What’s in a Name? A Theoretical Exploration of the Proliferation of Labels for International Education Across the Higher Education Sector

Abstract

Across the higher education sector international education has been described as experiencing a “crisis of identity.” The recent proliferation of new terms advanced to label “internationalization,” it has been suggested, represents little more than “tautology.” Here, we address questions posed by de Wit regarding this phenomenon: “Why is it new labels are emerging?” “What do they mean?” “How are they used?” And, “will they advance the debate on the future of internationalisation?” We argue the phenomenon of renaming highlights a deep unease among scholars and points to the need for further theoretical consideration of the subject/agent nexus in the context of internationalization. First, with Strauss (1997), we argue the renaming phenomenon reveals more about those attributing the labels than that which they name. Second, drawing on positioning theory we argue renaming “internationalization” can be equated to reflexive positioning in the context of uneven distributions of power across contested storylines. As such, current efforts to rename “internationalization” are not necessarily tautological; rather, they could be integral to systematic changes in understandings, activities, dispositions, and rationales across the higher education sector.

Keywords

internationalization naming positioning theory higher education

The naming or identification of things is . . . a continual problem, never really over and done with. (Strauss, 1997, p. 27)

Introduction

Across the higher education sector what is actually meant by “internationalization” has been the subject of considerable debate among practitioners and scholars (c.f. Green & Whitsed, 2012; Marginson & Sawir, 2011). To illustrate, Marginson and Sawir (2011, p. 14) observe internationalization, while being a “familiar” term, is problematic because it is “subjected to extensive and varied use in research and discussion.” Moreover, as it is widely observed across the literature, no definitive definition of “internationalization” has been embraced across the higher education sector. As a consequence several “broad-based labels” for “internationalization” have emerged and new labels are being advanced. Reflecting on this situation de Wit (2011a) argued that “broad-based labels” such as “mainstreaming, comprehensive, holistic, integrated, and deep internationalization” have done little to clarify what is meant by internationalization. For example, he argues, if one contrasts Hudzik’s (2011) definition for “comprehensive internationalization” with Knight’s (2003, 2004) definition of “internationalization” there is little to differentiate them. To illustrate, internationalization is defined as:

A commitment, confirmed through action, to infuse international and comparative perspectives throughout the teaching, research and service mission of higher education. (Hudzik, 2011, p. 6)

The process of integrating an international, intercultural or global dimension into the purpose, functions or delivery of post-secondary education. (Knight, 2004, p. 11)

Granted, there are subtle differences between these definitions: Hudzik (2011) conceptualizes internationalization as something that can be “infused,” and as such, may be understood in mechanistic and structural terms, while Knight defines it in terms of “process.” Nevertheless, de Wit’s observation that there is little to differentiate them seems valid.

While de Wit (2011a) indicates an appreciation of the motivations behind the new “labels” and is sympathetic to the urge to “broaden and deepen the notion of internationalization” he nevertheless feels this trend is problematic and potentially counterproductive. He states, “[i]n the discussions I have taken part in recently, I observe the inclination to embrace these new labels, but continue with business as usual.” According to de Wit, the “renamings” amount to little more than tautology; that is, different words are being used to say the same thing, “even if the repetition does not make the meaning any clearer.” With Brandenburg, he argues, a change in name has done little to address a trend to focus on the “form” as opposed to the “substance” of internationalization, which in turn he argues “devalue[s] the notion of internationalization” (Brandenburg & de Wit, 2011). From this perspective, “if internationalization is to be revived [emphasis added to highlight connotations of a religious backslider, or a cardiac victim—to which we will return] it will not be the result of new labels, but out of a debate and action around the key questions.” Four of these key questions for de Wit (2011a) are:

Why is it new labels are emerging?

What do they mean?

How are they used?

Will they advance the debate on the future of internationalization?

