GATS and Education

The General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) is one of the agreements of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) and came into force at the same time in the beginning of 1995 as the organisation itself was established. The logic of the GATS is that of a progressive liberalisation of trade in services through successive rounds of negotiations. GATS applies for all services except those supplied in exercise of governmental authority, i.e. "supplied neither on a commercial basis, nor in competition with one or more service suppliers". This means that also education is covered by GATS, as one of the vertical sectors, on which countries can make commitments in.

GATS recognises four different modes of supplying services. In terms of education the following examples could be made: 1) Cross-border supply, e.g. distance learning, 2) Consumption abroad, e.g. travelling abroad to study, 3) Commercial presence, e.g. university branch campuses or partnership agreements and 4) Presence of natural persons e.g. teachers, professors.

The problems of committing education into GATS
Education is an essential public service benefiting the whole society and should thus be provided as a public service free of tuition. The GATS agreement, however, does not provide much protection for public services, which should be "supplied neither on a commercial basis, nor in competition with one or more service suppliers". For most countries in the world this does not hold true for many education systems, especially for higher education, where various public-private mixes, for-profit providers and tuition fees exist.

More problematic yet, it is the WTO Dispute Settlement Panel that ultimately makes the decision what is considered a public service, not the member states themselves. Several other GATS regulations also cause problems for education. For example domestic regulations such as quality assurance mechanisms may not be "more burdensome than necessary", which might compromise the quality of education. State subsidies for education institutions may be considered as hindrances to trade and thus may have to be abolished or - according to national treatment requirement - given to domestic and foreign providers alike. Another problem arises from the logic of progressive liberalisation, any commitments made now are virtually irreversible without huge costs, and even more commitments will be asked for in the next round of negotiations.

ESU's opinion on the matter
ESU rejects the notion of students as consumers. Students are not consumers but partners in the process of Higher Education. As partners, students make important contributions to the creation of knowledge and should be seen as partners by the Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) rather than paying customers. ESU is further opposed to the further inclusion of education within the GATS negotiations. We call upon the European Union and governments around the world, to not schedule education further into the GATS. We believe that education should not be covered by an agreement primarily concerned with promoting free trade. Furthermore, we demand a cancellation of the negotiations with regards to education. States are responsible for the public financing of Higher Education, since they recognised HE as a Human Right in UN treaties. Education is a right - not a privilege and ESU will work for assuring that this right prevails.