A RT I C L E

Global Migration and

Social Protection Rights

gsp

329

The Social and Economic Security of Cross-Border Students

in Australia

A N A D E U M E R T, S I M O N M A R G I N S O N , C H R I S N Y L A N D ,
G A B Y R A M I A A N D E R L E N AWAT I S AW I R
Monash University, Australia

a b s t r a c t A growing number of students cross national borders for

their studies. An expanding global market in higher education has been
created. Yet significant gaps exist in the governance of international
students rights. As well as being educational service beneficiaries,
cross-border students are migrants, workers, consumers and human
beings. A broader view of students, as individuals deserving of social
and economic security, is superior to that which treats them as social
protection subjects. Recognizing this multiple status, and utilizing
in-depth data from 200 interviews with international students in
Australia, the article finds that the existing social protection regime
falls significantly short of recognizing students rights. Problems are
located in relation to language acquisition, social integration, finances,
work and personal safety. The article argues that, as well as law and
policy, a student security regime should incorporate better university
practices and more integrated civil society networks and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), and intergovernmental
organization (IGO) coverage.
k e y wo r d s foreign students, global education markets, migration, social
protection, student security, temporary

Global Social Policy Copyright 2005 1468-0181 vol. 5(3): 329352; 057415
SAGE Publications (London, Thousand Oaks, ca and New Delhi)
DOI: 10.1177/1468018105057415

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Global Social Policy 5(3)

Introduction
Since the late 1980s the international higher education market has been
expanding vigorously, with many universities becoming highly dependent on
cross-border students for revenues. Between 1990 and 2001, the number of
cross-border students studying in Organization for Economic Co-operation
and Development (OECD) nations increased from 1.01m to 1.58m. At the
end of this period cross-border students comprised 5.3% of all OECD
tertiary enrolments (OECD, 2004a: 31416). Despite this growth, the social
governance of international education remains in a state of flux and existing
formal social protection instruments fall significantly short of providing
adequate coverage. Major gaps exist in the administration of cross-border
students rights, with a notable lack of coordination between the various host
country rights-enforcement agencies and among institutions at the global,
regional and national levels.
This lack of coordination results in the failure of social and economic
institutions to recognize the multiple vulnerabilities of international students,
constructing them mainly as consumers rather than individuals with a variety
of social and economic rights. Stemming from the significant tuition and
other fees students must pay for their education, those who cross borders are
indeed consumers, but their position is complicated by their status simultaneously as migrants and human beings, and often as workers given that many
need to supplement their incomes to support themselves.
Recognizing students multiple rights-bearer status, this article utilizes data
from 200 in-depth interviews with international students studying in
Australia, the worlds third largest exporter of cross-border education services
after the USA and the UK (Mazzarol et al., 2001; OECD, 2003). Though the
data provide information on a variety of issues, they draw particular attention
to problems relating to language acquisition and proficiency, social isolation
and loneliness, inadequate finances and incomes, labour market and workplace discrimination, and experiences in relation to personal safety. Given that
traditional understandings of the concept of social protection do not delve
into some of these dimensions of disadvantage, the article argues that students
are deserving of social and economic security rather than mere protection;
thus combining protection, which is formal, with less formal practices from
universities and the civil society sector. A student security regime includes not
merely the laws attached to welfare states and other protective programmes,
but also recognition of social and economic rights channelled through the
formal and ad hoc practices of host universities and colleges, and civil society
networks and non-governmental organizations (NGOs); and it begins to
contemplate more direct roles for intergovernmental organizations (IGOs)
such as the International Labour Organisation (ILO), the World Bank and the
World Trade Organization (WTO).
The first section of the article outlines the main indicators of growth in

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Deumert et al.: Global Migration and Social Protection Rights

international education as a market. The second section reviews the common

understanding of social protection at the global and national levels, noting the
need for a broader perspective utilizing social and economic security. The
third section outlines the articles methodology and provides a first analysis of
the main findings from the in-depth student interviews. The fourth and final
section discusses the main implications of the analysis for social protection
and education studies in the field of global social policy.

International Education and the Cross-Border Student

Market
Cross-border students are students who cross national borders to acquire an
education, by studying outside their own country or accessing distance
education programmes or branch campuses in their own nation provided by
institutions from other nations. The most common form of cross-border
education consists of students moving from emerging and developing nations
to the nations in the OECD group, which educate 94% of all cross-border
students. There is also significant student movement between OECD
nations, especially within Western Europe, and into the USA, which is the
primary global demand magnet (Marginson and McBurnie, 2004).
Border crossing for study constitutes a form of temporary migration, and
most nations of study provide student visas. Cross-border study often leads
into other forms of migration, including temporary migration for work, and
permanent residence (OECD, 2002a). The English-speaking nations, which
together attract 55% of cross-border students and 73% of those from Asia
(OECD, 2004a: 211), use preferential immigration policies to encourage
cross-border graduates to migrate.
Since the end of the 1980s the scale of the growth in the market has been
significant; as noted, by 2001 cross-border students comprised 5.3% of all
OECD tertiary enrolments. There was considerable variation by country,
however, the percentage of enrolment being 17.0% in Switzerland, 13.9% in
Australia, 10.9% in the UK, 3.5% in the USA, and just 0.1% in Korea
(OECD, 2004a: 31416). The growing demand for cross-border education is
fed by the enhanced opportunities and status advantages at home and abroad
that cross-border education creates (Marginson, forthcoming), especially in
mobile occupations such as business, information and communications
technologies (ICTs) and scientific research. It is enhanced also by the global
utility of the English language skills acquired by living and studying in
English-speaking nations, and by desires for migration. Reputable crossborder education confers some advantages whether local tertiary provision is
adequate or not, but cross-border study has also been encouraged by inadequacies in the quantity and quality of tertiary education where the growth of
the middle classes in expanding economies has outpaced educational

