Internacionalização da educação superior e a reprodução de hierarquias coloniais: o caso brasileiro

Abstract

The dissertation, Internationalization of Higher Education and the Reproduction of Colonial Hierarchies: The Brazilian Case, seeks to understand how the contemporary internationalization of Brazilian higher education relates to the reproduction or contestation of colonial hierarchies and what possibilities emerge for adopting decolonial perspectives within this process. Its main objective is to analyze the influence of the most recent internationalization policies and strategies adopted by the Brazilian government, as reflected in the educational cooperation initiatives of BRICS and the CAPES-Global.Edu Institutional Internationalization Networks Program, on the reproduction and contestation of colonial hierarchies in the contemporary context. The epistemological perspective adopted is decoloniality, drawing on authors from the Modernity/Coloniality network, such as Aníbal Quijano, Nelson Maldonado-Torres, Ramón Grosfoguel, and Santiago Castro-Gómez, in dialogue with Brazilian and international scholars from postcolonial theory, critical pedagogy, and related fields. Methodologically, the study adopts a qualitative interpretivist approach and uses documentary and bibliographic research for data collection. The analytical and interpretive exercise is grounded in the reconstruction of meanings produced within the examined documents. The findings reveal the persistence of colonial hierarchies in the current internationalization of Brazilian higher education, particularly at the epistemic, linguistic, ethno-racial, and institutional levels. Nevertheless, given the phenomenon’s plurality and complexity, the results also highlight tensions, shifts, and counter-hegemonic meanings within the policies analyzed, especially in initiatives related to South-South cooperation, the valorization of diversity, and the incorporation of situated perspectives. This dissertation contributes to the field of education by offering analytical assumptions for identifying colonial hierarchies in internationalization processes and by proposing horizons for constructing more plural, contextualized, and cognitively just policies committed to epistemic diversity.