THE MYTH OF THE UNIVERSAL AND THE COLONIALITY OF KNOWLEDGE: CHALLENGES FOR AN EMANCIPATORY HIGHER EDUCATION

Abstract

This article analyzes the hegemony of Eurocentrism in Brazilian higher education, questioning the imposition of a science model that proclaims itself universal. Characterized as a bibliographic review study with a qualitative approach, the main objective is to deconstruct the fallacy of epistemic universalism and investigate how the productivist logic acts as a mechanism of academic uniformization and subordination. The methodological path is based on the articulation of decolonial thought with philosophical critique and the sociology of education. To this end, François Jullien's reflections on the distinction between the universal, the uniform, and the common are mobilized, intersecting them with the concepts of coloniality of knowledge by Aníbal Quijano, Edgardo Lander, and Walter Mignolo. Furthermore, the study dialogues with Renato Ortiz and Nildo Ouriques in the critique of scientometrics, and with Paulo Freire, Boaventura de Sousa Santos, Florestan Fernandes, and Álvaro Vieira Pinto in the defense of a liberating university. The results show that the current structure of scientific evaluation disguises global market interests under the cloak of universality, promoting the erasure of local epistemologies and the silencing of Brazilian social demands. It is concluded that overcoming intellectual dependence requires the transition from a uniform productivism to an "ecology of knowledges", reaffirming education as a common good and a strategic instrument of emancipation and social transformation in the Global South.