One of the promoters of the Brazilian debate on the impact on education of the measures taken by the WTO, the author wonders whether we can still maintain the idea that higher education is a public good, as advocated by the World Conference on Higher Education in Paris, 1998. The academic community lost the opportunity to react efficiently when, in 1994, the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) was signed. Yet, private providers are not enough to make a service commercial. Although the basic principles protecting the public goods are maintained under regulation, the figures of concession, delegation and authorization persist. Within the WTO, the Anglo-Saxon countries act inconsistently, closing the very doors they ask the others to open. The bigger danger, nowadays, is an attempt to create an international accreditation system, without the participation of Latin America
Public good; General agreement on trade in services; Accreditation