Education has long been regarded as one of the most powerful tools for personal growth and social transformation. Traditionally, it was meant to nurture curiosity, moral reasoning, creativity, and the ability to think independently. Schools and universities were spaces where students learned not only how to earn a living but also how to understand the world and their place within it. However, in recent years, this broader vision of education has been steadily shrinking. Under the pressure of commercialisation, education is increasingly treated as a market product rather than a public good. The emphasis has shifted from intellectual development to career training, from learning to earning, and from thinking to credential collecting. This transformation has contributed to what can be described as the slow death of general thinking.

The commercialisation of education is not merely about private institutions or rising fees. It is a bigger structural change in how knowledge is valued, delivered, and measured. Market logic now dictates what is taught, how it is taught, and why it is taught. As a result, education systems across the world are reinforcing social inequality while producing learners who are trained for narrow professional roles but lack critical, ethical, and reflective thinking.

Understanding the Education Crisis

The current education crisis is rooted in the idea that the primary purpose of education is employability. Degrees are marketed as investments, institutions are branded like corporations, and students are treated as customers. Success is no longer defined by intellectual growth but by placement statistics, salary packages, and institutional rankings.

While job readiness is important, reducing education to career preparation alone weakens its foundation. A society that values only economically profitable knowledge risks neglecting essential human skills such as empathy, reasoning, and social responsibility. The crisis becomes evident when graduates struggle to adapt to change, think independently, or engage meaningfully with social and political issues.

This crisis is sustained through several interconnected mechanisms that remain largely unquestioned.

The Credentialism Trap

One of the most visible outcomes of commercialisation is credentialism—the belief that educational value lies primarily in certificates, grades, and degrees rather than learning itself.

Education as a Checklist

Modern education systems often prioritise measurable outcomes over meaningful understanding. Curricula are designed around examinations, standardised assessments, and performance indicators. Students are encouraged to accumulate achievements that can be displayed on résumés rather than to explore ideas deeply.

This approach turns learning into a checklist. Subjects are studied not for their intellectual richness but for their exam relevance. Questions that encourage debate, reflection, or multiple interpretations are often avoided because they are difficult to grade objectively.

Impact on Thinking Skills

Credentialism discourages risk-taking and curiosity. Students learn to play safely, reproduce accepted answers, and avoid challenging dominant perspectives. Over time, this produces learners who depend on external validation rather than internal understanding.

The long-term consequence is a workforce that may be technically qualified but lacks problem-solving abilities, creativity, and ethical judgment. Degrees multiply, but genuine competence does not necessarily follow.

The Expansion of Coaching Factories

Alongside formal education, a massive parallel system of private coaching and educational technology has emerged. This “shadow education system” thrives on competition, fear of failure, and the promise of success.

Education as a Paid Advantage

In many households, especially among the middle class, spending on coaching classes, test preparation, and online learning platforms has become unavoidable. For competitive exams and elite institutions, regular schooling is often considered insufficient.

As a result, academic success increasingly depends on the ability to pay for additional support. Education becomes less about merit and more about financial capacity.

Deepening Social Inequality

This system creates a layered inequality. Students from economically privileged backgrounds enjoy constant academic reinforcement through tutors, AI-based learning tools, and personalised mentoring. Meanwhile, students from lower-income families rely solely on classroom teaching, which is often overstretched and under-resourced.

Even when disadvantaged students gain access to good schools through merit, they struggle to compete on equal terms. Thus, commercialisation reproduces inequality while pretending to reward talent.

The Managerial Turn in Educational Leadership

Another subtle but powerful change lies in how educational institutions are governed. School principals and university administrators are increasingly expected to behave like corporate managers.

From Learning to Branding

Institutional success is now measured by visibility, enrollment numbers, rankings, and profitability. Marketing departments often wield more influence than academic committees. Decisions about courses, faculty appointments, and infrastructure are driven by market demand rather than educational philosophy.

Programs that promise high salaries or quick employment are promoted aggressively, while disciplines that encourage reflection—such as philosophy, history, arts, and ethics—are gradually sidelined.

Loss of Academic Autonomy

This managerial approach reduces teachers to service providers and students to consumers. Academic freedom weakens as educators are pressured to deliver “results” rather than challenge students intellectually. The classroom becomes a product delivery space instead of a site of dialogue and discovery.

Career Training and the Narrowing of Knowledge

Commercialisation promotes the idea that only job-oriented knowledge is valuable. Skills are defined narrowly, often in terms of immediate market relevance.

Short-Term Skills vs. Long-Term Thinking

While vocational and technical training have their place, overemphasis on short-term skills ignores the unpredictable nature of the future. Technologies change, industries evolve, and job roles disappear. In such a world, the ability to think critically, learn continuously, and adapt creatively is far more valuable than rigid training.

General thinking—critical reasoning, ethical judgment, and interdisciplinary understanding—prepares individuals for lifelong learning. Its decline leaves individuals vulnerable to economic and social uncertainty.

The Erosion of General Thinking

General thinking refers to the capacity to question assumptions, connect ideas across disciplines, reflect ethically, and understand complex social realities. It cannot be reduced to measurable outcomes or immediate economic benefits.

Commercialised education discourages such thinking because it is time-consuming, unpredictable, and difficult to monetise. As a result, students are rarely encouraged to ask “why” or “should we,” focusing instead on “how” and “how much.”

The absence of general thinking has serious social consequences. Citizens who lack critical awareness are more susceptible to misinformation, intolerance, and authoritarian narratives. Democracy itself weakens when education fails to produce informed and reflective individuals.

Reimagining the Purpose of Education

Addressing the commercialisation crisis does not mean rejecting career preparation altogether. Instead, it requires restoring balance between vocational skills and intellectual development.

Educational institutions must reclaim their role as spaces for:

• Critical inquiry rather than rote learning
• Ethical discussion rather than blind competition
• Creativity rather than conformity

Policy-makers must regulate profit-driven educational practices and invest in public education. Teachers must be empowered as intellectual guides rather than content deliverers. Most importantly, society must question the assumption that the value of education lies solely in economic returns.

The commercialisation of education has transformed learning into a transaction and students into customers. By prioritising career training and credentials over critical thinking, the education system risks losing its deeper purpose. The true crisis lies not only in inequality or rising costs but in the erosion of general thinking that sustains thoughtful, ethical, and adaptable societies.

Education must once again be understood as a process of human development, not merely workforce production. Only by resisting excessive commercialisation can education fulfil its role in shaping individuals who are capable of thinking, questioning, and contributing meaningfully to the world.

.    .    .

References:

Illich, I. (1971). Deschooling Society. New York: Harper & Row.

•  Critiques institutionalised education and its transformation into a consumer-driven system.

Giroux, H. A. (2014). Neoliberalism’s War on Higher Education. Chicago: Haymarket Books.

• Explains how market logic and corporate values dominate modern education.

Freire, P. (1970). Pedagogy of the Oppressed. New York: Continuum.

• Introduces the concept of “banking education” and argues for critical thinking over rote learning.

Apple, M. W. (2006). Educating the “Right” Way: Markets, Standards, God, and Inequality. New York: Routledge.

• Analyses how education reforms driven by markets increase inequality.

Bourdieu, P. (1986). “The Forms of Capital.” In Handbook of Theory and Research for the Sociology of Education.

• Explains how cultural and economic capital affect educational outcomes.

Brown, W. (2015). Undoing the Demos: Neoliberalism’s Stealth Revolution. New York: Zone Books.

• Discusses how neoliberal values reshape public institutions, including education.