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t a b l e 1 Principal exporters and importers of tertiary education, 2001
Cross-border students

Cross-border students

OECD*
Proportion of all Nations importing
export nations Number
students (%)
from OECD* Number
USA
UK
Germany
France
Australia
Japan
Canada
Spain
Belgium
Austria

475,169
225,722
199,132
147,402
110,789
63,637
40,667
39,944
38,150
31,682

3.5
10.9
9.6
7.3
13.9
1.6
4.6
2.2
10.6
12.0

China
Korea
India
Greece
Japan
Germany
France
Turkey
Morocco
Italy

124,000
70,523
61,179
55,074
55,041
54,489
47,587
44,204
43,063
41,485

Proportion of all
students (%)
1.0
2.3
0.7
11.5
1.4
2.6
2.3
2.8
n/a
2.3

Note: * 93.5% of all tertiary education exports were from OECD nations.
Source: OECD, 2004b: 210, 314.

provision, notably in China, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam

(Marginson and McBurnie, 2004).
The main importer and exporter nations are summarized in Table 1. Crossborder education is largely self-financed (OECD, 2004a), and on the demand
side is readily understood as a global market where students and their families
choose between provider nations and institutions. On the supply side,
arrangements vary, from free tuition for cross-border students in certain
European universities, for example in Germany, to the commercial market in
much of the English-speaking world and in English-language programmes in
Europe, Malaysia and Singapore.
Cross-border education in Europe often takes the form of short-term
student exchange, with foreign study frequently included in degrees. In the
USA, which caters for almost one third of cross-border students worldwide,
arrangements vary. Whereas 69.7% of cross-border students are financed by
self and family, 23.4% are largely supported by the American college or
university; including 40.4% of graduate students (Institute for International
Education [IIE], 2004), who are crucial to research support and also provide
teaching. Cross-border education is otherwise marginal to doctoral
universities, where it is treated as a branch of foreign aid and cultural
exchange, but can be a vital revenue source in two-year and four-year institutions where it is provided commercially. In the UK, Australia and New
Zealand, cross-border students pay full-price tuition fees and cross-border
education is an expansionary commercial business, a principal source of
institutional revenues and a growing part of national exports. Commercial
foreign education is currently growing more rapidly than subsidized places.

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Several factors affect student choice of destination, including price and

living costs, travel distance, student security, language, degree quality,
graduate opportunities and migration potential. Research on student choice
suggests that apart from the world market in elite universities such as
Harvard, Stanford and Oxford (Marginson, forthcoming), national brand
carries more weight than institutional brand. Universities in the USA and
UK enjoy the most prestige, and those nations also provide favourable career
opportunities. These markets are therefore the most preferred destinations,
especially the USA (Mazzarol et al., 2001), though the US dollar and sterling
appreciated in the 1990s, forcing many students elsewhere. Australia is placed
third, after these two (Mazzarol et al., 2001; OECD, 2003), having benefited
from the currency movements. As discussed further on in the article, national
choice, and to some extent institution choice, is also affected by students
sense of their overall security in the host country and in the sub-national
region in which they reside. It is to the relationship between security and
social protection that the analysis now turns.

Student Rights, Security and Social Protection: Institutions and

Interpretation
Cross-border students are a significant population, not only commercially but
also as social protection subjects. Accordingly, there is an imperative for
scholarly writing on student rights to be trans-disciplinary. Yet research on
cross-border students has been driven narrowly by existing policy and
business agendas, and for the most part it shares their limitations. A comprehensive bibliography of Australian research and scholarship on international
education (Harman, 2003) shows that investigations of student rights are
largely confined to discrete aspects of student welfare and pastoral care.
Where the international business literature focuses on cross-border education
it is concerned with marketing strategies and the economic factors determining
student choice, often exploring the strategies which nation states, regional
governments and universities utilize to expand market share, and the potential
of global regulatory instrumentalities to become involved through inclusion
in trade agreements (e.g. Mazzarol and Soutar, 2002; Mazzarol et al., 2001).
There is an active discussion about the WTO/General Agreement on Trade
in Services (GATS) negotiations on trade liberalization and the consequences
for national educational provision (e.g. OECD, 2004a; Ziguras and McBurnie,
2004). But cross-border trade negotiations and the supporting policy discussion do not encompass the needs of students, and in all neither the business
studies nor educational literatures have framed student rights holistically or
mapped the global regulatory environment as it affects education.
A significant role for traditional social policy and global social policy
analysis is called for. Yet cross-border students rights are not featured

