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Globalization of Higher Education

Better Essays

Journal of Higher Education Policy and Management Vol. 30, No. 3, August 2008, 215–229

Globalisation and higher education funding policy shifts in Kenya
Gerald Wangenge-Ouma*
Faculty of Education, University of the Western Cape, Bellville, South Africa This paper identifies, examines and discusses higher education funding policy shifts that have taken place in Kenya. The paper argues that even though Kenya’s higher education funding policy shifts, from free higher education to cost-sharing, and privatisation and commercialisation, are (to a greater extent) products of the country’s encounter with globalisation, local social, political and economic dynamics have been of equally significant influence. Thus, the country’s higher …show more content…

Thus, globalisation is a dynamic of various interlinked processes operating on a planetary scale. The various dynamics of globalisation, always operating simultaneously, have serious implications for, and influences on, higher education (Altbach, 2004; Maasen & Cloete, 2002; Marginson & Rhoades, 2002; Vaira, 2004). For this paper, the important question is: How are the forces driving the (financial) restructuring of higher education being driven by processes of globalisation? The dynamics of globalisation circumscribe the various education policy shifts witnessed recently in education, in general, and higher education, in particular. Therefore, globalisation has become a key concept with which to interpret, inter alia, policy changes affecting higher education. Some of the aspects of globalisation impacting upon higher education include the hegemonic rise of English as the language of scientific communication (Altbach, 2004), advancements in information communication and technology, and the hegemonic rise of neo-liberalism as the de facto economic mode of the late twentieth century and the twenty-first century (Castells, 1996; Friedman, 1999; Fukuyama, 1992; Scholte, 1997; 2000). As far as higher education funding policies are concerned, the establishment of neo-liberalism as the de facto economic mode could be said to be of the greatest impact (Carnoy, 2000; Henry et al. 2001; Maasen &

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