The Entangled Infrastructures of International Student Migration: Lessons from Covid-19

Abstract

The impact of Covid-19 on international student mobility has been noted by policy makers and the media ever since the global lockdowns started in early 2020. However, most of the concerns focus on what the drop in student mobility means for the finances of the countries and educational institutions to which students would have moved; there has been little exploration of the students’ own experiences of Covid-19. This chapter explores the entangled education, migration, and finance infrastructures that shape international student migration and how they failed the students during the pandemic. It draws on questionnaires and interviews conducted with international student migrants from a range of countries and who are registered to study in the UK to point to how migration policies, consular services, educational institutions, and travel industry all affected students. It points to how these components are entangled, and that their failure during the pandemic led to particular forms of immobility and mobility, leaving many students stuck in uncertain and precarious situations. The chapter ends by suggesting that reading the pandemic as an acute unprecedented event is important but inadequate. It is also a window into the everyday failures that the entangled infrastructures of international student mobility posed before Covid-19, how these came to be and who benefited from these infrastructures.

Should they stay or should they go? A case study on international students in Germany

“…In the light of other global challenges like climate change and pandemics cooperation of states will be a fundamental precondition to maintain a free movement of people. The current COVID-19 pandemic led to particular forms of immobility among international students and put many of them into precarious situations (Raghuram & Sondhi, 2021). Scholarships for students could help here as well, if they provide support and extra funding in times of hardship.…”

Pandemic nationalisms

“…The situation was more complex for people with temporary status who have been admitted to a country for a specific period, whether for study or work, and who are likely to be relatively recent arrivals. These have faced significant hardship (Raghuram and Sondhi, 2022) as the permits of some expired during the lockdowns while others lost their jobs and hence risked losing their status as a result of the pandemic (Wright, 2020). The pandemic though has forced countries to consider what Canada has termed the 'effective residence' of temporary aliens.…”

Education‐migration brokers, international student mobilities and digital transformations in pre‐ and post‐pandemic times

“…In this way, brokers assisted the Australian state in controlling the spread of the COVID‐19 virus while benefiting from the (im)mobility of student migrants. Raghuram and Sondhi (2022, p181) argue that the state's strategies to contain the virus reflected infrastructural failure, as seen in “unclear migration policies, ineffective communication, and surveillance by the universities” during the pandemic. In this context, education brokers assume the critical work of repair, possessing the ability to engage with students and knowledge institutions, while assisting states in managing the (im)mobility of student migrants.…”

“…In this context, education brokers assume the critical work of repair, possessing the ability to engage with students and knowledge institutions, while assisting states in managing the (im)mobility of student migrants. In a (post-)COVID-19 setting, Raghuram and Sondhi (2022) suggest that brokers are crucial in maintaining the fractured infrastructure of education migration and have an increasing capacity to co-shape the outcome of education migration with states. More generally, Collins (2021) points out that state responses to COVID-19 in adjusting migration policies are heavily contoured by their dependence on and relationship to existing migration industries.…”