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prominently in either of these domains. Work on the national dimension is

particularly deficient when it is considered that, in their home nations
students normally enjoy the rights attached to social citizenship as conceived
by Marshall (1950). The detail of these rights may be contested, for example
in relation to welfare entitlements, but the framework of citizen rights is still
largely taken for granted. When people move from the nation of citizenship
to nations where they enjoy few social citizenship rights, however, migrants
permanent or temporary are in jeopardy. (Refugees lack rights in the nation
of origin, but share with other migrants a less than citizen status in the nation
of destination.) Non-citizens typically enjoy less access to government
services, may be restricted as economic agents for example in opening bank
accounts, securing loans or owning property and they may have less
opportunity for redress in relation to maltreatment and injury. Temporary
migrants typically form lower substrata of the workforce, they are paid less
than citizens and are more likely to be subject to discriminatory or exploitative
work practices.
Global institutions also leave gaps. As discussed, in trade instruments
student rights are absent. The ILO and the International Social Security
Association (ISSA) include migration within their concerns in relation to
labour rights and social security coverage respectively, and the United
Nations (UN) has the International Convention on the Protection of the
Rights of Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families (ILO, 2004;
Paparella, 2004). However, these exclude students from their conception of
migrants. Though the OECDs research agenda encompasses cross-border
students this is limited to questions of labour mobility, national capacitybuilding, brain drain and brain circulation (e.g. OECD, 2002a,b).
Global social policy scholarship has yet to meet the challenge presented by
this omission. The field of social policy still responds mainly to the operation
of national institutions and national phenomena; stemming as inherently
these do from the nation-state basis of welfare regimes (Mishra, 1995; Ramia,
2003: 815). This is despite the now well-established premise that the supranational and global institutions of social governance are evermore important
in driving social policy analysis (Deacon et al., 1997; Yeates, 2001). It is also
partly to be expected given that social policys heritage lies in a focus on
recognition of and interplay between formal social protection institutions.
This dates back to the earliest works constituting the roots of the social policy
field (Polanyi, 1944; Webb and Webb, 1911) and those works that became key
texts after the institutionalization of the welfare state in the 1950s (Titmuss,
1958, 1974).
The dearth of writing on cross-border students in the global social policy
literature also stems from a general shortage of systematic analysis of the
integration between formal welfare institutions and less formal ones. The
latter encompass the complex of global, supranational and national civil
society networks and NGOs (e.g. Anheier et al., 2005). As demonstrated in

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the remainder of the article, theorization of this lacuna may provide many of
the keys to understanding international students perceptions of their security
and protection. Such understanding may feed into more streamlined
administration, policy and governance. This latter endeavour is far from
simple, however, given that cross-border students are migrants, which as this
volume highlights is a group too rarely the subject of formal social protection
mechanisms, let alone informal ones. It is to a discussion of the mix between
formal and informal in the regulation of international students experiences
that the article turns, with a focus on the Australian context.

The Australian Study

T H E E D U C AT I O N E X P O RT M A R K E T I N A U S T R A L I A

According to Australian government data, between 1990 and 2003 the number
of cross-border students enrolled in Australian higher education institutions,
nearly all in doctoral universities, jumped from 24,998 to 210,397. (This constituted more than 10% of the global market.)1 In total 154,578 were on-shore
in Australia and 55,819 accessed branch campuses of Australian universities in
importing nations or distance education programmes. Nearly all were enrolled
at Bachelor or Masters levels with just 3.7% in research degrees, considerably
less than in the USA and UK. Cross-border students constituted 22.6% of all
students in Australian higher education in 2003.2 More than one third (14) of
Australian universities enrolled over 6000 cross-border students (Department
of Education, Science and Training [DEST], 2004). One consequence is that
Australian higher education is now highly dependant on cross-border student
fees, which provided 14.4% of revenues in 2003 (DEST, 2004). In some institutions, there is a much higher level of exposure.
The foreign education market in Australia is highly commercialized, with
less than 2% of cross-border students receiving official scholarships (DEST,
2004). Universities themselves determine tuition charges and cross-border
student numbers, though government immigration policy controls the
student visas issued to each importing nation. The growth of the market is
driven partly by reductions in federal government funding per student
(Marginson and Considine, 2000), which declined by 30% between 1995 and
2000, the largest such decline in the OECD. (There was a 17% decline in the
UK; see OECD, 2004a: 255.) Revenues from cross-border students have
come to function as a partial substitute for taxpayer funding of teaching and
research. However, cross-border students also generate additional costs in
marketing, recruitment, student servicing and other areas, and not all
universities generate a surplus. Nevertheless, income from cross-border
students has moved from being marginal to government funding, to a
substitute and an essential component of the core costs of Australian
universities.

