This article examines how a sample of 62 higher education institutions in Canada, the United States and the United Kingdom discuss international students in their official institutionalization strategies, focusing on how ideas of race and diversity are addressed. We find that institutional strategies connect international students to an abstract notion of diversity, using visual images to portray campus environments as inclusive of racial, ethnic and religious diversity. Yet, strategy documents rarely discuss race, racialization, or racism explicitly, despite the fact that most international students in all three countries are non-white. Moreover, racial injustice is externalized as a global issue and racial diversity is instrumentalized as a source of improving institutional reputation or diversity metrics. We argue that a first step to creating more inclusive and anti-racist campuses is to acknowledge international students’ racial identities and experiences with racism in official discourses and strategies.
The world has witnessed democratic decline in 23 countries worldwide during the last decade (Freedom House, 2019) in the context of rising nationalism and right-wing populism (Fraser, 2017; Robertson, 2018, 2020). The political importance of this topic is rooted in the fact that higher education is one of the most crucial public goods (Marginson, 2007, 2017) and governments tend to exercise tighter control over HEIs while democratic conditions worsening (Perry, 2015). Although many studies have examined the effects of the transition to democracy on higher education globally (O’Donnell et al., 2013; O’Donnell et al., 1986, Salto, 2020), very few have studied the reverse trend – democratic backsliding. Given that university autonomy is a wider term that encompasses the practises undertaken by universities to operate, researching its aspects, and assessing the true implications of democratic backsliding on universities represents an important field for current and future research. My research investigates the impact of democratic backsliding on the university autonomy, by examining the cases of Turkey, Hungary, and Poland. These countries were considered democracies until the 2010s, but they are increasingly moving away from democracy (Freedom House, 2020). The study draws on an extensive analysis of publicly accessible government laws and regulations, university decrees, mission statements, political pamphlets, online media sources and interviews, and grey literature to analyze institutional responses as well as field work and interviews. I employ neoliberal authoritarianism and historical institutionalism as a framework to investigate the critical junctures and institutional changes affecting appointive (hiring, promotion, and dismissal of staff), financial (funding levels and criteria, preparation and allocation of the university budget, and accountability), and academic (access, curriculum, degree requirements, and academic freedom) autonomy (Ordorika, 2003).
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
hi@scite.ai
10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614
Henderson, NV 89052, USA
Copyright © 2024 scite LLC. All rights reserved.
Made with 💙 for researchers
Part of the Research Solutions Family.