Paper short abstract:

The normative contradiction of the university in Chile takes place between the interests of particular universities – market niches and ideological projects – and the universalistic evaluation of their operation, in the sense of the ‘public good’ that justifies them as institutions.

Paper long abstract:

The institution of the university in Chile has been exposed in its contradiction. Namely, between the interests of particular universities, based on market positions and ideological projects, and the universalistic evaluation of their operation, in the sense of the 'public good' that justifies them as institutions. This contradiction may be illustrative for other cases in the Latin American region where the implementation of mechanisms to broaden higher education access is meant to counteract the reproduction of class inequality and cultural exclusion through universities. Chile's university system is mostly privatized and almost totally commodified, which in this manner reproduces socio-economic divisions. Moreover, empirical evidence suggests that the orientations of universities, the way they recruit students, their material conditions of operation, and the features of the teaching process vary in accordance to class segmentation. But on the other hand, the massification of higher education - paradoxically enabled by its marketization - has pulled universities back into the centre of public interest, evidenced particularly through the student movement in 2011. The empirical process to be described, from within the perspectives of universities, is the critique of the standards that align particular projects with class segmentation, using for that purpose universalistic frameworks on equality (decommodification), pluralism (access opportunities based on merit), quality of education (as opposed to for-profit-universities), and the meaning of professional labour (not reducible to economic return). Without being exhaustive, an emergent cleavage rises between universities that justify themselves by universalistic standards and those that remain entrenched in their market interests and ideological projects.