Teletechnology and Higher Education: Does the Approach Matter?

Abstract

This article discusses how international and national understandings of information and communication technology (ICT) and the knowledge economy inform contemporary higher education policies. Acknowledging that national educational policies in Latin America are increasingly influenced by the recommendations of international organizations (e.g. the World Bank, UNESCO, and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development), the article provides a clear example of the logics of policy transfer operating in the region. Challenging the interpretations that have tended to stress either the imposition and domination of international meanings and recommendations onto national policies or the total indifference of national reforms vis à vis those international views, this article contends that international policy narratives are locally appropriated and resignified. Specifically, the article deals with the ways in which higher education policy narratives on knowledge and information found in UNESCO's publications are appropriated and reconstituted in Mexico's policy documents.