Student Mobility and Internationalisation: Rationales, Rhetoric and 'Institutional Isomorphism'

Abstract

Drawing on interviews with Canadian and Australian offi cials, this article examines the frame of student mobility within the broad discourse of internationali- sation. Diffi culties in defi nition and admi ed shortfalls in achieving progress even on the more easily articulated benchmarks of student mobility, do not seem to staunch the enthusiasm of a variety of offi cials for the idea of internationalisation. This article will examine some of the contradictions framing these institutional discourses of internationalisation. These include the gaps between institutional claims and their substantiation, between lauding the internationalism inculcated by student mobility programmes and the more mixed motivations or engagements of student clients, and between claims for the entrepreneurial potential of internationalisation as against the uncertainty of its outcomes. I argue that a long-standing Western view of travel as a vehicle for self-cultivation and transformation combined with competitive eff orts to keep up with perceived trends in the fi elds of post-secondary education are producing a momentum that is elusive even as it threatens to bulldoze its way across important institutional practices and procedures.