Globalisation has opened and expanded its approaches to new needs and policies for development, somewhat serving as an instrument to introduce new discourses, agendas, and policy paradigms across the globe (Bonal & Rambla, 2009; Dale 1999; 2005). International organizations have played a key role in many State reform processes since the 1980s, especially in developing countries. In the context of educational reform, privatisation and market-oriented policy paradigms have long stood at the core of global policy recommendations (Bonal, 2002; Burch, 2006). Concepts such as accountability, school autonomy, decentralization and diversification –all of which appear directly linked to privatisation and market policies in education– have also become global norms influencing policy-making worldwide (Mundy et al., 2016).
However, privatisation and market-oriented education policies have not affected all national states in the same way (Ball, 2013). The way to approach the expansion of higher education in southern countries (especially in Latin America) differs in each State. On the one hand, the public universities have expanded and diversified in countries such as Argentina, Mexico or Venezuela, creating new public institutions which have absorbed some of the regional demands. On the other hand, countries such as Brazil, Chile or Colombia the public education has remained restricted, and private institutions have accounted for more opportunities, especially since the decade of 1990s (Holm-Nielsen, Thorn, Brunner, & Balán, 2005).
The Uruguayan case stands out for having remained somehow apart from the privatisation agenda widely spread in the region (Bordoli & Conde, 2016). More recently, however, research has identified a significant shift in the discursive order, especially driven by a series of new actors including local think-tanks, civil society organizations, and reform entrepreneurs favourable to different forms of privatization in primary and secondary education (D’Avenia, 2013; Verger, Moschetti, & Fontdevila, 2017). This shift displays an incipient form of what Ball (2009, 2012) calls ‘privatisation through education policy’ to account for the different ways in which corporations, NGOs and other policy actors engage in the process of policy-formation (Ball & Youdell, 2008).
In fact, expanding the knowledge on the processes of growing integration of private actors in networks and communities of education policy production (Ball & Junemann, 2012; Ball, 2012; Lingard & Sellar, 2013), Fontdevila, Avelar, & Verger (2018) identify various strategies used by these actors to impinge on the design of educational policy. The first of these strategies is based on the articulation of ideologically-aligned networks of actors that act as influencing platforms for the design of educational policies. The authors argue that such ‘networking and brokerage’ strategies seek to agglutinate actors from the private sector together with key actors of the educational field around various types of foundations or ‘coalitions’ that increasingly become relevant voices in the educational debate. Their network strategy is based on the intensive use of events and meetings –or meetingness– where different actors from the private sector, foundations and government officials exchange visions, diagnosis, and education policy solutions. These spaces play an important role in strengthening the links between the private sector and governments. As Ball & Junemann (2012) highlight, they suppose the construction and maintenance of a regime of educational network governance. A second strategy of influence in policy-making consists in the production and dissemination of research, or ‘knowledge mobilization’ by corporations, philanthropic actors or think-tanks (Fontdevila, Avelar, & Verger 2018). The kind of research they disseminate usually offers a somehow reductionist version of the ‘what works’ epistemological paradigm, simplifying educational policy problems and advocating for predefined policy solutions (Hogan, Sellar, & Lingard, 2016).
Said that, while many studies have addressed what and why the privatization in Higher Education has happened in Uruguay, there is not a clear focus on emphasizing how the policy discourse and its strategies used by the private sector, think-tanks, political parties or civil society organisations have impinge public policy within a complex model of governance in this country
Therefore, the presentation will be organised in two parts: the first one will address the diversification and privatization of the Uruguayan Higher Education and the appearance of new institutions and their education supply; and the second one will be focused on developing how and which strategies have been used by those key stakeholders (civil society, political parties…) in order to participate into the educational debate and to create an impact on particular policies.