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METHODOLOGY AND COVERAGE

The problems faced by international students were investigated through 202

intensive semi-structured interviews at nine Australian institutions: the
Universities of Ballarat, Melbourne, New South Wales, Sydney, and Central
Queensland, Deakin, Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (RMIT),
Swinburne and Victoria Universities.
In terms of quantitative scope the study is somewhat smaller than the recent
study of experiences of cross-border students in New Zealand (Ward and
Masgoret, 2004), which included 535 cross-border students at tertiary
institutions. However, whereas the New Zealand study used a written
questionnaire to elicit yes-no data from students, the study reported here is
firmly grounded in a qualitative research paradigm and data was obtained
through face-to-face, in-depth interviews. These gave participants an opportunity to expand and elaborate on topics and problems that were important to
their student experience. The interview programme commenced in August
2003 and was completed in early 2005.
Semi-structured interviews were of 3060 minutes duration and conducted
with cross-border students in at least their second semester of study. In most
institutions interviews were arranged by staff in charge of international
students. The staff contacted students and organized the time and venue for
the interview. At one of the institutions all international students were
contacted by email and students who were interested in participating contacted the interview coordinator. In addition, snowball sampling was used
once initial contacts had been established. The interviewer was a former
international student herself, which helped to create trust and empathy within
the interview situation, and to elicit information on sensitive topics.
The sample broadly resembles the demography of the total cross-border
student population in Australia, except that older and postgraduate students
were somewhat over-represented: 53% of interviewees were older than 25
years. The sample was balanced with respect to gender: 51% were female and
49% male (compared to 48% female, 52% male among all cross-border
students; DEST, 2004). The interviewees included 74 (37%) at Bachelor
level, 82 (41%) at Masters level and 46 (23%) in PhD programmes, compared
to 57% at Bachelor level, 29% at Masters level and 3% in doctoral programmes in the total population of cross-border students. In terms of fields of
study, the largest group was from Business, Management, Administration and
Economics (henceforth Business) with 67 (33%), followed by Society and
Culture (12%) and IT (11%). This compared to 45% Business, 8% Society
and Culture and 15% IT among all cross-border students (DEST, 2004). Like
Arts, Science and Education students were also somewhat over-represented in
the interview group. Engineering and Health students were represented in
proportions similar to those in the overall cross-border student population.
The 202 students came from 36 different nations with 86% from East,
South East or South Asia, a meta-region that constituted 85% of the overall

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t a b l e 2 Nation of origin of cross-border students interviewed
Nation of origin

Number
interviewed

Indonesia
49
China
28
India
21
Other South Asia
19
(Sri Lanka, Bangladesh,
Pakistan, Nepal)
Malaysia
18
Singapore
12
Other East Asia
9
Middle East/
8
North Africa
Other Africa
7
Europe
8
Other South East Asia
6
and Pacific
Laos, Cambodia &
6
Vietnam
Canada, USA
3
Hong Kong
5
Latin America
3
Total
202

Percentage of
total interviewees

Percentage of cross-border
students (2003)

24.3
13.9
10.4
9.4

5.6
12.8
5.3
4.5

8.9
5.9
4.5
4.0

13.0
14.2
5.8
2.1

3.5
4.0
3.0

2.7
5.3
5.0

3.0

1.7

1.5
2.5
1.5
100.0

6.9
13.9
1.0
100.0

cross-border student population in 2003. Compared to the total cross-border

student population in Australia, Indonesia, India, Sri Lanka and Pakistan were
over-represented and Hong Kong, Singapore, Malaysia and the USA underrepresented in the sample (Table 2).
HEARING THE STUDENT VOICE: RESEARCH FINDINGS

Interviewees were asked a wide range of questions covering the social and
economic experience of crossing borders for their studies. More specifically,
responses provided insights into their knowledge of Australia before their
arrival, their living and financial arrangements in Australia, problems in
relation to academic English, their access to support networks, work arrangements, loneliness and isolation, instances of discrimination and personal
safety. In the following overview of salient aspects of the data we provide a
summary discussion of selected findings concerning the following themes:
language, loneliness/isolation, work and money issues, discrimination and
personal safety. (The data set is rich, particularly in relation to individual
stories, and these issues and other aspects will be expanded upon in subsequent articles.) The focus will be on the qualitative nature of the data and
the students voices, with no attempt to be representative of the entire crossborder student population.

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Language Issues: I Think it is my Biggest Problem Here

That limited proficiency in the language of instruction (and of the wider
community) can create problems for students has long been recognized and a
vast industry has emerged to address this issue, ranging from testing to
bridging courses and foundation courses, support services and language
centres. However, despite such wide-ranging efforts cross-border students
experience on-going problems at Australian universities because of inadequate or inappropriate oral, reading and writing communication skills, and
researchers have argued that considerably more and better assistance is
necessary to address these problems (Pearson and Beasley, 1996).
In the interviews students were asked Does English create difficulties
for you in your academic work? One third of the student sample replied yes
(n = 60). Not surprisingly, there were major variations by national origin.
Only a few students from South Asia, where English is well established in the
education system and often serves as a lingua franca, experienced problems.
However, 19 of the 28 students from China reported serious language problems; and there were also higher than average response rates among students
from other East Asian and South East Asian nations including Hong Kong,
Taiwan, Japan and Thailand. Interestingly spoken language communication
was more difficult for many students than written communication, which
generally allows for more planning and preparation. This is exemplified in
comments from a Taiwanese student:
I dont know about the other students but for me I always think in Chinese first, in
Mandarin, and then translate it into English. There is a delay in time . . . I dont
know, that is very difficult for us to write essays in English, because you can find a
lot of resources and you can refer to the resources and then you can write in the
academic format. I think my difficulty is just oral communication, daily language.
(Female student, 29, Masters, Sydney, from Taiwan)

Among the resources available to students for writing are language and
learning services at various Australian institutions as well as tutors and
graduate supervisors, who often provide extensive editorial assistance to
international students. However, while support from supervisors was highly
valued, language and learning services were often seen as providing only
insufficient assistance given the extensive and complex language needs of
Australias diverse cross-border student population (see also Lee and Salamon,
2004). (I = Interviewer, S = Student, female, 29, Masters, Sydney, from
China).
I: What about in writing . . . Do you need someone to assist you in your use of
English in your written work?
S: Yes, I do, but . . . SUPRA [Sydney University Postgraduate Association] . . . they
offer somewhere to . . . they have some language experts, they can do proofreading
for international students. I know the service, but I didnt use it because it charges

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some money. We should pay, depends who, how much . . . some PhD they charge
lower price, some they charge higher price. No, its not SUPRA, its some other
organizations. They like students association but only for post-graduate students.
I: Do they have Language and Learning Services?
S: Yes, they have. I go to there . . . yes, its free. But they ask general knowledge,
not really help in details like SUPRA offers, but this service you have to pay
something.

