**2. The quasi-marketization and globalization of higher education**

The quality of Philippine higher education was once considered the second best in Asia, second only to Japan [6]. Today, this status has been left behind, and the country now lags to many nations in the continent and remains a developing country. The present system of higher education in the country is regulated by the Commission of Higher Education, an agency directly under the Office of the President of the Republic of the Philippines. It was created on May 18, 1994, through the passage of

#### *Perspective Chapter: Neoliberalism, Quasi-Marketization, and the Cultural Changes… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.109489*

the Republic Act (RA) No. 7722 or the Higher Education Act of 1994. It governs all colleges and universities offering tertiary, professional courses and graduate studies. The Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA), on the other hand, regulates all schools offering vocational courses, while the Department of Education (DepEd) takes care of the basic education from kindergarten to K-12. This trifocalization of the Philippine education system is one of the educational reforms studied and outlined by the Congressional Commission on Education in 1992 as a response to the continuous decline of the quality of education in the country.

Data from the Commission on Higher Education website indicate that the Philippines, as of June 8, 2017, has 1710 private higher education institutions – 21% of which or 351 institutions are sectarian schools, while there are only 283 public higher education institutions; these are the State Colleges and Universities (SUC's) and local universities and colleges (LUC's) created by national laws or local ordinances. The commission has direct and strong regulatory powers among private institutions to the extent that, given enough violations and/or non-compliance, it can order a closure to the institution. State universities and colleges, including local colleges, on the other hand, cannot be sanctioned likewise; since these institutions are created by law, CHED has a modified regulatory power over these SUCs but has full administrative control. The chairperson of all the state colleges and universities' governing bodies, the Board of Trustees, or the Board of Regents is the CHED chairperson. This was mandated in the RA No. 8292, otherwise known as the Higher Modernization Act of 1997. This law required the commission to "establish a complete, adequate, and integrated system of higher education" [7]. It provided power to the commission to modify and uniformly establish a governing board to every SUC nationwide. This law institutionalized the implementation of neoliberal principles in higher education institutions in the country. This is where the accreditation of programs offered in every SUC, ISO compliance, SUC leveling, and other schemes summarized under the Quality Assurance program, were systematically implemented, transforming every SUC to work like a private company under global standards and measures, providing neoliberal powers to the administrators and eventually changing the culture of public higher education permanently.

A significant impact of neoliberalism in education is the reforms seen worldwide with the main feature of aligning government schools with market-based ideas and practices. This marketization of education is often referred to as quasi-marketization. This is because, instead of mainstreaming government schools in the principles of free market, the government maintained strong regulatory powers while introducing reforms, making public education operate more like a private company. This policy stems from the perception that public schools have become inefficient, irrelevant, and unaccountable and do not effectively develop human capital [2]. Government intention to introduce market ideas and practices is supposed to be the solution. In the Philippines, education remains under government regulation and control. Several reforms in partnership with funding agencies, like the USAid, the British Council, AusAid, JICA, the World Bank, the IMF, the ADB, and numerous non-government agencies, were introduced to address the challenges in this sector. This scheme became the gateway for neoliberal policies to be implemented in the country as a required condition from the benefactors. Beginning from the modification of the composition of the Governing Boards of chartered state universities and colleges (SUCs), which resulted in the mutation of administrators into corporate-style managerial elites, trained with business perspective and paid like corporate managers, CHED have issued a series of memoranda and orders to implement the mandated functions of

"(a) achieving a more coordinated and integrated system of higher education; (b) rendering them more effective in the formulation and implementation of policies on higher education; (c) providing for more relevant direction in their governance; and (d) ensuring the enjoyment of academic freedom as guaranteed by the Constitution". The latest is the CHED Memorandum Order (CMO) No. 46 series of 2012 or the Policy Standard to Enhance Quality Assurance in Philippine Higher Education through an Outcomes-Based and Typology-Based QA [8].

Quality assurance institutionalized the infusion of free-market ideas in public higher education in the Philippines. The memorandum provides a template for SUCs as to what kind of institution it will be. The memorandum issued on December 11, 2012, aimed to: (1) "get HEIs to contribute more vigorously to national development". Citing the importance of globalization, CHED believed that HEIs played a significant role in boosting the national economy by producing competent graduates. Very clearly, this policy perceived education as an economic necessity rather than a search for knowledge. (2) "regain the Philippine competitive advantage close the competitive gap". CHED argued that it is through the quality assurance that the Philippines could enhance its competitiveness close enough to compete against its Asian neighbors. Hence, the accreditations that come with this order are internationally based standards evaluating local practices and traditional ways and means [9]. (3) "adapt approaches that will resonate with national needs and international practice". The commission wanted to steer higher education along with a learner-centered, competency-based, and industry-linked curriculum. This requires HEIs to embrace outcomes-based education, which countries around the world have already dismissed [10]. (4) "remain in step with the ASEAN in adopting and substantiating National Quality Framework". The CMO complements the issuance of Executive Order No. 83 series of 2012 issued on October 1, 2012, the Philippine Qualification Framework with alleged pressures from APEC and ASEAN [10]. (5) "enhance the competitiveness of Filipino graduates, reduce their vulnerability to sub-optional working conditions within and outside the country". Through quality assurance, Filipino workers, domestic and abroad, are required to be highly skilled and competent. This also ensures the labor mobility within the ASEAN Economic Community after its integration in 2015.

