Education as a Good: The Modern Cognitive Contexts

Abstract

Аrticle examines characteristics of understanding education based on use of concept of the good, which is one of the main for social and humanitarian sciences. We try to reconstruct discussion is it possible to consider education as an exclusively public good, or in terms of the commercialization of various spheres of public life, we can talk about education as an individual good. Proponents of the first point of view believe that education should be considered a public good because it presupposes the absence of competition in the consumption of this good and non-exclusion from its consumption, which is ensured by the inalienability of knowledge. Proponents of the second point of view point to the fact that these properties are not fully inherent in education, in particular, in many countries competition is present at least at the level of higher education. R.А. Musgrave proposes to consider higher education as an example of a merit good, since it cannot be either private or public. Society benefits from a large number of educated people for whom education can serve their personal interests. Thus, the article demonstrates the controversial nature of the understanding of education as a good. In addition, the focus is on a modern approach related to considering education as a global good.