Rector's speech at the annual celebration: Europe's future rests on its universities

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Dear Minister, board members, students and colleagues. Dear guests!

Today, we celebrate the fact that it is 150 years since women were granted access to the university.

Who was it that opened the medieval gates of the University of Copenhagen (UCPH) to women?

The women themselves, of course.

But also the liberal, democratic world order that arrived in Copenhagen — from the continent and from the United States.

Today, that world order is in disarray.

An Instagram reel plays on the inner ticker of my mind.
You may recall it from September:
President Macron, caught on a pavement in New York.
The representative of good old Europe
has stepped out of his darkened car.
A police officer politely asks Macron to wait.
Trump’s motorcade has to pass first.
America First — heading to the UN to deliver a scolding to Europe.
In disbelief, Macron rings up Trump:
»Everything is frozen for you«

Europe is being frozen out, parked on a pavement while the new world order drives right past it.

That’s also the conclusion of a widely discussed report published in Europe last year.

»For the first time since the Cold War, we must genuinely fear for our self-preservation«, said the report’s author, Mario Draghi, the Italian economist and former president of the European Central Bank.

A couple of months ago, Draghi delivered a progress report — one year on, but sadly with no progress.

Energy prices are up.
Trade barriers are up.
Debt is up.
Autocracies are up.
The innovation gap with China, India and the US — up, up, up.

Fortunately, Draghi still points to a way forward for Europe: We must do »fewer things better«!

The way forward means abandoning the peanut butter approach — a thin layer spread to the edges of the continent. And taking a decisive new path instead.

Less diesel engine — more quantum computer.

The way forward means committing to Europe’s very best research communities, transforming the continent into more than just an old museum with good food.

The way forward is science as a blueprint for industrial policy — one that provides work for both lab coats and boiler suits across a productive Europe.

But Draghi’s path forward requires a new social contract:

Politicians must accept that both basic research and innovation are messy processes with many dead ends on the road to major breakthroughs.

Capital — with a capital C — must invest more in Europe and more in frontier research.

And universities must — must! — uphold the highest standards of basic research.

But our part of the social contract also means that universities — even more than today — must be meeting places for ideas, for boldness, and for early investment.

And some of our deepest basic researchers need to be brought up to the surface to direct their world-class research towards mission-driven goals.

Just like Inge Lehmann in the 1950s, when she was headhunted to the US to help Americans — and the whole Western world — detect Soviet nuclear test explosions.

Or Professor Rebecca Adler-Nissen, who, after a stellar career in international politics, pivoted to artificial intelligence.

She now heads CAISA — Centre for Artificial Intelligence in Society — which brings together the brightest minds from universities across Denmark.

To help us all use AI in a way that unites us — rather than divides us.

Finally, Draghi urges us to scrap the rules that stand in the way of excellence.

Imagine the former central bank chief in a time machine, sent back to 1875.

Surely he would say it’s utter madness to keep out one half of the pool of talent from university?

After submitting her application to UCPH, Nielsine Nielsen had to endure a year and a half of absurd arguments against women before she was finally admitted to study medicine — as the first female student (alongside Marie Gleerup).

We must also take the Nielsine Nielsen test today.

Are we open enough to new ideas?
Are we fast enough?
Are our students and researchers ready to take risks?
Or are there too many obstacles in the way?

Yesterday, in my role as chair of the government’s task force, I presented proposals to remove the biggest obstacles and loosen the most rigid regulations that stand in the way of turning research into innovation. UCPH is ready!

Peace, predictability and appetite for risk

We are also ready to invest in the very best research. It requires peace, predictability and a willingness to take risks. Not the words you typically associate with politics.

That’s why it’s all the more remarkable that the Danish government this year managed to reach an agreement on the national research budget allocation that is both forward-looking and provides stability.

And recognises that the best research — the kind that expands our understanding and that we will live off — cannot be put into a formula.