The aim of this article is to critique the phenomena of naming as it relates to internationalization and therein address these questions. We argue that the act of naming (and relabeling) internationalization is more than a banal exercise in tautology. Rather, we understand the act of naming as reciprocally disclosing qualities imbued both in the phenomena labeled (internationalization), and the one imputing the label. First, we highlight the representational (Fairclough, 2010) and multivocal (Turner, 1974) aspects on internationalization across multiple (convergent and divergent) discourses. Second, we draw on positioning theory to argue that the act of renaming “internationalization” is a demonstration of reflexive positioning and agency in the context of uneven distributions of power across the contested storylines of internationalization. Finally, we argue the proliferation of labels ascribed to phenomena of “internationalization” will continue to evolve as old concepts and present situated realities intersect and diverge and new understandings emerge.

What’s in a Name?

Jones (2011), responding to de Wit’s article concludes that it is “right to say too much time is spent on definitions and arguing over detail,” and to question the utility of “such labels” to “advance the debate on the future of internationalization.” Instead, she argues, “it is now time to . . . focus on actions rather than further debate,” specifically by facilitating an “integrated internationalization.” Knight (2011) too questions the possible value of yet more definitions for the sets of activities and dispositions¹ labeled “internationalization.” For her, this suggests a “crisis of identity.” She poses the question, “is a new definition of internationalization the right response or enough? How can we avoid a scenario where words might change but actions and, more importantly fundamental values, do not?” Thus, Knight evokes a broader question we intend to address in this article, along with the questions de Wit poses, namely what and whose identity is in crisis?

Fundamental to our inquiry is the relationship between words and actions. None of the definitions proposed are without theoretical and operational challenges, nor are they ideologically neutral. Rizvi and Lingard (2009) observe, “While the appeal of the idea of internationalization of the curriculum appears ubiquitous it is not always clear what it means and how it might represent a new way of prioritizing and organizing learning” (p. 173). Knight’s definition in particular has attracted criticism, in spite of (or perhaps because of) its wide acceptance across Anglo and European higher education contexts. Sanderson (2011), following Trevaskes, Eisenchlas, and Liddicoat (2003) argue that the value of Knight’s definition for guiding important intrainstitutional internationalization initiatives is not explicit. Hence, “it fails to provide instruction or detail on how to develop within-institution internationalisation initiatives at anything more than a superficial level” (p. 663). Furthermore, according to Sanderson (2008, p. 279), Knight’s definition fails to account for how other levels at the “local-global continuum can affect internationalisation processes overall.” Marginson and Sawir (2011) question the wholesale adoption of Knight’s definition across tertiary institutions in Australia and beyond, from another perspective, arguing it has done little to address the ethnocentricity prevalent in these institutions:

Both the normative and variant character of Knight’s internationalisation generate difficulties. We agree it is vital to understand local variance and agent control. But when this is factored into the definitions, analytical precision is lost and a common understanding of terms becomes impossible . . . all of these elements also become subjected to the variant normative interpretations. It becomes difficult to use any of them (p. 15)

Further, “internationalization” has been so widely linked to globalization (e.g., Rizvi & Lingard, 2009) one might reasonably argue there is little discernable difference between the two concepts particularly in the commercialization and marketization (or neoliberal) of higher education discourses. Fairclough (2010, p. 455) maintains that when critiquing globalization (and by extention internationalization), one must make a distinction between “actual processes and tendencies” and “representations or discourses.” According to Fairclough (2010), one cannot “get away from the fact that globalization [and internationalization] is both a set of changes which are actually happening in the world (though what the set includes in highly controversial) and a word” (p. 455).²

