Transcending borders in higher education: Internationalisation policies in Sweden

Introduction

More than any other education sector, higher education (HE) reflects complexity and rapid change. Any student of higher education policies can quickly identify common trends such as the increasing influences of globalisation and interconnections on the sector, the changes brought about by systematic growth of student numbers, technological innovation, increasing diversification and commercialisation practices (Bjarnason, 2007; Dobbins and Kwiek, 2017). One of the consequences of these changes has been an increasing focus on internationalisation, the process of intentional integration of ‘an international, intercultural, or global dimension into the purpose, functions or delivery of postsecondary education’ (Knight, 2003: 2). Still, this process is far from straightforward or uniform, and different national and institutional contexts frame internationalisation differently, altering and adjusting its definition, rationale, policy content and practice to suit their particular circumstances (Forstorp and Mellström, 2013; Gornitzka and Langfeldt, 2008). In addition, a number of authors in the field caution against the unintended negative consequences of superficial implementation of internationalisation, and its increasingly instrumental, uncritical or deteriorating content (Frølich, 2008; Knight, 2013; Stein, 2019; Yemini and Sagie, 2016). Still, internationalisation is a popular theme at the level of transnational and national policies, lobby groups and commercial actors, as well as for individual universities and academics (European Commission et al., 2018; OECD, 2012), with each actor driven by different priorities and motivations for engaging with it.

Within Europe, internationalisation ideas and practices have been institutionalised through the twin frameworks of the European Higher Education Area (EHEA) launched as intergovernmental cooperation in 1999 (known as the ‘Bologna process’); and, the creation in 2000 of the European Research Area, a part of the Lisbon Strategy and formally introduced in 2009 in the Lisbon Treaty (article, 179 TFEU). These two frameworks have been driving institutional changes in higher education systems across the continent, that pertain to teaching, in the form of alignment around common academic structures, credit transfer systems, mutual recognition of university qualifications, and the design of quality assurance systems. They have also targeted research through the creation of mechanisms for a European governance of research, research roadmaps and infrastructures, among others (European Commission, 2012). The political impact on the participating countries, more visibly the Bologna process and EHEA, has been significant since it enabled countries within and beyond the EU to develop international embeddedness in their HE systems and to launch modernisation or quality reforms (Dakowska, 2019; Muller and Ravinet, 2008).

Such structures operate as legitimising references in national debates around higher education. They function to provide national policy actors with arguments for reforms via ‘externalisation to world situations’ (Ringarp and Waldow, 2016), as sources for ‘silent borrowing’ of ideas or practices (Waldow, 2009), adaptive policy learning (Lange and Alexiadou, 2010), selective ‘filtering’, interpretation and adoption of relevant aspects for reform (Phillips and Ochs, 2003), or even ‘voluntary co-option’ and active engagement (Brøgger, 2016: 86) of states in adopting large-scale reforms in order to respond to external pressures and measures. Internationalisation has embedded itself in HE systems across Europe as an independent discourse as well as part of such reference external contexts (Altbach, 2013), with distinct outcomes in terms of how universities with different histories and in different countries adopt its norms and values (Elken et al., 2016; Hill et al., 2019). National responses to and filtering of internationalisation still remain under-researched in the Swedish HE policy setting, where current and ongoing important policy developments and an internationalisation strategy proposal from 2018 have put these issues on the national policy agenda.

In this article we analyse internationalisation policies in Sweden that, similar to other European and Nordic countries, has been proactive in creating relevant policy frameworks for universities and invested resources to make it operational (Christensen et al., 2014; Dir, 2017: 19. Little is known about the evolution of internationalisation policies against other HE policies, and the role of ideas in sharpening its focus, rationales and justifications in the national context over time. The study contributes to contemporary discussions across the European HE policy space that is increasingly concerned with the multiple aspects and diverse national manifestations of, and responses to internationalisation (Dakowska, 2017; Kehm and Teichler, 2007) its definitions, institutionalisation, management, and its consequences (Bedenlier et al., 2017).