With these objectives, CMO 46 directed all HEIs, including private institutions, to (1) "shift to an outcomes-based quality assurance". This required SUCs to state their roles (instruction, research, and outreach) in an outcome form, including the extent and manner of evaluating them. This imperative also resulted in the re-statement of SUCs' Vision, Mission, and Goals to be outcomes-based. (2) "adapt an outcomesbased accreditation of the HEI's program offering and itself". Under this scheme, SUCs needed to (a) get a Certificate of Compliance for programs offered in both the undergraduate and graduate studies, (b) voluntarily submit itself to determine whether they qualify as a Center of Excellence (COE) or Center of Development (COD) for programs offered, and (c) undergo the accreditation process of these programs offered conducted by Accrediting Agency of Chartered and Universities in the Philippines (AACUP). This accrediting agency describes itself as an independent and international benchmark company, which in effect sets standards for public higher education in the country. Presently, AACUP is a member of the International Network for Quality Assurance Agencies in Higher Education (INQAAHE) based in Barcelona, Spain; CHEA International Quality Group from Washington, D.C., USA; and the Asia-Pacific Quality Network (APQN) based in Shanghai, China. Both the AACUP and CHED promote the benefits of accredited programs for SUCs, which include: "lend prestige to universities and college, ensure the listing of SUC in the

#### *Perspective Chapter: Neoliberalism, Quasi-Marketization, and the Cultural Changes… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.109489*

list of Internationally Accredited Universities/Colleges (UNESCO-IAN), reveal their strengths and weaknesses that need to be addressed, help parents identify which schools they may send their children to for quality education and make possible for prospective funding agencies to know what academic institution is worth supporting". The result is also used as a "criterion in administrative decision-making in a variety of ways". It is also a requisite for budgeting SUC leveling and performance bonuses [11]. These shared perspectives on benefits by AACUP and CHED reflect what truly is the purpose of accreditation – competition, publicity, globalization, the commodification of education, and administrative control. (c) on the institutional level, public HEIs are mandated to become ISO compliant also. Not only are the programs evaluated under international standards, but also the institution itself is evaluated by measures not really designed for education. (3) adapt a typology-based quality assurance. Under this process, SUCs are classified according to their status as a college or a university with its corresponding level to which they are qualified. This SUC leveling makes use of the HEI's compliances and accreditation processes it underwent and other criteria relevant to its functions as the basis for its classification or leveling. For example, an SUC could be level 1 up to level 5. The leveling comes with an enticing incentive of attaching the level to the official designation of the head of the SUC; if the SUC is level 5, the president is consequently, officially and formally, addressed as SUC President 5, which carries with it an additional budget and financial incentives. The achievement of SUCs in this leveling mechanism is a motivation for other SUCs to work harder, prompting a competition among the group.

Although globalization has been around in the country, its formal, deliberate, and strategic entry in higher education was on October 1, 2012, when Executive Order No. 83 series of 2012 had been issued by the then President Benigno C. Aquino III. Its main purpose was to align the country's educational standards to international standards and low mobility of people within the ASEAN region and beyond in preparation for the ASEAN Integration in 2015. The outright response from CHED was the issuance of CMO No, 46, which subjected HEIs to quality assurance accreditation. Then, on November 11, 2016, when quality assurance had been integrated into the SUC system, CMO No. 55 series of 2016 or the Policy Framework and Strategies on the Internationalization of Philippine Higher Education was dispensed. The main purpose was to "address the effect of globalization and the recent ASEAN Integration. The CMO also acts as a guide to HEIs to ensure that their internationalization efforts serve the country's interest, security, and identity" [12]. Finally, CMO No. 62 series of 2016 or the Policies, Standards, and Guidelines on Transnational Education came out. The British Council, one of the major benefactors of the K-12 Basic Education Reform, together with several British universities, forged courses with SUCs with excellent quality assurance accreditations in the Philippines [13]. The integration and transformation of SUCs with free-market ideas have been completed. The Philippine higher education is now on its way to follow the footprints that were left behind by those who did it first.
