Is the era of internationalisation at risk – or not?

On 23 February, Philip Altbach and I wrote a commentary in University World News on the challenges confronting higher education internationalisation, asking ourselves if the era of internationalisation of the past 25 years was coming to an end or at least was on life support. And on 9 March, we wrote a commentary in which we expressed our concerns about the closing of China and its potential impact on higher education.

Surprisingly enough, the first commentary created many more supportive and some critical reactions than the second, whereas in our view the developments in China and their implications for universities are of equal concern for higher education and its internationalisation.

In essence, our commentary on China is meant as an extension of our broader analysis on the dangers of inward-looking, nationalist trends in the world and their impact on academic freedom and international exchange and collaboration.

A continuing flow of students?

In his “One Thought to Start Your Day” blog, Alex Usher, an analyst of higher education in Canada and the world, whom I highly regard, wrote a critique of our first commentary on 2 March, entitled “The end of internationalisation?”

Although he agrees with several of our arguments, he is of the opinion that we are ignoring the higher education-importing countries’ perspectives, those with students studying in the higher education-exporting ones. His argument is that there will be a continuing flow of students moving out of the importing to the exporting countries (that is, from countries that send students abroad to the countries that take them), notwithstanding the unwelcoming climate in the main ones, the United States and the United Kingdom.

In other words, “the era will end when demand slackens, not when we run into some issues in the supply” and, according to him, the era of internationalisation will roll on.

Usher argues that student mobility will continue along the same patterns as over the past decades: students will move from emerging and developing countries to Europe and the Anglo-Saxon world.

And if patterns are shifting, it will primarily be within Europe (from the United Kingdom as main host country to Germany, France and other countries on the continent); in North America (from the United States to Canada); and within and between other regions (to China, for instance).

But one should not ignore the fact that several of these countries are facing increasing resistance to the admission of large numbers of international students (see the case of the Netherlands). Moreover, the shifting pattern to more mobility within, and between, Latin America, Africa and Asia, which we have seen for the last several years, will come up against challenges of academic quality, infrastructure and political and economic instability.

Usher sees branch campuses as a way for higher education-exporting countries to continue to internationalise, ignoring the fact that, increasingly, higher education-exporting universities face challenges with regard to academic freedom and other limitations imposed on them.

Internationalisation across borders or at home?

Phil Baty, editorial director of global rankings at Times Higher Education, is also unconvinced that internationalisation is in need of life support. He says: “I don’t believe we are in the death throes. I believe that internationalisation will continue to thrive and will not be held back by these nationalistic forces. And the reason is simple – knowledge knows no boundaries. Ideas don’t have borders and universities will continue to seek collaboration with whomever they can fruitfully develop ideas.”

Our argument is not that current patterns of higher education internationalisation will fundamentally change overnight or that the direction of universities around the world will alter, but rather that current trends in many countries will affect higher education significantly, at least in the medium term. Like Usher and Baty, we believe in science without borders and gave positive examples in our commentary.

Both of these critics, however, want to believe that the political and societal trends that are so obvious today will not have a significant impact on higher education in the coming years.

Perhaps they believe that Donald Trump, Brexit and the more recent election results in Italy, Austria and elsewhere, as well as the political climate in countries like Russia and China are either unimportant or are temporary blips on the inevitable path to globalisation. This is wishful thinking at best. These trends will inevitably have an impact on higher education.

China is the leading sending country for international students, but also, increasingly a higher education-exporting country. The concerns we expressed in our commentary of 9 March may have a big impact.

Two incidents which occurred after our commentary was published confirm our concerns: possible visa restrictions for Chinese students by the Trump administration and visa delays in Australia, and the limitations on the number of foreigners allowed in bars and restaurants, imposed in Beijing by the Chinese government. These are examples of how exporting and importing countries are taking ominous measures to limit international exchange and cooperation.

More important is our concern about the fact that the issue of quality is absent in the critique of our commentary. The numbers of mobile students are only one aspect of the total picture.

It is illustrative that Phil Baty made his comments in connection with the new Times Higher Education most international universities rankings. Of all the rankings, I find this one the most absurd as it is mainly based on numbers of international students and scholars. Because of that it is not surprising that 11 of the top 20 universities are from small countries with many borders.

In the Netherlands we use to call this ‘internationalisation by bike’. It excludes completely the great efforts made by universities that are not located close to borders and which focus more on internationalisation of the curriculum for all their students.

In my view it is the latter that are really the ‘most international’ universities. Internationalisation perceived solely in terms of mobility across borders ignores the fact that most students and faculty will not have an opportunity to travel.

Internationalisation at home for all students and faculty is a better guarantor of a continued era of internationalisation – as long as academic freedom is guaranteed.

Hans de Wit is director of the Center for International Higher Education at Boston College, USA. Email: dewitj@bc.edu