The World Bank, support for universities, and asymmetrical power relations in international development

Abstract

This article examines the role of the World Bank in advancing higher education sectors in the developing world, considering in particular the increasing power and strength of a global knowledge-based economy. Given the powerful role that intergovernmental organizations such as the World Bank play in shaping global economic policies, the authors are concerned about how the Bank's policies and actions may limit knowledge generation and capacity building of universities in the developing world. Relatedly, the authors use case studies of the Bank's involvement in Thailand and Uganda to better understand the role it plays in producing and reproducing forms of global hegemony. The authors discuss hegemony in terms of neocolonialism and neoliberalism. Neocolonialism is described as forms of domination advanced by powerful nations and their institutions, while neoliberalism is understood as an economic ideology by which weaker nations may be brought into greater alignment with global trade initiatives.We must take stock of the nostalgia for empire, as well as the anger and resentment it provokes in those who were ruled, and we must try to look carefully and integrally at the culture that nurtured the sentiment, rationale, and above all the imagination of empire.

Analyzing the Anglo-American Hegemony in the Times Higher Education Rankings

“…For example, hegemony is examined through international media domination (Consalvo, 1998, pp.64-65;Gunn, 2006, pp. 559-576), political/military imperialism (Bill, 2001;Buckel & Fischer-Lescano, 2009;Kumar & Verma, 2009;Sementelli, 2005), cultural domination (Ashbolt, 2007;Jiang, 2011), and hegemony in comparative higher education (Collins and Rhoads, 2010;Mohrman 2008;Marginson, 2007;Olaniran & Agnello, 2008;Watson, 2009).…”

“…Examining Anglo-American hegemony in international higher education, Collins and Rhoads (2010) point to their concern pertaining to the influence of the World Bank (which is almost always headed by an American) and universities in the developing world. Pointing to what they consider a new form of global hegemony through the forms of "neocolonial" and "neoliberal" policies that bring developing countries in the line of thinking about higher education as it is done in the United States and European nations, particularly the United Kingdom.…”

“…Pointing to what they consider a new form of global hegemony through the forms of "neocolonial" and "neoliberal" policies that bring developing countries in the line of thinking about higher education as it is done in the United States and European nations, particularly the United Kingdom. Collins and Rhoads (2010) add that " We see both ideas-neocolonialism and neoliberalism-as deriving to a great extent from the global economic interests of powerful nations like the United Kingdom and the United States…" (p. 182; also see Olaniran & Agnello, 2008, p. 71). Writing about challenges facing Chinese scholars in China, Mohrman (2008) points out that the importation into China of the research and publication pressure at top United States and United Kingdom universities puts enormous pressure on Chinese scholars, although they help to improve quality "… of higher education in China, but at the same time feel that they are victims of a kind of Western academic hegemony that they cannot refuse" (p. 39).…”

Cooperação Internacional, Desenvolvimento Ultramar, Assistência Estrangeira: breve revisão histórica e bibliográfica sobre a ajuda externa oficial

“…A mesma crítica pode ser estendida ao projeto do Banco Mundial de financiamento de universidades africanas nos anos de 1970 e 1980, que resultaram no desmantelamento do ensino superior público nos países receptores dos fundos e o consequente barateamento da mão de obra (COLLINS; RHOADS, 2010;CAFFENTZIS, 2000). Podemos citar ainda o investimento da USAID no treinamento das polícias latino-americanas durante os anos de 1960 e 1970, período marcado por vários governos ditatoriais e violentos no continente (MOTTA, 2010).…”

Rethinking the World Bank Agenda for Chinese Higher Education Reform

“…This was in marked contrast to the Bank's experience with India, which seemed to have an ideologically compatible government and was viewed as decentralized and democratic (Drake, 1989). The partnership has also been quite different from the Bank's cooperation with such other developing countries as Thailand and Uganda, a point that has been elaborated by some scholars (see, for example, Drake, 1989;Collins, 2009;Collins & Rhoads, 2010).…”