Incipient mechanisms of educational privatization in countries with a public university system: The recent case of postgraduate studies in education in Uruguay

Abstract

Latin America is currently defined as a hyper-privatized region in higher education, although some countries, such as Argentina and Uruguay, have had and continue to have university systems in which the public sector, established within the Latin American university model—free, public, and open to all—is predominant. In this context, using a sociology of public action approach, this paper analyzes recent changes in two instruments promoting postgraduate education in Uruguay. Based on public institutional documents and data specifically requested from state agencies, this research identifies trends that may be an incipient indication of educational privatization as a consequence of the transfer of funds from the public to the private sector. In a country with a fundamentally state-run university system in a hyper-privatized region, this constitutes a particular type of scholarship directed toward certain institutions, shaping the characteristics of education and often grounded in quasi-market logic. In the long term, this can help to blur the lines between public and private.