Issues concerning the future of higher education and trends in the 1970s are analyzed in the proceedings of the 1981 Intergovernmental Conference of the Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development. The following themes are addressed: access to higher education, the changing relationship between higher education and working life, new patterns of authority, and financing and redeployment of resources. The following factors that are likely to be influential in the future are also considered: changes in the social demand for higher education, employment prospects, research and technology requirements, financial considerations, the internal dynamics of higher education institutions, and changing power structures. Access to higher education is discussed with regard to: quantitative college planning, admissions policies, changing links between higher and secondary education, access of new groups and new forms of attendance, coordinating admission and financing policies, limits to growth of higher education, structural reforms of higher education, selection methods and criteria, and admissions policy variations within and between countries. Statistical data on student characteristics and enrollment trends for a number of countries are included. (SW)