Higher Education Under the Yoke of the Market: Private Universities in Mexico and Social Inequalities

In Mexico, the historical organisation, growing diversification, institutional hierarchy, competition between institutions and lack of regulation by the State of private higher education all contribute to a strong reproduction of social inequalities. After a historical overview showing the role of public universities in the reproduction of elites, the chapter highlights, through an analysis of recent reforms and the structuring of private higher education, the multiplication of stakeholders in the sector’s development and the differentiation of private institutions according to the social groups they target. The curricula, the teaching conditions, and the criteria for access to the different ‘classes’ of institutions foster the process of distinction between these institutions. In this context, inequalities no longer solely lie in the unequal possession of the economic, cultural or social capital required to access high-quality higher education: they have more to do with the unequal chances of acquiring the socially valuable academic qualifications needed to enter the most privileged socio-economic sectors. Rather than democratising access to higher education, opening up the sector to private capital has increased the segregation of the least endowed social fractions of students.