The concept of Social Responsibility of Higher Education (SRHE) is discussed in the light of the World Conferences on Higher Education of 1998 and 2009, which were promoted by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (Unesco). In 1998, Unesco was opposed to World Bank theses and defended the State's responsibility for higher education. However, one decade later, it has incorporated and accepted neoliberal principles as valid for application to higher education. Thus, the SRHE concept has been enriched as an ethical principle that seeks to balance tensions between education as a human right and as a commercial service. While neoliberalism moves forward in the fields of hegemony and consensus, Unesco has metamorphosed to adapt to what seems to be irreversible: the victory of education as a commercial service in the molds of the World Trade Organization. A new flag has been raised: the fight against "diploma factories".
Unesco; Higher Education; University Management; Social Responsibility; Evaluation