This article investigates cross-national patterns of public and private higher education institution (HEI) foundings from 1960 to 2006. It argues that in addition to national demographic and economic factors, patterns of HEI foundings also reflect world-level models about how nations should structure their higher education systems. Findings document a rapid, recent rise in new private HEIs and point to supranational normative, mimetic, and coercive pressures that have encouraged nations to expand private higher education, including international development aid trends in peer nations, and linkages to intergovernmental organizations. I argue that while the public-sector HEI has been a long-standing and globally legitimated model for national development, private higher education has historically been associated with some world regions but not others. However, over the past two decades, supranational actors and ideas helped legitimate the private HEI as an acceptable model, spreading it even in regions that previously eschewed private higher education.
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