The article discusses the problem of creating of a higher education market in post-communist countries in the period of transformation. On the examples of three countries: Poland, the Czech Republic and Romania, the implementation of multi-sectoral social policy paradigm, allowed to show that liberalization of the higher education system was a response to market demand and led to the creation of a model in which both public and private universities operate, and the sources of funding for higher

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... education are also public and private. Due to the growing interest in higher education during the transformation period and the inability to satisfy educational aspirations by the public sector, the countries introduced a market element to higher education, allowing for the functioning of non-public schools. It brought positive effects related to the expansion of the educational offer, but also negative, such as lowering the quality of education.