EN
The text analyses the development of the autonomy of higher education institutions in the Czech lands following the Prussian model with an emphasis on the aspect of the economic dependence on the state, which was very significant in European comparison. It notes the gradual development of autonomous identity in the representation of higher education institutions with a core at the universities and the achievement of a high degree of autonomy in the decision-making of the state in 1890–1930. At that time, higher education institutions became the leading bearers of a liberal vision of corporate management and a liberal-democratic view of the role of the state. Increasing cases of the abuse of the autonomy by the representations of higher education institutions mainly in the economic sphere led to the intensification of oversight and the gradual reduction of autonomy in the search for postliberal social order in Czechoslovak society with the advent of the economic and political crisis after 1929.