While we see de Wit’s observations concerning the proliferation of terms ascribed to “internationalization” as valid and the questions he poses as important and relevant, we don’t dismiss the current interest in relabeling as tautological. Reference to Juliet’s famous line in Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet in our title is intentional. In that play, the heroine naively believes that she and Romeo can escape the powerful, material effects of public and family institutions simply by changing their names, or ways of labeling themselves. The tragedy is that of course, they cannot. Words or labels accrue their meaning and power by their position within “discourse,” which we understand to mean a complex set of dialogical relations. Like the words “Montague” and “Capulet,” the words “globalization” and “internationalization” are:

used in various senses within more complex discourses, which are partly characterised by distinctive vocabularies in which “globalisation” [and “internationalisation”] is related in particular ways to other “keywords” such as “modernisation,” “democracy,” “markets,” “free trade” . . . “cosmopolitanism” and so forth and these discourses are more than vocabularies—they have certain lexico-grammatical features . . . certain narratives, certain forms of argumentation, and so forth. (Fairclough 2010, p. 455)

With Fairclough (2010, p. 455), we argue that representations and discourses “contribute to creating and shaping actual processes, though in complex and contingent ways.” Turner (1974) identified the “multivocal” symbolic nature of labels such as “internationalization” and the meanings they acquire as they are employed across different contexts for different purposes. As Goodman (2007) cautioned in the context of a critique of the deployment of “internationalization” (kokusaika) in Japanese higher education: “As academics, we need to be very sensitive to the way actors use multivocal policy instruments such as the rhetoric of internationalization. We need to examine in what context who is using the rhetoric, how and for what purpose” (p. 86). Failure to do so, Goodman concludes, will only contribute to the further “mystification” of “internationalization” at the conceptual level. Moreover, as Cousins (2011) points out, the dominant discourse of internationalization is limited by largely uncontested assumptions about a West/non-West divide. This, she says has “congealed into a grand narrative that inhibits our explorations of global divisions” in a more complex nuanced manner (p. 585).

We interpret the recent proliferation of “labels” for international education as a sign—a promising sign—of deep unease among scholars of, and in this context. In the following, we now employ Strauss (1997) to argue the renaming phenomenon reveals more about those attributing the labels than that which they name. Then, we draw on the positioning theory to argue renaming “internationalization” can be equated to reflexive positioning in the context of uneven distributions of power across contested storylines. As such, current efforts to rename “internationalization” are not necessarily tautological; rather, they could be integral to a process of systematic change across the higher education sector.

Naming and Identity: Evaluation ⇒ Classification ⇒ Action

Internationalization as a Word: Evaluation

“Internationalization” is a word and is therefore symbolic. Being a word “internationalization” has no inherent meaning, agency, nor any qualities other than those ascribed to it across the multiple discourses in which the word is applied, appropriated, or deployed. Nor, is it something that can be “revived” (de Wit, 2011a). “Internationalization” is a “multifocal” construct with a context specific meaning. As such, “internationalization” is a label attributed to a series or “sets of activities” (Fairclough, 2010) that have been clustered together and classified through and by the label, its associated connotations, and the qualities located in those deploying the term. It is not something that can “come of age,” “lose its way,” experience a “midlife crisis,” or experience an “identity crisis” (Knight, 2011).

Strauss (1997, p. 33) contends that in the use of language “past, present, and future” are all evaluated in the course of speaking and doing. Regardless of how any culture’s vocabulary intersects with and structures temporal flow, past and future intrude on and influence “action in the present” (Strauss, 1997 p. 33). What is significant in this construction is the elusiveness of present experience. As Strauss observes, the present can never truly be evaluated because it is ephemeral. In other words, it is not until present action is past that it can then be evaluated. Thus, in any ongoing “sequence of action” the course of actions may only be altered by making evaluations of “immediate past actions” or predictions concerning the future. The future like the present is, however, unknowable and is the subject of speculation grounded in the relative certainty of an experienced past. Mestenhauser (2011) reflecting on 60 years involvement in international education described the future in the following terms:

I bring to international education the argument that the trends I have studied overwhelmingly support the idea that the future will not be just a linear extension of the present, which is perceived as an extension of the past. Instead I agree with those who expect the future to be discontinuous, drastic, uncertain, unexpected, and unprecedented. In short, not like anything we would normally expect (p. 46).