Language is not only a serious issue within the academic institution that the
student attends, but also in everyday encounters with Australian society. Lack
of linguistic fluency in English makes it difficult for students to establish
friendship networks with domestic students and contributes to the formation
of ethnically exclusive networks among the cross-border student population.
Limited language proficiency can also limit access to those social protection
services that are, in principle, available to cross-border students, but that are
provided exclusively through the medium of English. The quoted student
from China, for example, arrived in Australia in 2001 and struggled initially
to obtain medical attention, not for lack of availability of medical services or
helpfulness from the institution, but as she commented: for language
problem, i.e. she simply could not follow verbal instructions of where to go
and how to obtain help.
Loneliness and Isolation: Ill Cry and Cry on the Phone
One hundred and twenty-one (or 60% of) students expressed feelings of
loneliness and isolation. The reflections of a 22-year-old Zimbabwean
Masters student (provincial city) were emblematic.
I:

Have you experienced periods of loneliness or isolation while in Australia?

S:
Yes, yes, oh, especially right at the beginning when I first got here. I didnt
have anyone to talk to, that was the thing. Initially I came all by myself, so exactly
who to approach, who to talk to, I had no clue. I used to be on the phone everyday
with my Dad I wanna go home. Its like every single day, Ill cry and cry on the
phone . . . there was a lot of loneliness.

Older students, students from smaller national groupings and students in

regional cities in particular shared their experiences of loneliness and/or
isolation. Among the larger national groupings, students from Indonesia frequently gave strong reactions to questions. Isolation was felt in institutional
situations, as well as in students personal lives. In addition, the experience of
being a temporary migrant set cross-border students apart form the local
student cohort and created severe feelings of stress and alienation.
I:

Have you experienced periods of loneliness or isolation?

S:

Yes. Not in often at university, but within my university life, especially when

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I have to deal with Immigration. International Students [Office] or the School of
Graduate Studies always refer you back to the Immigration office, and when you
have to deal with Immigration office yourself, you feel like you are just a piece of
paper. (Female, 29, PhD, Melbourne, from Indonesia)

Many students testified to the importance of bonding networks: family,

friends, and other affinity groups. Friendships with cross-border students
from cultures other than their own were often important; though a number
referred to an apparent segmentation of the cross-border student population,
with a barrier between Asians on one hand and non-Asian students on the
other.
I would say in fact that most of my friends do come from other countries. I think
you generally find that people in Sydney . . . most of the people who go to
university here are already fairly entrenched in their social circles and circles of
friends; and its generally people that are, say, feeling disenchanted or trapped, that
are seeking out new friends from other places. So most of my friends here probably
are from different countries. A wide array but mostly European countries, South
American countries or North American . . . I do have a few friends from, say, South
East Asia, but most of them are people that I know say through my scholarship
program, so thats how we have been introduced to each other. I would say that
when Ive been in classes, even with the high mix of foreign students, there doesnt
seem to be any mixing between say I mean basically you see almost two divisions,
where you see students from Asia and then students from North America and
Europe. I dont feel like there is very much mixing, especially among people that
you meet in academic settings. (Male, 24, Masters, Sydney, from USA)

In addition, there were few friendships with locals. Some of the students
expressed strong disappointment about this, as noted in previous studies (e.g.
Smart et al., 2000).
Work and Money Issues: One of the Reasons may be Cultural
When asked, Are you experiencing or have you ever experienced financial
difficulties? while studying in Australia, 70 (35%) answered in the
affirmative. Such difficulties increased with age and the probability that
students were self-supporting. Of the 21 students with children, 14 (67%)
acknowledged overall financial difficulties and others added references to
financial problems of a specific nature. Financial problems affected 13 of the
25 PhD students, who were generally older and likely to be dependent on
scholarships and/or their own earnings. Issues of money were more severe for
students in provincial cities, where jobs were hard to find.
Finding a job here especially in Ballarat . . . Im finding it a bit difficult. I dont
know, maybe the reason may be that there are not enough jobs. One of the reasons
may be cultural problems. (Female, 34, PhD, regional city, from Sri Lanka)

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Deumert et al.: Global Migration and Social Protection Rights

When asked how they had dealt or would deal with a financial crisis, some
talked about asking their parents for help, and a few referred to friends, or the
university. But more commonly students said they would tough it out
without help.
I count every cent I have and spend and make my budget five times, six times,
because Im afraid that I would run out of money and not have enough to pay my
bills . . . I try to live within my means to pay my bills as they come and not incur
debt that I cannot afford to pay. [If I was in financial difficulties] I wouldnt speak
to anyone. I would just handle it myself because I think it is my responsibility to do
that. I make my budget and live by my budget. (Female, 33, Masters, Melbourne,
from Bangladesh)