The agreement makes room for curiosity and wild ideas, focuses on key strategic efforts, and places trust in the universities’ own priorities.

On behalf of UCPH: many thanks for that!

It will give us the right framework to strengthen basic research — and to fulfil our major investment in Innovation District Copenhagen.

We are the World

You’d think Netflix had read the Draghi report. Because that’s what the Netflix documentary about the creation of We Are the World is like. The documentary — The Greatest Night in Pop — is a masterclass in getting things done.

In 1985, the biggest US pop stars came together in one studio on short notice. Stevie Wonder – Cyndi Lauper; Lionel Richie – Diana Ross; Bruce Springsteen; and many, many more.

In a single night, they created a giant banger that raised a fortune — and awareness — for the famine in Ethiopia.

Individually, the stars were brilliant. As backup singers — on a song written by someone else — they were actually rather difficult to work with.

Take Stevie Wonder — a loose cannon. Immune to planning and deadlines.

In the weeks leading up to the recording, Lionel Richie tried calling Wonder to co-write the song. He never answered.

At the studio, Wonder still seized the piano — and nearly derailed the song at around 4 in the morning by suggesting it would be more authentic, more African — in Swahili …

… until a kind soul pointed out that they don’t speak Swahili in Ethiopia.

But Wonder is a musical genius.

There’s a scene where Bob Dylan freezes up — awkward, unsure, and vocally outclassed by everyone else.

Then Stevie Wonder sits at the piano and sings Dylan’s verse in a Dylan-esque way — nasal, staccato, drawling. And just like that, Bob knew how to deliver his solo line.

How do we get the university to sing along to Europe’s chorus — without losing the original voices?

How can we bridge the gap between narrow basic research and broad innovation — for the benefit of the many?

And how do we pull it off in a single night?

In the film, Quincy Jones — the great producer — tapes up a cardboard sign at the studio entrance:

»Check your ego at the door,« it reads.

We can’t and shouldn’t change Diana Ross, Springsteen or Stevie Wonder.

But even the greatest researcher, the most self-assured university, the wealthiest foundations, and the most influential politicians should not be too grand to consider the philosophy behind Quincy Jones’ cardboard sign.

We need to try and create a we are the world moment — and it’s urgent.

The Nielsine Nielsen Test

They were »the world«, at least for a moment back in 1985.
But how are we the world — in 2025?

Technology can now translate word-for-word what is being said in Russia, Iran — or Ethiopia, where the official languages are not Swahili but Amharic, Oromo, Tigrinya, Somali and Afar.

But what does Moscow mean?
What does Tehran think?
And what does Europe look like from Addis Ababa?

When the world grows noisy, it’s tempting to stay home and lock the door, to rely on what we know. But we must insist on inviting the world in — and stepping out into the world, even when it’s hard.

There are some bright spots:

– the Danish government’s language initiative for German and French, which aims to reverse declining enrolment and the shrinking of European outlook that is the result.

– our own new flagship initiative UCPH Geopolitics, which unites the university’s researchers in explaining the world to Denmark — supplementing all the UCPH experts you meet daily in the news media, and a big thank you to you!

But there are major blind spots:

Fewer students are going on exchange. In fact, new figures show it’s going completely in the wrong direction. The problem is not our students — it’s the times.

But we need you out there: Exchange broadens our perspectives, prepares us to understand the world burning around us — and encourages us to examine ourselves critically.

Just like Nielsine Nielsen, who had an urgent need for an »out-sickness« from her seafaring family home in Svendborg after reading in the newspaper that women could become doctors in the US.

Nielsine Nielsen, who after graduating with top marks, had to travel to England to specialise in gynaecology.

We must learn from history’s sins of omission.

– Give our students more »out-sickness«.

– »Open the windows to the world.«

– Check our egos at the door.

– And place our outstanding science at the heart of Europe’s new world order.

Thank you.

This speech was first published in Danish on 18 November. It has been translated into English and post-edited by Mike Young.