Another high point of the AFT National Higher Education Issues Conference was the Irwin Polishook lecture, delivered this year by Fred van Leeuwen, general secretary of Education International. EI is the largest world confederation of independent and democratic teacher unions, with 26 million members in 161 countries and territories. Both AFT and NEA are members.

Van Leeuwen spoke on the globalization of higher education. At the helm of a worldwide organization, he noted that while it is tempting to focus only on local challenges, the largest unseen forces operating are corporate and global forces. Higher education has become a "tradable commodity," he said, that speaks only to providers and not to society and definitely not to students.

Education for the public good, he said, is being overtaken by trends associated with free market ideology, such as privatization and commercialization. While free and public education is central to our notion of a cohesive, democratic society, policies such as those spelled out in the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) threaten to turn education into a commodity to be controlled by the most powerful in the world.

Higher Education is based on free inquiry, cooperation and academic freedom, van Leeuwen said. If we are to engage in higher education issues, we must "forge solidarity" and mobilize organizations towards a global framework for higher education. [Lindsay Albert]

[March 22, 2004]