DIVERSIFICACIÓN Y REGULACIÓN DEL CAMPO DE LA EDUCACIÓN SUPERIOR Y LAS UNIVERSIDADES

Abstract

Bolivia has experienced an intense process of social, economic, cultural and educational diversification in the last forty years. Cultural, linguistic and indigenous knowledge diversity has been claimed, defining itself as a plurinational State in 2009, without this substantially changing social, economic, regional inequality and emigration. In this scenario, this article analyzes higher education, especially universities, in their repositioning, resistance and changes in relation to the State, and among themselves as a field of training and research in conflict. This paper is inspired by neoinstitutionalism in sociology synthesized by DiMaggio and Powell and other authors such as Mary Douglas, Michel Foucault and Pierre Bourdieu whose approaches vary, but also share common elements. It is inspired by them, but does not intend to make a theoretical debate limiting itself to the descriptive level. Discusses the institutional actions of the State and its devices that, beyond university autonomy, aim to induce the field of action of universities towards their institutional policies without affecting internal routines and regulations. Specifically, it analyzes the field of universities in their interaction with the State, based on the analysis of the production of standards corresponding to two national educational reforms. The objective is to show the diversification of the university field and the regulation strategies from the State.