Latin American Private Universities in the Context of Competition and Research Productivity

Abstract

For several decades, science and technology systems in Latin America prioritized infrastructure and capacity development. In the past 20 years, attention moved towards incentivizing research productivity and developingmechanisms to evaluate individual and institutional performance (Aupetit 2007; Delgado 2011a). Research in Latin America has been traditionally concentrated in major public universities, in particular, megauniversities (Didriksson et al. 2008). However, there are also successful private universities that have, in some cases, a longer tradition and often more flexibility than their public counterparts to respond to pressures from the knowledge-based economies. In addition, private higher education institutions (HEIs) have been one of the drivers of higher education expansion, when governments have been incapable of providing access to postsecondary education to the growing numbers of high school graduates (Rama 2006).