Tensions between university autonomy and state control surrounding the higher education quality assurance system in Argentina.

Abstract

The concept of university autonomy found specific treatment in the 1994 National Constitution and the 1995 Higher Education Law, a concept that, despite its deep roots in Argentine university system, had not yet received such formal recognition. However, alongside the list of powers that give concrete content to autonomy, the law included a quality assurance system that challenged the prevailing conception of autonomy held at the time by much of the university system. This paper traces the conflict that began in the political arena with the debate over the specific characteristics that the quality assurance system should adopt. After the LES was approved, the conflict continued in the judicial arena with challenges to its constitutionality from some national universities, without reaching a definitive end. Almost thirty years after the implementation of the quality policy, the echoes of the tension between university autonomy and state control persist in the form of low-intensity disagreements that take place at the technical level of the quality assessment processes.