Higher Education and the Challenges of Network Society: Philosophical Themes

Abstract

The article presents a philosophical analysis of the humanitarian impact of educational reform due to the influence of new digital technologies. The post-industrial development of society has been characterized as a network society. Specifically, the revolution in media today defines the technological and substantive changes in the educational sector. Its modernization in the 1990s in Russia began through the discussion of the humanitarian mission of the classical university model. However, the process of globalization and the mobility of education demanded the alignment and unification of national educational programs. The Bologna Process was a response. It was implemented in Russia as a two-tiered system, although the society still needed specialists and engineers rather than bachelors and masters. The restructuring of the educational process to comply with international standards then led to the necessity of economic reform. Society needed educated specialists but could not support a large number of educational institutions with a sizable staff. In the manufacturing sector, automatization leads to a growth in workforce productivity whereas in education the traditional pedagogy is mainly practiced. Digital technologies have opened up new opportunities for the increased economic efficiency of centers of education. However, the faculty body, especially in the Humanities sphere, expressed strong criticism. The argument is that digital technologies do not solve pedagogic problems. While discussing the economic efficiency, the main, substantive issue of the meaning and purpose of education has been left aside. Hence the question of how an individual’s education can be embedded into the overall educational process continues to be of high relevance. Resorting to philosophy may be appropriate and reasonable inasmuch as it has accumulated a range of caring and self-preservation practices aimed at the development of social skills of an individuum. Philosophy can also provide an anthropological expertise of on-going reforms, identifying their social and cultural implications.