A massification of higher education in Swedish and European spaces can be traced since the1960s as a result of political decisions and adjustments to societal transformations, the jobmarket and not least shifts regarding the ways in which learning and participation are theorizedover time. This study is based on a systematic review of the international literature between2010-2020 wherein the focus lies on the issue of how the massification of higher educationhas contributed to i) a diversification of student cohorts and ii) changes at organizational(systemic) levels across the last decade. The analysis focuses upon articles identified in aselection of peer-reviewed research journals that have a clear higher education focus.Preliminary results illustrate the challenges that fostering diversity in higher education entails,for faculty, students and other sectorial actors. Issues of standards, support and openness areparticularly interesting in terms of where, when, why and not least for whom higher educationis, as one of the constitutive pillars of societies of “a world worth living in”.