Abstract
The paper presents and analyzes the key policies for the private sector of higher education adopted by the government of Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva (2003/ 2010). From a historical retrospective and an analysis of their implementation, policies are considered through a critical review of the literature and official data. The work seeks to demonstrate that, despite the quite distinct policies for the public sector if compared with the government of Fernando Henrique Cardoso, in the case of the private sector, there is rather a deepening of policy options already developed during the Cardoso government. These options translate into actions to encourage the development of the private sector, to the extent that the financing of this expanded and consolidated legal framework that provided legal certainty to sponsors. This promotion, however, was accompanied by a significant increase and improvement of the mechanisms of control over the growth of the private sector. The result was a fall in the growth of the private sector, even though it has remained at a fairly high level.
KEYWORDS:
private sector of higher education; university reform; higher education; public policies; Lula government