This article founded on documental analysis as well as on analysis of the literature in the field, addresses the issue of non-neutrality of quality assessment; it discusses dimensions of the quality concept, identifies factors that contribute to the non-neutrality of quality in reference to universities. It emphasizes that the benchmarks that are considered valuable to the evaluator (reference model), give different characteristics to the institutional and program evaluation models for higher education, making reference to the cases of Colombia, Argentina and Brazil and discusses the different implications of its operation. It is inferred that what contributes to the non-neutrality of quality assessment are: the conceptual emphasis on one or on several quality dimensions, the purpose of the evaluator, which determines the quality benchmarks he uses, and the demands for quality which are endogenous or exogenous to the institution, program or system that is under evaluation.