International Students' Role as Nonstate Actors Amid a World in Crisis

• In Event: Future Directions for Equity-Driven International Student Research in Post/Crisis Times

Abstract

The so-called fourth-wave of globalization (Baldwin, 2019) has created for the first-time challenging positions for the wealthiest countries who are now not just benefitting, but also suffering, the effects of global interconnectedness. Former and current colonizers now feel threatened by the Other, by ‘foreigners’ who come to invade ‘their land’, ‘take their resources’, and ‘alter’ their way of living. In response, we have recently witnessed isolationist strategies in several countries, including some of the historically most powerful colonizers (such as the United Kingdom) and neo-colonizers (like the United States of America). Through growing nationalistic discourses of country-first agendas, both countries keep sending messages of how unwelcome immigrants are.

One of the subpopulations that has been targeted and affected during these global tensions are international students. These individuals possess skills and forms of capital that position them as competitors (Stein & Andreotti, 2016) with the ‘locals.’ Taking the U.S. as an example, during the presidency of Donald Trump, a dehumanizing portrayal of international students (Castiello-Gutiérrez & Li, 2020) as criminals, spies, or thieves of jobs and intellectual property was the preferred nationalistic discourse. Public opinion in other countries, such as the U.K. and Australia, have also depicted international students as ‘opportunistic backdoor migrants’ (Robertson, 2011).

These attacks escalate as the number of mobile students from the Majority World to the Minority World increases. Despite these changes, research around international student mobility has historically revolved around topics such as the external push/pull factors that explain migration patterns, or the affective and social process that students undergo to adapt, assimilate, and thrive in a different culture. Other lines of research have focused on the effects of international student mobility such as the economic impact for the host countries in the Minority World and the loss in talented human capital (brain drain) at the students’ home countries in the Majority World. More recently, and given the escalation in discriminatory policies and practices, other scholars have discussed international students’ position amid current global tensions as ‘hostages’ (Blanco, 2020), or as being used as ‘political pawns’ (Lee, 2020). That is to say that most of the research on international students has focused on either the context surrounding international student mobility or on roles ascribed to students. One common thread—and oftentimes an unintentional consequence—of all these research approaches is that they omit students’ agency; they place students as somewhat passive actors (Robertson, 2011).

In this presentation, I delve deeper into the different roles that international students are given as political actors in the global landscape as well as how students—through their own agency—challenge, defy, and rewrite these labels. I suggest how, using as a framework an equity-driven lens (George Mwangi & Yao, 2021), research around international students’ needs to re-focus on students’ agency and self-determination. Under an evolving social, political, and economic landscape, research needs to better reflect the growing importance that international students have as non-state actors amidst a world in global turmoil.

Author

• Santiago Castiello-Gutiérrez, Seton Hall University