Given the “supercomplexity” (Barnett, 1999) of an increasingly global, interconnected, and interdependent world uncertainty is the defining reality. According to Barnett, the University is no longer simply a complex environment (in which actors face a surfeit of data); it’s now engaged in “supercomplexity,” where actors are faced with multiple frameworks of understanding, action, and self-identity. Thus, as Strauss points out, there exists an ongoing necessity for evaluation and reevaluation in the becoming of self in an uncertain and unknowable future revealed only in the past. Significantly, a recent statement by the International Association of Universities (IAU) begins with an acknowledgement that the “internationalization of higher education” is an “evolving concept,” and necessarily so, because it refers to “a dynamic process continuously shaped and reshaped” by the international and global context in which it operates. Hence the attention given to pondering the “future” of international education in the recent literature (see de Wit, 2011a) warrants comment. In the midst of such supercomplexity, Strauss (1997, p. 27) would suggest, the best one can do is “draw upon possibly analogous experiences” that may, or may not lead to “accurate conceptions.” Therefore, the naming of a thing(s) is and will remain a “continual problem,” never completed.

So then returning to the question, “what is in a name?” internationalization is construed as an issue of identity by Knight (2011) and this is reflected in the act of naming it. The question Strauss raises is what is denoted in the act of naming? According to Strauss (1997) a name reveals as much about both the person(s) attributing it and that which it labels. In this sense, a name/label is “like a container; poured into it are the conscious or unwitting evaluations of the namer” (p. 17). In responding to the question then the attributes of the person ascribing a name are revealed in the name. Slocum-Bradley (2009) stating what is obvious, but not always recognized, observes that:

[p]ersons are the only truly efficacious agents in the social realm (Harré, 2000). This is not a bias of psychology but an ontological fact. Neither “States,” nor institutions, nor groups of people (“collectives”) can actually say or do things . . . In the process of naming, describing, and/or interacting with these “characters,” the narrator constructs “identities” for them³ (p. 92).

Thus, as noted above, “internationalization” is inert. It has no inherent meaning or agency and cannot speak or act for itself unless personified and therefore, its qualities are constituted in the identities of those that evoke/ascribe the word. As evaluation and classification are key components in the act of naming the question then is, “what do the evaluations by the various namers reveal? Strauss notes a range of responses that may be educed in response to being invested with a name from indifference and or rejection, to “prideful acceptance.” What is significant, Strauss observes, is that “an extensive range of reactions can be evoked by one’ s imaginings of what one must look like to certain audiences if one bears the name they do” (p. 18). Strauss maintains that where names are adopted voluntarily there is an “indissoluble tie between name and self-image.” At issue is the manner in which the bearer of the former name perceived it signified them and imagines the new name representing them. Thus, a change of name represents a change of identity. In the context of de Wit’s first question—“why are new labels emerging?”—this suggests levels of dissatisfaction with what “internationalization” signifies in relation to the person or a group adopting the new name and how this name will project them. This does not suggest an identity in crisis, rather it signifies an act of agency, evaluation, and reclassification. This is now elaborated.

To Name is to Know: Classification

Drawing on the philosophers Dewey and Bently, Strauss (1997) contends that “to name is to know, and that the extent of knowing is dependent upon the extent of naming” (p. 20). By this they mean naming is a central act of cognition and that to name is to place a phenomena or object within potentially countless categories. Implicit in a name and in the act of naming is the notion of classifying, “marking” or “delimiting boundaries” through taxonomical association (which is also a sociocultural and situatedly mediated activity). Hence, the act of naming proceeds from a point of view and the “nature or essence of an object does not [therefore] reside mysteriously within the object itself but is dependent on how it is defined by the namer” (p. 22). So although any group will necessarily strive towards developing a common language, naming is always predicated on a particular point of view: “If you do not agree with your neighbor’s classification, this may only signify that you have a somewhat or wholly different basis for drawing symbolic circles around things” (Strauss, 1997, pp. 22-23).

