Commercialization of Higher Education: The Balance between Benefits and Risks

Abstract

The article is aimed at studying the peculiarities of commercialization as a modern global trend in the development of higher education and analyzing the main strategies for reforming universities. The relevance of the publication is due to the reform of the sphere of higher education in Ukraine and the need for competent borrowing of best practices of educational systems from the leading foreign countries. It seems important to find answer to the following question: thanks to which educational model western universities have received significant achievements in all directions of activity? Ambiguous evaluation of commercialization processes both among the Western and Ukrainian academic community causes the expediency of this study. As a result of the study, it is defined that commercialization means the transition of the higher education system to market relations on the basis of the introduction of new management methods that change its position in society, contribute to the capitalization of knowledge and research results. The peculiarities of formation and manifestation of the process of commercialization are determined, among which the most significant are the change in the role of the State in the sphere of education financing, transformation processes in the forms and types of provision of educational services, diversification of the funding sources. The essence of the concepts of «commercialization», «comodification» and «managerism» is identified and characterized, their relationship in the approaches of transformation of educational institutions into institutions for educational services, and students into consumers, is substantiated. The detection of commercialization of higher education in the context of «academic capitalism» is considered. The content and forms of «academic entrepreneurship», tasks and functions of the «entrepreneurial university» are analyzed. It is concluded that the entrepreneurial university is the most financially successful model of the educational institution, which combines modern requirements and traditional values of higher education on the basis of innovative activities. The carried out analysis of scientific articles and researches allowed to identify differences in the process of commercialization in American and European educational systems. Prospects for further research are to study the best world practices of commercialization of higher education institutions and determine approaches to their adaptation and directions of efficient implementation in Ukraine.