Abstract
This paper analyses the characteristics of the university model sustained by academics in Latin America. According to Bernasconi (Comp Educ Rev 52(1):27–52, 2007, p. 30) the American model of research university is the one that is becoming dominant in the public sector. The findings presented in this work are not so reassuring. In fact the author finds support for the idea that, while the old model is being undermined by the dynamics of the region, a more realistic picture is one where conflicting values and goals are evident in the universities. Thus competing models are being advocated, and these disputes weaken the real capacity for universities to agree on strategic action. The study presented in this chapter uses data collected under the Changing Academic Profession (CAP) Project for the countries of Argentina, Brazil, and Mexico. The author analyses the main traits of differentiation inside the Latin American academic profession and how these differences influence the way academics think a university should be organized, governed and operated.
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- 1.
Brazil is an exception in this picture. The first high learning institutions were founded only after 1808, when the Portuguese Royal family came to Brazil escaping from the Napoleonic invasion. At that time, and until the 1930s, the only institutional model known in Brazil was the Professional Schools, each of them in charge of training for a recognized profession, such as medicine, law, engineering, and so on.
- 2.
Since professional education was so central that the idea of a full-time academic has no place in this model. The Chair holder should also be an established and well reputed professional that could provide real professional guidance for the students.
- 3.
This dynamic is still very relevant in Latin American higher education. As an example, one can cite the new law approved by the Brazilian government last December (Law no. 12.772, from December 26th, 2012), which imposes that all new academics at the Federal Universities are to be hired as teaching assistants, regardless their academic credentials. The approval of this law followed a long lasting strike in the Federal universities, and was enthusiastically received by the unions’ representatives of the academics in the public sector in Brazil.
- 4.
Even in Brazil, where graduate education is better institutionalized and has been a focus for public support since middle 1960s, a major commitment to graduate education is seldom found. Only a few public universities and a handful catholic universities could be classified as graduate oriented institutions, with more than 30 % of their enrollments at the graduate level (master’s and doctoral programs). For more details, see Balbachevsky 2013.
- 5.
For Braun (2003) blind delegation occurs when all property rights (to decide, to act, to control) are delegated to scientists. In this way, scientists are required to do what they will do anyway, that is, basic research to promote their scientific career. The incentive mode of funding exercises pressure on scientists and attempts to increase responsiveness by using directed funding. In his work, he identifies also two other modes of delegation in contemporary research policies: delegation by contract and delegation to networks. But, in my understanding, even when adopting some instruments typical from these more advanced modes, science policy in Latin America is still balancing between the blind delegation mode and the incentive mode.
References
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Balbachevsky, E. (2015). The Latin American University Model and the Challenges Posed by the Reforms: Perspectives from the Academics. In: Cummings, W., Teichler, U. (eds) The Relevance of Academic Work in Comparative Perspective. The Changing Academy – The Changing Academic Profession in International Comparative Perspective, vol 13. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-11767-6_14
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