The proliferation of “evaluations” and “classifications” of international education suggests that the advocates of the humanistic/altruistic/ethical/moral/intercultural, in other words the transformative, dimensions of international higher education have reservations concerning the effectiveness of the increasingly neoliberal and commercial direction of higher education (deWit, 2011b, Jones, 2011, Leask, 2009 as linked to the internationalization of the curriculum and internationalization at home discourses) to be a positive force. For example, “mainstreaming internationalization” is one such new, and as yet to be critiqued, label coined to signify a move for internationalization from the margins to the core of higher education (de Wit, 2011a). Thus, the intention is to effect a paradigmatic shift in the dominant neoliberal discourse and practices. In addition to “directing action” the act of classification also “arouses a set of expectations toward the object thus classified” (Strauss, 1997). Because one’s classifications simultaneously assume a “past” and “future” orientation (p. 25), they not only carry anticipations but also those values experienced when the object now classified was first experienced. Consequentially, as the range of experience with the object broadens the “more extensive become [the] judgements of its capacities and qualities” (Strauss, 1997, p. 25). In the context of the sets of activities and dispositions (Mestenhauser, 2011) labeled “internationalization,” experience with “it” varies significantly and this has also contributed to what might be seen as a welcome and necessary proliferation of terms. As Strauss (1997) observes, evaluation, classification, knowledge, and qualities that underpin naming of phenomena such as, “internationalization” are inseparable. Given that the experiences of internationalization have changed radically over time, and in different places—shaped by events such as the relatively recent demise of colonial rule in the majority world, the Bologna process in Europe, and the export of international education to offset a withdrawal in public funding in many countries—the specific historical and social-cultural milieu of the namer is significant; it will frame any “evaluation act.”

The Emperor’s New Clothes: Action

Returning once more to de Wit’s question, “why is it new names are emerging?” we conclude that it is not surprising that there is a proliferation of labels for the sets of activities and dispositions associated with “internationalization.” The point is, as we argue, this phenomenon should not be written off as a simple act of tautology. Rather, it may be more productive to think of it as the disruption of tautological language. According to Barthes (1957/1993, pp. 152-153), tautology is the essence of dominant discourses, or “mythologies.” As such, it is a “magical” or self-referential language, which can “only take refuge behind the argument of authority . . . ‘because that’s how it is,’ or even better: ‘just because that’s all.’” As in the story of The Emperor’s New Clothes, it becomes increasingly difficult to articulate any other truth. For Barthes, herein lies the problem: myth maintains its power by transforming historical processes into seemingly natural ones; meaning becomes somehow “frozen, purified, eternalised . . . so that one can say it’s just a fact” (1957/1993, p. 124). In the process, it neither denies nor confronts previous truths; instead, it “insinuate[s] itself into [language] and swell[s] there: it is robbery by colonisation” (Barthes, 1957/1993, pp. 129-132). To illustrate in relation to the dominant discourse of internationalization, at author 1’s university recent communiqués from the new Senior Leadership Group have introduced “deep internationalization” into the University’s internationalization discourse in its new strategic plan and documents outlining structural and curriculum changes to be implemented. Following Fairclough (2010), this might be understood as a strategic attempt to reposition internationalization within a new discourse, as an attempt to disrupt the established paradigm as they move to establish new power structures. Yet, there has, to date, been no “official” statement defining either “deep” in the construction of “internationalization,” or the composite “deep internationalization.” This is potentially problematic when “internationalization” like “globalization” is deployed as a buzz-word. As Knight (2011) observes, “internationalization has become a catch all phrase used to describe anything and everything remotely linked to the global, intercultural, or international dimensions of higher education.” What is interesting in the case of author 1’s particular university is the move to introduce the label “deep internationalization” into the university’s discourse. This might also be understood as a strategic and not uncommon attempt to shore up the university’s position in the marketplace (Fairclough, 2010). As Biesta (2011, pp. 37-38) points out in discussing the ubiquitous presence of the “global university,” the term does not “refer to a particular kind of university but instead highlights a particular modus operandi of universities—in that it operates in an entirely self-referential manner.” As Barthes might say of tautological language, the term is empty or “vacuous.”

