Habilitation
The qualification or degree of aggregate is the highest academic degree that a person can attain in some countries of Europe and Asia. Obtained after a doctorate, the habilitation requires that the candidate write a second thesis, reviewed and defended before an academic committee in process similar to the doctorate. Although in most countries the doctorate is sufficient for the post of university professor, in some countries only the qualification qualifies to be doctoral advisor. Such a post is known in Germany as Privatdozent, after which it is possible to be admitted as a teacher. The eighteenth-century habilitation system exists in France, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Bulgaria, Poland, Portugal, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Slovenia and countries of the former Soviet Union such as Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Russia, Uzbekistan, Ukraine, etc. A similar qualification known as free-teaching exists in public universities in the Brazilian state of São Paulo, but no longer exists in other parts of Brazil.