It undoubtedly has an important role to play – the market and private sector have been shown to deliver multiple benefits in areas such as air transport, multimedia and communications and retail services, providing a level of choice and competition for consumers that enable them to select the best product for their requirements.

Some then argue that, given the successful track record of the market in this respect, that it should be extended to other areas of daily life, such as education.  After all, it is just a logical extension of a tried-and-tested approach.  If people gain from price reductions and product choice because of market forces and privatisation when buying a foreign holiday, surely they should and could benefit from the same choices with their educational provision.

This is where the market logic collides with fundamental human rights and entitlements.  There are several key differences between buying a foreign holiday and following an educational pathway that make the marketisation agenda fall down.  Buying a holiday abroad is optional – as much as we may like to think the opposite, it is a luxury – an addition to our daily lives rather than an essential necessity. And because it is an optional extra which we can choose to have or not, we expect to have to pay for it.  Having one simply makes our lives temporarily more enjoyable, rather than bringing any wider individual and societal benefits.  Failure to have one impacts on no-one but ourselves.

Education is another matter entirely.  Widely acknowledged as a basic human right, it is an entitlement and an essential pre-requisite for realising individual potential, citizenship, equal opportunities and creating a knowledgeable, sustainable and equitable society in which everyone can flourish.  It is therefore something that needs to be available to everyone, regardless of financial means, origin, background or situation.  The market does not work for basic human rights and entitlements, because it functions on an entirely different logic – of creating a good deal for optional extras that people can either choose to have, or choose not to have.  Education is not an optional extra, and marketisation in practice simply means a shift away from universal access and entitlement to limited access based on the ability to pay for the ‘goods’ in question.

For this reason, the recognition this month at the World Conference on Higher Education of higher education as ‘a public good and public responsibility’ was a major breakthrough against a growing tide seeking to inject market forces into learning provision.  While such a statement at global level is an important statement of principle, the signs in Paris were that it’s just another step forward in a much longer-term battle.  It’s going to take a lot more work by ESU and other higher education actors before the marching tide seeking to marketise this ‘public good’ is forced into a permanent retreat.