Universidad: servicio público frente a mercantilización

Se denuncian intentos de “privatización encubierta” de la universidad, esto es, de sometimiento de su docencia e investigación a los requerimientos de los demandantes privados, concretado por ejemplo en la planificación docente, las tasas académicas y los sistemas de gobierno. Tal mercantilización responde a una consideración, más o menos explícita, de la educación superior como una mercancía frente a la concepción de servicio público, al alcance de toda la sociedad. Se argumentan los principios básicos de este modelo social (autonomía universitaria, compromiso social, rendición de cuentas, financiación pública, gobierno participativo y democrático,…), y se alerta sobre diversas vías de penetración del modelo neoliberal (competitividad, jerarquización, gerencialización,…) y en particular sobre las campañas de desprestigio contra la universidad pública.The paper denounces the covert privatisation of university; in other words, the submission of its teaching and research to private interests. For example, concerning the teaching plan, the academic fees and the governance system. This commercialisation stems from considering higher education, more or less explicitly, as merchandise instead of as a public service made available to all levels of society. The basic principles of this social model (university autonomy, social commitment, accountability, public funding, participative and democratic governance…) are discussed in the paper. It also warns about the penetration of the neoliberal governance model (competitivity, hierarchisation, management…) and the systematic campaigns aimed at discrediting public university

Prólogo

Prólogo del Informe "La educación superior en el mundo 2006: La financiación de las universidades"Peer Reviewe

Bifurcation diagram for saddle/source bimodal linear dynamical systems

We continue the study of the structural stability and the bifurcations of planar bimodal linear dynamical systems (BLDS) (that is, systems consisting of two linear dynamics acting on each side of a straight line, assuming continuity along the separating line). Here, we enlarge the study of the bifurcation diagram of saddle/spiral BLDS to saddle/source BLDS and in particular we study the position of the homoclinic bifurcation with regard to the new improper node bifurcationPostprint (published version

Classi fication of monogenic invariant subspaces and uniparametric linear control systems

The classification of the invariant subspaces of an endomorphism has been an open problem for a long time, and it is a ”wild” problem in the general case. Here we obtain a full classification for the monogenic ones. Some applications are derived: in particular, canonical forms for uniparametric linear control systems, non necessarily controllable, with regard to linear changes of state variablesPreprin

Distance from a controllable switched linear system to an uncontrollable one

The set of controllable switched linear systems is an open set in the space of all switched linear systems. Then it makes sense to compute the distance from a controllable switched linear system to the set of uncontrollable systems. In this work we obtain an upper bound for such distance.Postprint (published version

A systematized approach to obtain dependable controller specifications for hybrid plants

This chapter focuses on the problem that a designer of an automation system controller must solve related with the correct synchronization between different parts of the controller specification when this specification obeys a previously defined structure. If this synchronization is not done according to some rules, and taking some aspects into consideration, some dependability aspects concerning the desired behaviour for the system may not be accomplished. More specifically, this chapter will demonstrate a systematized approach that consists of using the GEMMA (Guide d`Etude des Modes de Marches et d`Arrêts) (Agence Nationale pour le Developpement de la Production Automatisée) [ADEPA], 1992) and the SFC (Sequential Function Chart) (International Electrotechnical Commission [IEC], 2002) formalisms for the structure and specification of all the system behaviour, considering all the stop states and functioning modes of the system. The synchronization of the models, corresponding to the controller functioning modes and the controller stop states, is shown in detail and a systematized approach for this synchronization is presented. For this the advantages and disadvantages of the vertical coordination and horizontal coordination proposed by the GEMMA formalism are discussed and a case study is presented to explain the proposed systematic approach. A complete safe controller specification is developed to control a hybrid plant. Also this chapter presents and discusses a case study that applies a global approach for considering all the automation systems emergency stop requirements. The definition of all the functioning modes and all the stop states of the automation system is also presented according the EN 418 (European Standard [EN], 1992) and EN 60204-1 (EN, 1997) standards. All the aspects related to the emergency stop are focused in a particular way. The proposed approach defines and guarantees the safety aspects of an automation system controller related to the emergency stop. For the controller structure the GEMMA methodology is used; for the controller entire specification the SFC is used and for the controller behaviour simulation the Automation Studio software (FAMIC, 2003) is used

Perturbed marked reduced forms of invariant subspaces

The classification of invariant subspaces is an open problem related to other important ones like the Carlson problem. Here we obtain a reduced form of these invariant subspaces as a new tool to tackle these problems. In particular, it allows us to prove quite easily partial results already known. The key point is assigning to each invariant subspace a marked one (its marked type) in order to partition the set of invariant subspaces in a finite number of subsets (the marked classes), each one containing only one marked subspace. Next, we parametrize (minimally) each marked class by means of the so-called PM reduced families, so that representatives of an invariant subspace (its PM reduced forms) appear in just one of these families.Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft

Dimension of the orbit of marked subspaces

Given a nilpotent endomorphism, we consider the manifold of invariant subspaces having a fixed Segre characteristic. In [Linear Algebra Appl., 332–334 (2001) 569], the implicit form of a miniversal deformation of an invariant subspace with respect to the usual equivalence relation between subspaces is obtained. Here we obtain the explicit form of this deformation when the invariant subspace is marked, and we use it to calculate the dimension of the orbit and in particular to characterize the stable marked subspaces (those with open orbit).Moreover, we study the rank of the endomorphisms in the quotient space by the subspaces in the miniversal deformation of the giving subspace.Peer Reviewe

Miniversal deformations of observable marked matrices

Given the set of vertical pairs of matrices M¿ Mm,n(C)×Mn(C) keeping the subspace Cd×{0} ¿ Cn invariant, we compute miniversal deformations of a given pair when it is observable and the subspace Cd × {0} is marked. Moreover, we obtain the dimension of the orbit, characterize the structurally stable vertical pairs and study the effect of each deformation parameter.Preprin