Page - 71 - in Radical Solutions and Open Science - An Open Approach to Boost Higher Education

5 WhoBenefits fromthePublicGood… 75 Openlicensesaloneareinsufficienttopromotesocialjustice,tocreateacommons or even just to achieve economic efficiency.Claimingopenness does not automati- callycall intobeinganeutralorprogressivespacefreeofpolitical tensions.Without explicitlyaddressing theirpoliticalvalues,openmovementsareat risk tohave these values subverted. If a project seeks to promote social justice, for example, it will need to take intoaccount existingpower relationsbetween relevant actors.Without recognizing existing social inequalities, providing access, providing equal oppor- tunities, or “democratizing” technologywill not be effective and can even amplify these inequalities. 5.3 TheBattle forOER OpeneducationandOERareideaswithgreatprotagonismindiscussionssurrounding the future of education. Issues related to the personalization of teaching in online platforms, the digitization of teaching material, access to online practice exams, and online tutoring videos, among others, are promotedwith a commonmessage of equity and access to education for all. On the one hand, these resources can help promote the “hacker ethic” in education (Pretto, 2012) with an emphasis on questioning, criticality, remixing, recombination, and collaboration. On the other hand,thedemocratizationofaccesstoeducationalresourceshasbeenusedtopromote aneducationcenteredon the logicofefficiencyand trainingof students for specific tasks,sothattheymay,onlyinstrumentally,overcomemoreefficientlythecontinuous certification frombasic tohighereducation.OERasweknowit, achildof theweb, ispermeatedbythehistorical tensionswehavepresented. It is important tosketcha brief historyof the concept inorder tounderstandwhy, despite arguments for their educational benefits that appeal to commonsense,wechose to say thatweare in a “battle forOER”. Online learning, and in particular “LearningObjects” (LO) gainedmuch atten- tionduring the90swith theweband the rise of resource-based-learning (Hannafin &Hill, 2008). LOs are small educational resources, usually focused on a single learning objective, designed so as to be combined with other resources to create a larger entity, focusing on a particular context of use. According to this logic, a small set of educational resources would be able to be used and reused inmany different contexts (Downes, 2001). Some authors have emphasized the use ofLOs in constructivist environments (Wiley, 2001); others have emphasized that in their actual implementationsLOsweremorenaturallyusedininstructionist teachingwith a trainingperspective (Friesen,2004). AsBenkler (2005) points out, the use of repositories of small adaptableLOs to form a larger and contextualized collection would be appropriate for the type of education inwhicheducatorshaveautonomytocurateandselect theirownteaching materials.Thisscenario ismore typical inhighereducation,withaprofessionalcre- atingasingularexperienceforstudents.Howeducatorsinothercontexts—withmore rigid institutional constraints, less technical support, limited digital competencies,