The paper is organised as follows. First, we describe the theoretical and analytical perspectives that frame our research, followed by a section on the methodology of the study. Next, we present our analysis in two main sections. We begin with a historical analysis of higher education reforms in, primarily, the post-2000 period that highlight the interconnectedness of internationalisation ideas with (a) the Bologna and EU frameworks, and (b) their interplay with national pre-existing policy priorities. The next part of the findings explores two national strategies with regards to the ideational dimensions of internationalisation as a set of policy ideas that provide major motivation for reforming the university sector, as well as ideas that function to legitimise other policy goals. We conclude with a discussion that draws out the significance of national reforms for understanding higher education policy directions across Europe.

Internationalisation and policy change: Ideas and national responses

Our study of internationalisation draws on theoretical tools from policy analysis, comparative education and the movement of ideas, in order to understand policy change in national contexts. Different logics for policy adoption and change may be at play at different times and depending on the context. Historically formed institutions of higher education do change, even if slowly, through ‘layering’, the selective adoption of new ideas (Mahoney and Thelen, 2010). In such evolving and gradual processes, revised policy directions are introduced on top of existing ones, and changes are adjusted to domestic and external political, economic and social environments (Streeck and Thelen, 2005). Layering as a concept denotes successive and incremental institutional change whereby new elements of policy are added without completely replacing established practices (van der Heijden and Kuhlmann, 2017). Each addition may be relatively small, but the cumulative effect as institutions evolve may result in a more fundamental change. Displacement is a further source of gradual change where ‘new models emerge and . . . call into question existing, previously taken-for-granted organizational forms and practices’ (Streeck and Thelen, 2005: 19) usually following some other mode of incremental change.

The article engages in particular with analytical perspectives that explore: (a) how policy ideas interact with existing national and institutional traditions of policy and practice; and (b) how national policies respond to international mobile ideas such as internationalisation.

• (a) The process of policy formation requires an examination of the role of ideas in the policy process and there are several approaches that consider ideas in policy research. These range from an exclusive focus on the substantive content of ideas, to the interactive processes involved in discourse – as ideas are generated, communicated and legitimated (Schmidt, 2008: 306). These ideas need to be examined from the perspective of context (where, when, how and why these ideas are promoted), agency (who promotes what, to whom), in addition to content (what is entailed) (Schmidt, 2010). Policy ideas are both dynamic and representative of particular normative positions that underpin what types of policy are possible and available at any particular time period. As such, exploring ideas can help us understand how and why policies translate to specific operational forms and instruments (Courtois and Veiga, 2020). Particular ideas around internationalisation are mobilised to shape interests within the university sector, but also to justify certain choices and decisions about the focus or direction of policies. In this respect, we suggest that policy ideas around HE internationalisation provide meaning for political action: First, in legitimating such action by attaching value to it – what Schmidt (2008) refers to as normative ideas, and second, through a cognitive set of ideas that ‘provide guidelines and maps for political action’ that justify particular policies and policy programmes (p. 306).

• (b) Within comparative education research there is an increasingly large body of work that explores the global movements of policy ideas and the institutional developments that take place at national level. Internationalisation comprises a set of ideas that we find in the global education policy field, whereby university education is conceptualised as part of a politics of knowledge promoted by international and transnational organisations (Buckner, 2019; Robson and Wihlborg, 2019). Actors such as the EU and EHEA encourage and disseminate policy adoption and transfer, while they also evaluate, measure and rank countries in terms of effective implementation of promoted policies (Steiner-Khamsi and Waldow, 2012). Higher education is a sector that in most countries in Europe enjoys considerable institutional autonomy to adopt and interpret particular ideas and policies, but at the same time it also operates within the parameters of national legislation and historical institutional patterns (Shattock, 2014).

In the crossing of boundaries, policies and policy ideas are recontextualised and adapted in ways that reflect nationally defined priorities and positions that, to a large extent, determine the extent and depth to which states decide to engage with them. In our case, the way that Sweden interacts with and interprets European cooperation frameworks and the Bologna process offers such an example of flexible adoption of internationalisation ideas and practices, in what Dakowska (2017) calls a relation of reciprocity between national and European institutions. Given the nature of this policy field, the expected benefits from such engagement include a combination of positive reputational and material outcomes for the higher education sector, as well as Sweden being seen as a reliable and progressive international partner (Gornitzka and Stensaker, 2004). Here we explore how political and administrative frameworks of higher education, with dense patterns of working norms underpinning the purposes and functions of the sector, mediate internationalisation policies by focusing attention, channelling resources and adjusting practices. In these processes, externalisation (Schriewer, 1990) to world situations may serve to legitimise particular policies in ways that connect these to the national policy-making arena and its particular history and policy agenda (cf. Ringarp and Waldow, 2016).

