Universities, the Internet and the Global Education Market

Abstract

In the educational and academic sectors, there are enormous profits to be made from a commercialised Internet. This situation is by no means the cause of the global privatisation of public educational and academic systems. The profitability of the Internet, however, which has been structured accordingly, is a factor that very much accelerates these transformations. Subject to these are not only the actual processes of acquiring an education that are a part of an individual's existential provisions, but also the normative ideal of education as a public good and a human right. When this basic right succumbs to the innovation rhetoric, there are indeed no more arguments why people should not pay for their individual education themselves.