When asked, Are you working or have you worked while in Australia?, 129
(64% of) interviewees said yes. They were also asked, Have you ever
experienced problems at work, such as abuse or exploitation?, to which 27
(21% of those who had worked) said yes. These problems at work included
such factors as exploitative rates of pay, excessive hours or other unreasonable
demands, difficulties in performing the expected functions without proper
training, and/or instances of sexual or other forms of harassment. In the
sample problems at work were more common among female (17) than among
male students (10).
Discrimination: It was not Happening to Anyone Else
Students were asked if they had experienced discrimination or bad treatment
while in Australia. The preamble to the question tied bad treatment to
discrimination and racism. A majority, 101 (50%) said yes. Work, and
experiences in trying to obtain accommodation in the private rental market,
were the two main sites of discrimination. Less discrimination was experienced on campus. A typical example of work discrimination was the problems
of a Sikh student from India:
I have no job now. I did work part-time before, but that was because my friend had
already created the job . . . otherwise, you know, people are not very willing to give
me a job because of my appearance. I cant do most of the jobs, I cant be an
accountant, they dont want me there, they dont want me to be anywhere where
Im visible. And as for some other jobs, Im not too comfortable doing them. (Male,
30, Masters, Sydney, from India)

Accommodation issues also at times appeared to involve discrimination

based on appearance or perceived cultural background.
When I was looking for a house I felt at the time we were treated differently
compared with other people from other countries. We applied for many houses, but
there was always somebody else that had taken them. All my friends from other
countries had gone out from [the student accommodation] at the time; but only us

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from Indonesia still stayed there, because we found it very, very difficult to find a
house. Sometimes we thought that there was discrimination, especially for people
from Indonesia. [However] in the campus, I never found any discrimination . . .
(Male, 31, Masters, Melbourne, from Indonesia)

Some discrimination-related problems take the form of institutionalized

disadvantage as a consequence of students temporary residence status. The
absence of most citizenship rights for cross-border students can affect not
only day-to-day living for example, difficulties in opening a bank account or
securing subsidized medicine or childrens education but students career
opportunities and academic development as well.
I dont know if you can consider it discrimination as such, or bad treatment either.
But when you apply for things like internships or something, I found it is a
problem. Im doing my Masters in Banking and Finance. After my studies I intend
to go back to my country, when the visa expires. But when I try to get an internship,
which adds a lot to your degree real hands on experience in banking and finance
they simply say that it is not open for people who have no permanent residence.
I dont want to apply for PR, because I intend to go back to my own country, but
this means Im not getting with my degree what other people are getting, either
when they get back at home, or in the States or Canada. I have no opportunities at
all to do an internship. All the places that I applied to, said they are looking for
people with PR or citizenship. (Female, 22, Masters, Sydney, from India)

Women students were somewhat more likely to report experiences of

discrimination than men (57% of female students vs. 43% of male students;
the difference between the two groups is statistically significant, p = 0.05). In
addition, a high proportion over the entire sample of students living in
provincial cities outside Melbourne and Sydney reported experiences of
discrimination.
Safety and Personal Security: Even though I give them Everything, they Start
Hitting Me
Students were asked if they felt safe and secure in Australia 19 (9%) said no
outright and three (2%) a qualified yes. The nos were concentrated in
Sydney, where 27% answered no. Only 3% of Melbourne-based students
did so. The three who qualified their yes responses were from Melbourne or
Ballarat. Of those in Sydney who did not feel safe and secure, all were either
female Muslim students, males from India, or males and females from East
Asia.
I got bashed twice here. I got robbed twice, it was really a horrible experience. I was
walking home after work, eight guys were there. They saw me and started hitting
me all over my head. Everything . . . They took everything, my wallet, they even
took my shirts, I had two shirts in my bag, they took them as well. My digicam, my
wallet, my mobile phone, my watch . . . everything [. . .] so I called the police and

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they took me to hospital. They put me there for the whole night, just to make sure
I didnt have any head injury . . . Actually the police took my bag. And I called them
for the fingerprinting and DNA testing and they havent been sent to me. I called
them three times and they havent even bothered to call me back. I didnt mention
anything here [at university], there was no need. They cant do anything. And the
police are not cooperating so what can you expect from [the university]? I went
through the scans, the CT scans, x-rays, everything is fine. For 15 days I had a really
bad headache, there was so much pain afterwards. (Male, 24, Masters, Sydney, from
India)

Women studying in provincial cities face particular difficulties, more so if

they are Muslim. The response from a Muslim student from Brunei illustrates
that cultural differences, discrimination and feelings and experiences of loss of
personal security often go hand in hand.
S: I wear my headscarf back in Brunei, but now . . . when I first came here last year,
I stayed at this bed and breakfast. I walked with my headscarf to school, and
everybody was staring at me. I wore that headscarf for three days, and then I started
telling myself that its not safe. I didnt feel safe with people staring at me. I decided
not to wear it. And then when I came back here this year, I decided I want to wear
my headscarf again, until . . . well, we were in the class, and somebody threw some
stones, to the window . . . It happened again three more times . . . So I told my
teacher that I didnt feel safe. Is it because Im wearing my scarf? And my teacher
said yes. Well actually, the first time when they threw the stones, my teacher
realized that was happening, and he was trying to catch those kids, but they ran off.
I: Its not the students?
S: Yes, its some of the students there. The teacher even asked the security to make
[special arrangements] because we have a night class until 7 oclock.