Methodological approach and material

Our methodology entails a critical examination of internationalisation policies and rationales and includes an analysis of Swedish policy documents on higher education and internationalisation in particular. We focus primarily on the period post-2005, which coincides with the more systematic and explicit commitments to international dimensions, even if we also look back to the early years of internationalisation (post-1970s). The analysis draws on public and official documents in the form of commission and agency reports, and Government Bills. In addition, and in particular for the first and more historical/contextual section of the forthcoming findings, we also draw on secondary sources and literature on issues of internationalisation and Swedish higher education. We analysed core strategy documents with a primary focus on identifying the definitions, rationales and justifications for internationalisation displayed in the different documents, along with an explicit analytical effort to connect these to the context of HE policy priorities that the government of the day was pursuing. This empirical material includes three core documents. First, the 2005 internationalisation strategy, presented in a government Bill with the title ‘New world, new higher education’ (Govt. Bill 2004/05:162). A little more than a decade later in 2017, the government appointed a commission to inquire on internationalisation and to propose a revised strategy. The commission produced its report in two parts: First, the ‘Internationalisation of Swedish Higher Education and Research: A Strategic Agenda’ (SOU 2018:3), followed by the final report ‘Increasing the Attractiveness of Sweden as a Knowledge Nation’ (SOU 2018:78). We should note that the formal decision on a revised strategy is still pending and no government Bill has been presented to the parliament yet.

We analysed these three strategy documents that represent core stages in national policy-making procedures. They follow a ‘tradition in Sweden of using templates which specify the aims and direction of politics to come’ (Forstorp and Mellström, 2018: 196) and incorporate different interests and perspectives in these processes. A Bill (the 2005 Strategy document) represents the government and needs to be endorsed by the parliament, whereas commission reports (the two 2018 documents) may include a wide range of actors from the sector and are not explicitly party political in their orientation, in contrast to government Bills. Still, a commission is instigated by the government via one of its ministries. The government issues the remit for the commission, specifies the focus of the inquiry, which in turn influences the work of the commission, even if direct government involvement at the inquiry stage is rather limited.

Next, our findings unfold in two sections. In the first, we focus on reforms and policy change through a historical-institutional approach that includes an analysis of the policy contexts and reforms relevant to internationalisation and the strategies. In the second part we explore more explicitly the ideational dimensions of internationalisation (Schmidt, 2008, 2010) in the context of the two national strategies in particular.

Reforms and policy change: Sweden’s path to internationalising HE

We can trace the historical roots of the two Swedish internationalisation strategies in the publication of two reports by the Higher Education Authority in the 1970s (UKÄ, 1973, 1974). These looked to issues and guidelines necessary for student mobility, but also gave a steering of HE towards developing an international understanding (Nilsson, 2019). The significance of this was connected to the need for Swedish economic expansion in global markets, in addition to motivations around solidarity with countries in the non-industrialised world (Börjesson, 2005; Kälvemark, 1997). This early policy work found its way into the 1977 Higher Education Act that included a general goal for HE to promote and facilitate understanding for other countries and international contexts. Between 1977 and the next major legislation of 1993, higher education shifted from a largely centralist, state-government sector to a more autonomous one with emphasis on accountability for institutions, and the funding system was linked to the numbers of students who graduated (Segerholm et al., 2019). The decentralisation changes of the early 1990s, part of a wider set of reforms across the Swedish public sector, and the accompanying quality drive and institutional autonomy for universities, were modelled on similar international reforms. At the same time, changes in student financing conditions, and the possibility for Erasmus participation since 1992–1993, made international mobility for students possible and widely accessible, with large numbers of Swedes choosing to study abroad, adding to an increasing drive for internationalisation.

