Conceptions of Internationalisation and Their Implications for Academic Engagement and Institutional Action: A Preliminary Case Study

Abstract

This chapter sets out the context of internationalisation within Higher Education (HE), as it is counterpointed against broader issues within the globalisation of knowledge and education. It explores the way in which some of the key conceptual themes and tensions play out in a practice-based setting through the introduction of an institutional case study documenting the outcomes of a project taking place at the University of Newcastle. The case highlights some of the contradictory effects of the organisational processes characterising internationalisation and explores the resonances between the lived experiences of academics within a rapidly internationalising institutional setting and other forces shaping their academic lives and identity. The key conclusion of the case study is that participants experienced internationalisation as a powerful but negative factor in their working lives, allied to conceptions of globalisation in which they saw themselves as victims of externally generated forces bringing increased teaching workloads, resource pressures and a shift away from their preferred academic identities. A major theme within the case study is that people’s experience reflects the conceptual ambiguity within much of the literature in its assessment of globalisation as simultaneously a manageable and an irresistible force. Underlying themes of resistance to and cynicism about engagement also emerge in the case data as counter-reactions to the sense of helplessness and confusion that compliance with an aggressive institutional globalisation agenda implies.