Abstract:
This article aims to explain how ‒ within an ultra-liberal economy with financial dominance and a semi-private State, that is functionally useful to this economy ‒ the frontier between the public and the private/mercantile spheres is being annulled. It also aims to show how an expansion of higher education is being promoted that remains elitist and highly qualified for a few, on the one side, and as a mass product and of low quality for many, on the other. This calls into question its intended democratization. The interpretation of the data concerning the legal status of the institutions and their respective enrollments, the concentration by area of knowledge, the presence of national and transnational investment funds associated to large companies in the education sector etc., allow the hypothesis that higher education, in Brazil, lives an intense process of transformation of a right into a merchandise.
Keywords:
Higher education; Higher education democratization; Higher education massification; Higher education expansion policy
