Abstract:

The present era is seen by this writer as being inappropriately called 'globalisation era'. As Ellen Meksins Wood tells us, that what has been called globalisation is actually "universalisation of Capitalism". In her own words, " I prefer to talk about the universalisation--the increasing imposition of capitalist imperatives, a capitalist "logic of process" on all aspects of social life--rather than about "globalisation".(Wood: 1998,p46). In the context of education, globalisation leads to increased imposition of capitalist controls and this tendency is seen both in developed and developing countries. While agreeing that open and distance learning (ODL) is not born out of globalisation, the paper contends that it is more vulnerable to the attacks of capital and more susceptible to come under the grip of it. This system of education could be used for those disadvantaged sections of the society so far denied access to higher education. This needs to be kept in mind to understand the perspective in which ODL should develop. Othenvise the danger of vested intsrests taking over the ODL is too great not to take account of. In this article I have kept this perspective in mind to understand the link between ODL and globalisation. Due to limitations of my experiences, I have presented a sketch of the problems involved and, taken IGNOU as an example.