In the Republic's less dynamic recent past universities had a clearly established and fixed role as seats of learning. Their purpose was fairly straightforward, to prepare students for professional life. The concept of the university as a powerhouse of economic and social development is a relatively recent one, but Prof Philip Bourke, Dean of the Faculty Commerce at UCD, is a firm believer in the merits of that change.

"I don't think there was an appreciation of the broader role of universities in the 1960s. The environment was very safe and certain, with a much greater emphasis on professional qualifications and it was unusual to hear academics commenting on policy issues," Prof Bourke recalls.

The professor acts as a consultant to financial and governmental organisations and to the EU and has particular expertise in the area of banking and finance. The Irish banking sector has come under severe criticism since the revelations of the Public Accounts Committee inquiry, but Prof Bourke maintains that the landscape has changed utterly since the sharp practices of the 1980s and early 1990s.

"There's been a sea change in the way in which banks see their responsibility in relation to tax issues since then. What happened in that period wouldn't be tolerated at any level in banking now from the lowest to the highest."

Prof Bourke paints a grim picture of the State before the economic upturn. "There was a low level of legislative compliance in general at that time, from traffic laws to serious crimes, and coupled with that was a feeling that the prospects for the future were bleak.

"It seems extraordinary now but there was a certain amount of talk of rescheduling the national debt and a whole range of measures that people talk about in relation to third world countries now."

According to Prof Bourke's analysis, it needed an enormous shock to force a turnaround to this economic and social culture. "The shock was that we were well on the way to becoming bankrupt and a failure as a country. We had the point of view that capital was free and we behaved like a dependent State until it reached the point where we had to change."

The professor does not agree with one of the key recommendations of the Public Accounts Committee inquiry that another regulatory body for the banking sector be established separately from the Central Bank.

"I never went along with that concept, I think it comes from a completely flawed analysis and a misunderstanding of the complexities of the financial world. It doesn't seem to me that in a smallish country there's any case for splitting resources by having two supervisors of the banking system," says Prof Bourke.

"Instead, what should be properly on the cards is a mega-regulator who would look after insurance, the financial markets and the banking system."

The logic behind this, the professor says, is that all the financial services are intertwined nowadays, with insurance companies lending money and banks on the periphery of insurance, for instance.

Prof Bourke first entered UCD as an undergraduate in 1967 and today as Dean of the Faculty of Commerce, he is responsible for a staff of close to 200, and the business education of more than 3,000 students each year.

There are two operating divisions within the faculty, the undergraduate school based in Belfield and the Michael Smurfit Graduate School of Business in Blackrock.

He recently started a campaign to build a new state-of-the-art Undergraduate Business School at Belfield, a project which was kick-started by a £3.5 million (€4.4 million) donation from UCD BComm graduate and AIB chairman, Mr Lochlann Quinn. The new school will be technology-driven and promote a different learning experience.

"We will have a much greater investment in the development of students' brainpower, with more emphasis on thinking for themselves. The classes will be much smaller and they'll be geared towards encouraging students to assess the knowledge that's out there, developing their critical powers of analysis."

Prof Bourke says this approach is already on the agenda in UCD but the potential in the purpose-built school for technology to assist the students is enormous.

"In the high-tech environment, every student location will be either wired or wireless for Internet and Intranet access and each student will have a laptop. The design incorporates lots of common space for working in groups. We notice it already in Blackrock that students do a huge amount of their work in the restaurant or in a semi social environment."

Last week's £3 million donation by Mr Denis O'Brien to the graduate school will facilitate the installation of more than 1,000 fixed Internet connection points and wireless connectivity throughout the Blackrock campus and is a taste of things to come.

Prof Bourke places huge importance on the development of intellectual and personal skills. "The students will have to address significant conceptual problems, be they marketing problems or technical finance problems, which are becoming increasingly complicated. We need to train them for a world where there are vast amounts of knowledge which they've got to be able to sort through.

"Apart from giving students the brainpower to address complex problems, they also need to develop the written and oral skills to put across their point of view and negotiate."

According to Prof Bourke, there are fundamental theories to be grasped about human behaviour and economic behaviour which are essential for success in the business world.

A huge part of Prof Bourke's job is dealing with fundraising. "I lecture on a Saturday morning to keep my hand in but my job is essentially dealing with administrative issues with the university and dealing with strategy and the external environment.

"Fundraising and developing educational programmes with industry are central to the faculty's development."

Prof Bourke sees the Faculty of Commerce as a large partnership where everybody has an ownership stake and says it requires a particular style of management.

"The challenge in a rapidly changing environment with a large group of highly skilled and motivated professionals is to ensure that there's the correct climate of change to keep moving forward. Given that historically we've been a very successful faculty, there could be a temptation for us to rest on our laurels.

"But we will continue to press forward in technology, teaching methods and the way we're linked to our students and the outside world," he says.