Commercially, questions of student security can affect market choices and

are thus of interest to the Australian tertiary sector. A logistic regression
analysis of choice-making by Chinese students (Mazzarol et al., 2001) demonstrated that a safe environment was the most significant predictor (p < 0.001)
of intentions to choose Australia over competitor nations. Similarly, focus
groups in Indonesia and Taiwan found that many parents sent their children
to Australia not the USA because Australia was deemed safer (Mazzarol and
Soutar, 2002).
Overall, there exist differences between the experiences of the largest
national groupings in the sample. Language problems and work place problems were particularly common among Chinese students, while Malaysian
students reported above average experiences of financial difficulties, loneliness and discrimination. Lack of safety was a concern, in particular for
Indian and Chinese students.

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International and Global Implications and Significance

THE AUSTRALIAN REGIME

Feedback provided in our in-depth interviews leaves little doubt that the lives
of cross-border students in Australia are strongly affected by a wide range of
social and economic security problems. There are two issues which dominate
the data, however, affecting students lives on a daily basis: finances, and the
necessity of English as lingua franca. More students than expected reported
discrimination, and there were less data concerning problems at work and in
the labour market than might be expected.3
While our sample cannot be representative in the technical sense, the data
are significant in a qualitative sense: not merely for Australia, but elsewhere
as well, given that Australia is one of the worlds top education exporter
economies. It is apparent that security coverage is uneven by institution,
region and category of student. Security is also heavily dependent on uneven
informal networks, and problems originating within universities have generated significant lacunae. This is largely because universities and governments
at both the State and Federal levels have adopted a commercial approach to
delivery of foreign education based on expanding market share, full cost
recovery and maximum surplus (Marginson, 2003). Universities are
positioned as quasi-independent firms with the government providing a rights
framework that is minimal in character, being geared towards citizens rather
than cross-border students, who hold only temporary visas. The policy focus
is almost exclusively on cross-border students as consumers, with little
attention given to their social rights.
The Australian approach contrasts with the regulatory framework provided
in another exporting nation, New Zealand. The New Zealand code of
practice for the pastoral care of cross-border students (New Zealand Ministry
of Education, 2004) covers the educational and linguistic preparation of
students; cultural sensitivity in recruitment; assistance to students facing
difficulties in adapting to the new cultural environment; supervision of
temporary student accommodation; advice in relation to accommodation,
travel, health and welfare; information and advice on addressing harassment
and discrimination; the monitoring of student attendance and course
progress, and mandatory communication with the families of students at risk.
All university staff and agents, including offshore agents, are subject to the
code, which also specifies staff training. New Zealand has also established an
independent public agency, the International Education Appeals Authority
(IEAA), with the power to receive and adjudicate on complaints received
from cross-border students and their authorised agents/representatives concerning breaches of the code (New Zealand Ministry of Education, 2004).4
The New Zealand model highlights the limitations of the Australian
experience. In Australia the growth of the cross-border student market has
thus far produced a greater scrambling for student numbers as revenue

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Deumert et al.: Global Migration and Social Protection Rights

sources by most universities, which have yet to extend comprehensive pastoral

care to students in return for their dollar. This is despite the potential longerterm commercial pay-offs from a more care-focused approach. Amid the
scrambling, alarm bells for universities were sounded in the late 1980s, when
the Australian government was forced to respond to the collapse of several
revenue-reliant English-language colleges, whose cross-border student
customer populations were left without education or the return of their fees.
The negative impact on the reputation of all education providers compelled
legislative changes, culminating in the Education Services for Overseas
Students (ESOS) Act 2000, whereby institutions must secure registration,
comply with a national code of behaviour and contribute to an Assurance
Fund that guarantees student fees. Yet the Fund represents commercial riskmanagement rather than pastoral care. The code of behaviour enforced by
ESOS focuses on such matters as fair advertising, and properly informing
students before binding contracts are signed. It does not spell out pastoral or
social responsibilities. To the contrary, among the purposes of the ESOS Act
are obligations on education providers to police aspects of student behaviour
on behalf of government. This militates against the implied pastoral role of
universities.
The fact that pastoral care and rights-enforcement responsibilities are not
codified reveals several regulatory gaps, which are instructive for other
nations and suggest innovations are needed at the level of global governance.
First, under a highly marketized regime there is scope for variation between
different universities in the coverage of security matters; hence national and/
or international standards are needed. Second, given that foreign education is
a profit-seeking business, universities have a vested interest in unit cost
minimization, which may be incompatible with a consistent rights framework
universal to all students. Third, particular difficulties are created when
security problems originate in the university itself. There is no point of
accountability or appeal external to the university whereby students might
seek redress, unless a model like that of New Zealand is followed. Fourth,
there are gaps in security coverage beyond the university. This was seen in our
interview data, particularly in student dealings with immigration authorities
and potential and actual employers.
N AT I O N A L A N D G L O B A L G O V E R N A N C E I M P L I C AT I O N S

The lacunae identified here suggest a lack of institutional streamlining

between the national and global levels of governance. They also suggest that
the role of civil society within the governance of cross-border education is
highly uncertain, though certainly less formal than it should be. This is
symptomatic of broader contemporary understandings of globalization both
within and outside the fields of education studies and global social policy
(Ramia, 2003). Theorists have not elaborated on the substantive linkage
points between the national and global levels of governance. It is also

