In this essay, the author reflects on the crisis of higher education in face of the new challenges derived from epistemic and social transformations which occurred during the last decades. The conducting axis is the passage from a formative to an informative character of higher education and, in this context, the imposition of an utilitarianist and efficientist logic as a quality paradigm. In face of the growing supremacy of operational thinking, of globalization and neoliberal economic policies, one wonders how much room remains for State policies and for guaranties of higher education autonomy in an educational system dominated by market demands.
Higher education; University; Education; Science and technology; National Education Master Plan; Operational thinking