as dialogue and supervision as paperwork. Between research as commitment and research as career branding.

These are not individual gripes. They are systemic fractures. And if we keep pretending otherwise, we risk alienating the very people we claim to be training for the future of science and society.

What’s more, the doctorate has not become more accessible for all. In fact, for those from underrepresented backgrounds, the structure of doctoral education remains riddled with barriers — financial, cultural, institutional. We talk about inclusion but often fail to address what kind of knowledge we consider legitimate, or what kinds of voices are still missing in our labs, archives and seminars.

We don’t have to achieve utopias for them to matter. Their power lies in serving as guiding principles — reminders of what we strive for, even if the journey is unfinished. Working towards our ideals means dismantling the exploitative structures that define today’s academia — systems that too often neglect basic labour and human rights for researchers, staff and students alike. As one US professor recently responded to a journal review request:

“I do not believe that perpetually producing more things faster will help eradicate violence, end injustice, heal our planet, or address other forms of suffering in the world. I have chosen to slow down and work more mindfully. Therefore, I am unable to review manuscripts unless I have an existing working relationship with the editor.”

His words reflect a deeper truth: slowing down is not laziness, it’s resistance. And it may be one way we reclaim meaning in doctoral education.

So, here’s the challenge — to academics, administrators, policy makers and doctoral candidates alike:

What kind of doctoral education do we want to fight for?

Do we continue to build a system where students are expected to conform, produce and compete? Or do we reclaim the doctorate as a space of resistance, creativity and social engagement?

Can we imagine a model where supervision is not about ticking boxes but nurturing ideas? Where success isn’t just measured in publications, but in ethical depth, collective impact and intellectual risk-taking?

Some universities are already trying. Interdisciplinary doctorates, community-engaged research and creative methodologies aren’t pipe dreams, but they remain exceptions. The real question is whether the system has the courage to make them the rule.

Let’s stop pretending that we are ‘reforming’ doctoral education by adding more training modules or asking for more evaluations. Let’s talk about purpose. Let’s talk about trust. Let’s talk about time — and who is allowed to take it.

And let’s do it now. Because if the doctorate becomes just another credential in an exhausted race for academic survival, we will have lost far more than a few disillusioned scholars. We will have lost a space once meant for imagining the future.

Perhaps the real question is this: Is it time for a new vision for the doctorate? Or is the system too far gone? Let’s start the conversation!