The 1990s saw Sweden’s intense engagement with Europe through its entry to the European Union in 1995, fuelling Europeanisation and mobility as politically important issues (Jacobsson and Sundström, 2016) and further connecting Sweden to a European labour market. Preparation for entry to the European Community and the political objective of West European integration, further intensified debates around the need for universities to be more international in their outlook. In the 1992 Bill, Challenges to Science: A Strategy Towards the 21st Century, it was repeatedly emphasised that the small size of Sweden makes international cooperation an imperative. Cooperation with European and Nordic countries more particularly, was seen as a primary strategic area for development. Sweden’s accession to the EU and participation in education and research programmes signalled what Nilsson (2003: 23) called ‘a shift from internationalisation to Europeanisation’, but this was balanced by the traditional Swedish involvement in international politics of a humanitarian and cultural nature (Kälvemark, 1997; Nilsson, 2003).

In these reforms and processes, internationalisation has taken various forms, ranging from brief references, to providing the major motivation for reforming the university sector. The twin rationales for internationalisation to develop solidarity with developing nations as well as economic competitiveness, are discernible from the start, even if with different emphases over time. In the early internationalisation programmes followed by the Swedish Government (1970s–1980s) the emphasis was on partnerships with universities and countries in the global South, but economic growth and competitiveness concerns became increasingly ‘layered into’ the overall policy direction and justification (Kälvemark, 1997: 174).

Shifts and continuities: The ideational dimensions of internationalisation

In this second part of the findings we focus on the ideational dimensions of internationalisation, including how it is defined, the priorities and goals it is promoted to serve, and the rationales provided for its implementation. We identify the logics for change in internationalisation practices, and the continuities with past and existing policy rationales.

Concluding discussion

This article illustrates the dynamic interactions between the national, European and international contexts and policy ideas in the field of higher education, through the example of internationalisation policies. The relations between the domestic and external agendas and pressures are not easy to disentangle, and the particular national priorities at any period of time very much shape the selective adoption of international policies or ideas.

The significance of this temporal/historical analysis is clear in the case of the Swedish internationalisation policies that took different forms in the mid-2000s as compared to the latest 2018 ones. In 2005, major reforms were driven by priorities to decentralise the system, change student finances, widen access to universities and introduce new accountability regimes. At the same time, membership of the European Union, the push for increasing participation in HE, and harmonisation through comparability of university qualifications and the Bologna process, have provided further steering but also legitimation for the particular reform of the sector. Similarly, the 2018 Strategy was produced at the end of a decade of reforms that saw the introduction of research performance-based state funding for universities, intensified institutional autonomy, a renewed emphasis on quality assurance systems and the introduction of fees for non-EU students. In comparison, this latter strategy reflects a more assertive discursive positioning of the sector at the international scene. Older, pre-existing commitments to ‘the global’ as an arena for HE action, and international solidarity with countries of the global South continue to exist, as newer objectives that clearly prioritise the competitiveness of the university sector are layered into the national strategy.

Both the 2005 and 2018 strategies thus reflect pre-existing national goals and directions for reforming HE, while at the same time being attentive to international opportunities and environments in ways that lend legitimacy to external contexts (Schriewer, 1990). Internationalisation has been used to mobilise changes in the sector that were already part of the changing organisation and governance of HE. In addition, the Bologna process provided a useful set of ‘borrowable’ structural changes as well as a source for legitimacy of the impending reforms, and a set of cognitive ideas that mapped the necessary political actions to implement them (Schmidt, 2008). In the later strategy, internationalisation acts not merely as a map for changing higher education to be more internationally oriented, but also as a policy idea that can transform HE into a national political asset. The 2018 Strategy includes elements of earlier strategies, layered with new functions and gradual displacements of ideas for structuring and sequencing of HE programmes.

Taken together, there is a gradual shift from more or less emulating external European models, to a more ambitious objective for Sweden to carve its own internationalisation path. Internationalisation is thus an adaptable idea that reaffirms previous directions and at the same time aids to repurpose higher education to serve economic functions, while attempting to keep ‘alive’ the traditional Swedish concerns around social justice, solidarity and sustainability.