According to Barthes (1957/1993), any effective disruption of dominant cultural constructs—such as the commodification of international education—must entail their continual interrogation and reformulation. Barthes urges us to counter the weightiness and apparent fixity of the established order by reading dominant narratives against their own dynamics—to use them as “departure points” for other narratives (p. 135). Thus, relabeling, in the context of international education can be seen as significant and creative act, if it is undertaken mindfully. Furthermore, such reassessment affords innovation, because it;

rests upon ambiguous, confused, not wholly defined situations. Out of ambiguity arises challenge and discovery of new values: “it is in the areas of ambiguity that transformations take place . . . without such areas transformation would be impossible” (Strauss 1997, p. 28).

Innovation may be a valuable outcome associated with perpetual evaluation, yet, as Strauss observes, “emergent evaluation is hardly a serene process” (Strauss, 1997, p. 28). To illustrate, Strauss proposes that if a shift or “stepping out of character” in an object presumed to be known occurred a cascade of reclassification, reevaluation, action, and identity in relation to the object in question would be triggered because the object is no longer what it was thought to be. Ultimately, as Brandenburg and de Wit (2011) suggest in relation to “internationalization,” the term may ultimately be abandoned.

Turning our attention to de Wit’s next questions, “what do they mean?” and “how are they used?,” we argue, following Harré and van Langenhove (1999) the recent proliferation of names and associated discussions linked to internationalization maybe understood as a series of reflexive positioning acts and storylines in conflict. This is now elaborated.

Taking the High Ground: Positions, Social Force, and Storylines

Positioning theory is grounded in discursive social constructionist ontology, according to which positions and positioning, speech/social acts, and storylines are the key units of analysis in the study of human interaction and meaning making (Slocum & van Langenhove, 2004). Harré and van Langenhove (1999) define “positioning” as a “discursive process whereby people are located in conversations as observably and subjectively coherent participants in jointly produced storylines” (p. 37). Positioning theory therefore, aims to reveal patterns of reasoning both implicit and explicit that are “realized in the ways people act toward each other” (Harré, Moghaddam, Pilkerton, Rothbart, & Sabat, 2009, p. 5).

People use discursive resources, which are regulated by “the local system of rights, duties and obligations, within which both public and private intentional acts are done” (Harré & van Langenhove, 1999, p. 1). Positioning thus refers to the “cluster of rights and duties to perform certain actions with a certain significance as acts, but which also may include prohibitions or denials of access to some of the local repertoire of meaningful acts” (Harré & Moghaddam, 2003, p. 5). Harré et al. (2009, p. 9) explains, “rights” and “duties,” refer to “presuppositions which people believe or are told or slip into and to which they are momentarily bound in what they say and do” begins. Therefore, as Slocum and van Langenhove (2004) observe, actors can be positioned through indexers such as, personal pronouns or direct reference to a particular entity or phenomenon (e.g., Australia, internationalization, globalization). For example, when referring to Australian institutions of higher education in the context of global higher education rankings, a tacit reference would be to other national higher education sectors such as in America, Europe, and Japan. The statement “Australian higher education meets international standards and qualifications” positions Australian higher education directly as internationally reputable; and, tacitly through inference that non-Australian institutions of higher education as being potentially less reputable.

According to Harré and van Langenhove (1999) most positioning acts constitute first ordering positioning which are generally tacit or unconscious in nature. These can include though are not limited to:

Deliberate self/other positioning—Locating self or other in terms of agency, point of view, or biological details as a move to gain advantage.

Explicit positioning—an overt and explicit act of positioning.

Forced positioning—positioning someone in the eyes of others against the will of the person so positioned (Harré & Moghaddam, 2003).

