GATS & Globalisation
:: Policy ::
Since 1998, the EI World Congress and the EI Executive Board passed several resolutions and developed several policy papers on the exclusion of education from both GATS negotiations chaired by the World Trade Organisation (WTO) and other multilateral and bilateral trade talks. These include, resolutions such as "Education: Public Service or Commodity" (2004), "The World Economy and Education" (1998), "Global Campaign to Defend and Enhance Public Education" (1998), "Educating in a Global Economy" (2001) and "The ILO, the WTO and the Globalisation of the World Economy" (2001).
Education International and its member organisations oppose the commercialisation of education. We believe that education is a human right, a public service and not a commodity. The commercialization of education services carries risks of inequity, discrimination and deepening of the digital divide.
GATS is a trade agreement, a multilateral investment agreement and a labour mobility agreement, with far-reaching effects and restrictions on the decision-making capacities of national governments. At its heart, the GATS commits WTO members to a liberalization agenda, not just by eliminating barriers to trade and investment in services, but also by encouraging countries that have privatized, contracted out their public services or deregulated them to cement in these liberalisations by making relevant education services commitments under the GATS.
Education, health care and other basic social services should be excluded from agreements between national governments in the framework of GATS, or bilateral or regional trade agreements; this requires that governments maintain that education must be exempted under GATS article 1.3, as 'services supplied in the exercise of governmental authority'.
In the case of higher and vocational education, GATS presents an immediate threat. These sectors of education vary from one country to another, but mixed public/private systems are common, opening the door to inclusion of these sectors in the GATS system.
Inclusion of education in GATS would undermine public systems of education and reinforces trends towards privatisation or deregulation.
National governments have the right and the duty to regulate the provision of education, including the licensing of schools and universities, the accreditation of courses, and ensuring that course contents are culturally appropriate.
Moves to dilute national sovereignty on these matters through the use of WTO procedures are undesirable. For example, it is inappropriate to use dispute panels to determine whether qualifications should be judged as being 'trade-restrictive'.
WTO and GATS should not be used to impose limits on the right of governments to allocate subsidies to public education and social service providers or to refuse to extend these subsidies to private providers .
GATS negotiations must be fully open and transparent. Government mandates (including all requests from other member states to open their education services and/or the government's initial intentions in response to these requests) should be published ; there should be consultation with national and international trade union organisations and publication of reports and projects on trade in services.
The positions expressed in relation to GATS apply also to regional agreements such as NAFTA and MERCOSUR.
To download our policy documents, please visit our Resource Library