International Students as Sources of Income? Moving Beyond the Neoliberal Framing of Internationalization

Abstract

This paper focuses on international student mobility and the funding of higher education. We theorize that relying on international students for funding is stronger for institutions in developed English-speaking countries because they more often adopt marketization practices. Compared to Northern and Southern European countries, we find that they had the largest decrease in public funding and largest increase in private funding. The relative number of international students has also increased for English-speaking countries, but not for other country groupings. Furthermore, we found associations between public/private funding and international student enrollments, but these patterns were not uniform. These results show that a decrease in public funding and a reliance on international students as a source of income is not equally important everywhere. This opens new avenues for research on the marketization of higher education, including the role that differences between cultures and types of governments play in shaping international student mobility.