On the other hand, actors can engage in reflexive (second order) positioning and performative/accountive (third order) positioning, which challenge or revise a positioning act. Each of these forms of positioning can be identified in the act of naming. To illustrate, Marginson and Sawir’s (2011) critique of the positioning of international students in the Australian higher education sector highlights numerous examples of “forced” and “performative” positioning. They offer pertinent examples of forced positioning in their rendering of six international student’s (a term which is also problematic) stories based on interview data. Because these students are positioned as, “international,” “student,” “non-Australian,” and “Other” and so forth, they do not have full access to the “local repertoire of meaningful acts” (Harré & Moghaddam, 2003, p. 5). By highlighting how positioning someone as “Other” works to exclude or deny them the right to full membership within the host community, Marginson and Sawir’s critique functions as an act of reflexive positioning; that is, it questions, challenges and rejects the first order positioning in dominant storylines about these students.

These acts entail changes in the “storylines” of any phenomenon, along with changes in the positioning of actors and the social force of their acts. Within positioning theory, storylines are temporal, and (hence) are a teleological series of customary events, or “plots” that are familiar to a society. In other words, storylines implicitly or explicitly link past with the present and future (Slocum & van Langenhove, 2004, p. 238) in a similar manner to the evaluation act in naming (Strauss, 1997). Within positioning theory positioned actors, acts and storylines are seen as mutually determining. Internationalization storylines are multiple, contested and embedded in highly diverse contexts and milieu in which all actors are positioned with access to a repertory of action/acts that either afford or constrain the limits of their social force. Thus, at the heart of positioning is a set of power relationships and binaries and subsequent rights, duties, and obligations that are subscribed, assumed, or contested.

In the context of the renaming phenomena this is significant. Each act of naming either acquiesces or subverts the tacit positioning within a given storyline. To illustrate, Rizvi and Lingard (2009) and Marginson and Sawir (2011) in their critiques of globalization and internationalization highlight several storylines arising out of the shifting trends that have shaped higher education policy nationally and internationally. To illustrate, in the Australian context the Colombo plan developed in the 1950s was conceptualized in terms of foreign aid with the goal of international education to “increase intercultural knowledge” and enhance “international cooperation” (Rizvi & Lingard, 2009, pp. 168-169). In contrasting this with the more recent view of international education as largely a “matter of global trade” Rizvi and Lingard (2009, p. 169) and Marginson and Sawir (2011) “de-naturalize” (Barthes, 1957/1993) and subvert “the ritual incantation of the TINA (“there is no alternative”) creed,” to which Biesta (2011, p. 36, citing Bauman) refers in his critique of the “global university.” Like Brandenburg and de Wit (2011), they highlight the uneven distribution of power and access afforded actors in recent decades as the focus of international education shifted from “aid and development” to commercialization, competition, brand building, and reputation consolidation through league tables (Rizvi & Lingard, 2009).

Within the “marketization” storyline highlighted by Marginson and Sawir (2011) and Rizvi and Lingard (2009) the commodification of academics, students, curriculum, and experience has positioned these actors such that their access to the repertoire of meaningful acts is limited. To illustrate, Whitsed and Volet (in press) report on the experiences of adjunct English foreign English language teachers in the Japanese University context. Participants in Whitsed and Volet’s study largely perceived the dominant storyline to be a higher education system dictated by commercial rather than educational interests. In this storyline, as Guha (2008, p. 107) observes it is perfectly legitimate for the employing organization to use employees “to the optimum of greater production/distribution and profits when needed” and dismiss them when not. The reciprocal implication of this type of positioning is employees are likely to seek opportunities to exploit an organization for their own personal gain. Moreover, in order to negotiate the commodification storyline they will endeavor to reflexively reposition themselves as being not implicit in the marketization of higher education storyline, but as victims being exploited. Because access to the rights permitted educators as commodities are limited academic staff are disempowered (Whitsed & Volet, in press). Thus, an analysis employing positioning theory of the renaming phenomena and associated activities point to the need to apply greater scrutiny to “internationalization” across all it dimensions (horizontal and vertical) of who the actors are and how they are positioning and positioned within the organizational structures of global, national, and local higher education.

