Public Goods and Private CommoditiesThe Case of Higher Education

1
Public Goods and Private Commodities--The Case of
Higher Education

• John Hawkins and Deane Neubauer
• IFE 2020
• 23 Feb-6 March 2009

2
The Contemporary Context

• The pervasive ideology of contempoary
  globalization is neo-liberalism
• Developed out of Reagan-Thatcherism, but has
  spread widely with countries borrowing
  selectively from it to suit their local purposes.

3
Tenets of Neoliberalism

• Rule of the market--freedom for capital, goods
  and services
• Market self-regulating allowing trickle down
  notion of wealth distribution
• Reducing public expenditures--e.g. health and
  education
• Decreased taxation (especially on upper incomes)
  to promote investment and consumption
• Deregulation to allow market to self regulate
• Privatization of public enterprise (from water to
  internet)
• Changing perceptions of public and community good
  to individual and individual responsibility
• (Martinez and Garcia, 1997)

4
Western Notions of Higher Education as a Public
Good

• Grew out of liberal traditions of a market
  society (as opposed to state dominated) to
  provide opportunities for private capital.
• A public good was one intended for all by virtue
  of citizenship in state.
• The public good is the benefit derived from the
  whole of society by a given activity, e.g. the
  health of its population, security from external
  threat, etc.
• Higher education a private good, tied to
  religious organizations before the mid-19th
  century.
• Invention of the Land Grant University in the mid
  19-the century to provide public higher education
• Growing sense within progressive tradition of
  education as contributing to the public
  goodunderlying notions of general education

5
Public and Private Higher Education

• Private education supported by individuals or
  groups exists in the private sector--under state
  charter (regulation ranges from limited to
  relatively comprehensive.)
• Public Education
• First at state level--presumption of a state
  pays role.
• Different developmental course--some state public
  universities become among the best, e.g.
  Virginia, Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota,
  California
• Significant expansion from 1960s on with
  creation of multi-level university systems
  research universities, state colleges, community
  colleges.
• Reduced funding in 1980s and again in late 1990s
• Funding crisis impose managerialism, raise
  student fees, develop stronger external funding,
  entrepreneurial activity. All of which equals a
  move toward the private sector.

6
Public and Private Higher Education

• Private Education--Increasing secular trend over
  19th century creation of the modern scientific
  university special role of liberal arts
  colleges--social role of reproduction of
  elites.
• Emphasis on general education from Harvard in
  1829 on.
• Capitalist tradition of giving to private
  education
• Post-war complexity of higher education
  development Elite, Mass, and Convenience
  Institutions, and role of public/private
  investment

7
Major Public / Private Issues

• Who authorizes and assures quality? Unique role
  of US associational model. Increased federal role
  in process.
• The cost of higher education. GI Bill, Student
  Loans, Tuition costs--the theory of educational
  investment as a public good (hand out)
• The alignment issue and the vocationalization of
  higher education what should HE be for?
• The down sides of managerialism (loss of
  tenure-track faculty, dependence on business and
  government for finance, loss of academic
  freedom.)

8
The Asian Inversions of the Public / Private
Experience

• Different traditions of absolutism
• Absence of sovereignty assignment to the people
• Ideas of public inseparable from government
• Strong tradition of invested governmental
  bureaucracies
• Higher educations purpose to meet needs of the
  state, e.g. Meiji Restoration
• Complex history of colonialism, imperialism and
  subsequent institutional creations of both public
  and private sectors
• Sense that the duties, rights and privileges of
  the private sector have been delegated from
  governmental authority
• Issues of quality strongly linked to
  administrative authority

9
Specific Neo-Liberal Challenges to Higher
Education

• Declining public budgetary support-cost shifting
  and user charges
• Managerialism and academic capitalism as tools
  for running universities
• The alignment issue how do university outcomes
  align with economic needs?
• Pressures to vocationalize the curriculum
• Differential internal financing--shorting
  non-economic aligned disciplines
• Shift in discourses away from those of the
  liberal tradition.
• In light of current global financial meltdown,
  where has neo-liberalism led us?

10
Critique of HE as Commodity

• Carries the logic of a consumer society and
  commodification s/he who can pay, gets.
• Quality referenced against what the market is
  willing to pay for. Vocational reductionism.
• Content of higher education follows market,
  including private research funding--who does
  pure research in such a relationship?
• Non-vocationally oriented subjects get ignored.

11
HE and New Public / Private Relationships

• Issues of differentiated and expanded access
  with massification, who gets what under what
  conditions?
• The Globalization of Research--who does what?
  Where does the funding come from?
• Social Mobility--the differential value of
  higher education to different classes of
  consumers
• Decentralization and autonomy--who benefits from
  liberalization of control?
• Higher Education ranking behavior as an
  introduction of a market mechanismcoupled with
  idea of globally competitive universities.

12
Some Relevant Questions

• Can there be some irreducible meaning to the
  public good that might be associated with higher
  education? What would it be?
• Can we derive essential elements of public and
  private sectors that cover the range of
  differences between Asian and non-Asian
  experiences?
• Is neo-liberalism a particular form of
  privatization as it is applied to higher
  education? Are there significant differences
  between the emergence of neo-liberal regimes in
  the west and the eclectic borrowings of
  neo-liberal elements in Asia?
• Does public higher education always contribute to
  the public good? Under what circumstances might
  it be viewed as non-contributory?

13
Public Private Issues for Further Discussion

• Are there irreducible roles for the state in HE?
• Will the global financial crisis result in a new
  interventionist role for the state?
• Given the many different ways of discussing
  public / private may we not need a new language
  to talk about what is going on in HE?
• What is the role and function of higher education
  and its transformative functions, for both the
  individual and society? How does one get the
  leadership necessary in this new context?
• Need to differentiate the missions of individual
  institutions. When the market fails, how will the
  state step in to regulate in order to protect
  higher education institutions which are now
  dependent upon the market for funding.