That scrutiny must include consideration of the position of speaker/author in relation to her/his (given or implied) interlocutors (Slocum & van Langenhove, 2004, p. 235). What is at issue is the social force these pronouncements have to effect action. The individual voices of academics may have little impact on the larger more dominant marketization and commercialization storyline for high education globally by virtue of their positionality in that discourse. Within this dominant storyline Jones, de Wit, and those like them, may be easily dismissed by university leaders as they are reciprocally positioned as obstructionists or naive idealists and dreamers. At the same time, indications are that the dominance of the neoliberal rationale for internationalization over the more cooperative, internationalist perspectives associated with academic values point to “a lack of long-term sustainability and the disruptive capacity of motivational disunities” within universities (Turner & Robson 2007, p. 80). It is encouraging then to see the International Association of Universities’ (2012) recent statement, “Affirming academic values in internationalization of higher education: A call to action.”

Conclusion

Here, we have argued that the recent proliferation of labels assigned to the sets of activities and dispositions labeled “internationalization” is not tautological, and that following Strauss (1997), naming is necessarily a perpetual act. “Internationalization” (like globalization), because it is a linguistic/symbolic construct is deployed in multiple and contested ways across a wide array of discourses from the macro/exo-systems level to the micro-level of individual actors. As such, it does not exist but rather “becomes.” This “becoming” occurs in and through “social practice and discourse” when labeled, thus reciprocally it reveals its qualities and those of the namer. How “internationalization” is deployed and the qualities it is imbued with are derived through an ongoing process of evaluation and classification that either confirms or contradicts the legitimacy of the established label (Strauss, 1997). Therefore, the act of naming signifies a significant meaning-making endeavor and is as such not to be dismissed lightly.

We agree with de Wit (2011 a) that there is an ongoing need for further discussion and action around the key questions arising out of internationalization as an activity. We do however, disagree with the notion that internationalization is something that can be “revived.” Furthermore, we contend that there exists the need for deeper theoretical explorations of the phenomena and activities subsumed under the umbrella of internationalization and how this positions actors within the broader higher education discourse. Moreover, as this discussion has shown, a “shared understanding of the concept of internationalisation” (de Wit, 2011a) is not attainable, at least in definitive terms. Given the focus on commercial impulses and market forces across the global higher education sector at the national and institutional level, locating a “central purpose” (de Wit, 2011a) is a complex undertaking, one which we have argued, is most productively approached as an ongoing debate.

Given the relative certainty that the future of higher education will be increasingly global and “supercomplex,” the proliferation of names or “broad-based labels” will continue. New labels will continue to evolve as old concepts of internationalization and globalization and situated realities intersect and diverge and new understandings, perspectives, and actions will arise. This does not mean there is a crisis of identity (Knight, 2011), rather it suggests there is a growing chorus of voices prepared to question the value and effectiveness of international education as it is in the present moment. Finally, we might answer de Wit’s fourth question—“Will these new labels advance the debate on the future of internationalisation?”—in the affirmative, though it may be that, as de Wit and Brandenburg (2011b) suggest, we eventually abandon the term “internationalization” altogether.

Footnotes

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Notes

Author Biographies

Craig Whitsed is a senior lecturer in the Centre for University Teaching and Learning (CUTL) at Murdoch University, Perth, Western Australia. His research interests include internationalisation of the curriculum, Japanese higher education internationalisation, and academic integrity. He is convenor of the International Education Association of Australia special interest group Internationalisation of the Curriculum.

Wendy Green is a lecturer in higher education at the Teaching and Educational Development Institute (TEDI) and the University of Queensland (UQ), Australia. She teaches and researches in the area of international, cross-cultural education. Her current interests include internationalising the curriculum, continuing professional learning (CPL) for academics, the experiences of international academic staff, and study abroad.

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