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symptomatic of notions of government and policy space that remain overly

dependent on formal legal boundaries and notions of sovereignty, and are
unable to fully encompass the subtlety of contemporary relations between
government, civil society, and the sphere of home/family. This latter lacuna
becomes more significant in relation to cross-border people mobility,
precisely because of the lack of streamlining and fit between national and
global governance, and the central role of civil and private institutions in
providing for security.
In the analysis of cross-border education and the provision of student
security, an appropriate pattern of coordination between the national and
global levels engages: the individual student; the university or other education
provider; governments and their agencies at both the national and sub-nation
regional levels; civil society groups at all levels which represent students as
well as those acting as intermediaries between the state and the market
(increasingly in the form of publicprivate partnerships); global regulatory
bodies like the ILO (for students labour and social welfare concerns); and,
economic institutions such as the World Bank (providing an interface
between education and the needs of the developing economies from which
students often originate). In addition, given that education has become a
major international trade commodity, the WTO needs to engage with
education services more fully than it has in order to ensure minimum
protection and security standards underpin cross-border student regulation.
Global social policy analysts can make major contributions to the analysis of
such possibilities as part of their pursuit of social democratic global governance. That social considerations can and should underpin the global
education market is suggested by the current analysis.
Education is complex to regulate globally, because if globalization is
understood as the widening, deepening and speeding up of all kinds of
worldwide interconnectedness (Held et al., 1999: 14), then cross-border
education is both a function and a driver of globalization in cultural,
educational and economic life. Global interdependency fosters demand for
globally mobile people, and mobile students and graduates extend and
intensify global interconnectedness. Questions of the social and economic
security of temporary migrants highlight the transformative effects of globalization, in the domains of regulation and political and human rights. They
invoke problems of national and international law, policy and governance that
have immediate practical importance for many people but are inherently
difficult to address because they push beyond nation-state frameworks (Held,
2004; Held et al., 1999). There is a jurisdictional gap standing in the way of
attempts to harmonize protection and security at the various levels; a
discrepancy between a globalised world and national, separate units of
policy-making (Kaul et al., 1999: xxvi). Precisely because issues of crossborder student security are generated in cross-border movement, single
national governments do not own those issues and are not under the normal

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domestic political pressures to address them. For nations sending students

abroad, the problems of their citizen-students have been moved outside their
jurisdiction, and are only addressed in exceptional circumstances by their
foreign missions; and/or through bilateral negotiation with the nation(s) of
education. For nations that receive students for the purposes of education,
these are not their own citizens. Typically, their rights are understood as
consumer rights, or second class pastoral rights, not human and civil rights
even though cross-border students often contribute to society and culture,
working cross-border students pay taxes, and many cross-border students
later become citizens.

Concluding Comments
Security issues have become more pressing worldwide since the 11 September
2001 attacks on civilian and military targets in the USA. American authorities
have tightened visa requirements and more closely scrutinize incoming
students, changes that have fallen disproportionately on non-white applicants
and students from Muslim nations. At the same time American civil society
has become less friendly to Muslims. Thus, amid heightened attention to the
security of Americans, the security of cross-border students has been reduced.
In both 20023 and 20034 there were sharp falls in students entering the
USA from the Middle East and from other Muslim nations such as Indonesia,
Malaysia and Pakistan. In 20034 there was also a 4.6% drop in Chinese
students entering the USA. These data suggest that questions of student
security will be significant, and probably very significant, in determining the
future trajectory of the cross-border student market in the USA, with likely
flow-on effects to other nations of study including Australia.
The conjuncture that drove the rapid growth of Australian education
exports has now altered. A comparative analysis in 2004 indicated that
Australias cost advantage relative to American public universities had largely
disappeared, due to US dollar depreciation and rising living costs, particularly
accommodation, in Australian cities; and the cost advantage relative to UK
universities had been eroded (IDP Education Australia, 2004). This suggests
that future student numbers will be increasingly determined by factors other
than cost, such as the academic reputation of Australian universities; perceptions of the quality of the learning experience as relayed by foreign graduates;
and extra-curricular factors including climate, inter-cultural relations; and
generally the social and economic security of cross-border students. Issues of
cross-border student security extend beyond physical safety to include health
and welfare, ease of passage through social and economic institutions, cultural
acceptance, protection from maltreatment and exploitation, and assistance in
difficulty and crisis.
It is unlikely that in the context of the possible downturn in the US share of

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the education market, nations like Australia will increase their market share
while universities and governments continue to neglect their social and moral
responsibilities to cross-border students. More than this, nations need to
coordinate with institutions and civil society at the global level to ensure that
students can make their choice of study destination based on factors like the
quality of the education, rather than questions over their security.
a c k n ow l e d g e m e n t s
The authors have collaborated on this project as part of a programme of research on
Global People Movement and Social Protection supported by the cross-faculty
Monash Institute for the Study of Global Movements, Monash University, Australia.
This article forms part of a broader project entitled, The Social and Economic
Security of International Students in the Global Education Market, funded by an
Australian Research Council Discovery Grant over 2005 to 2007.
notes
1.

2.

3.

4.

Foreign student numbers in other sectors of education also increased. In 2002

there were 385,000 foreign students studying in Australian education in all
sectors, including schools, vocational training institutions and specialist English
language learning colleges, with 49% of these students in higher education
(Australian Education International [AEI], 2003).
This proportion is higher than the OECDs datum for 2001 (13.9%): the difference in the figures indicates both a different basis of calculation (the inclusion of
the full number of off-shore students) and the rapid growth of foreign student
numbers, which rose by 13.7% between 2002 and 2003 alone.
There may have been under-reporting here. Given that students who work more
than 20 hours in a week are in breach of visa conditions, despite guarantees of
anonymity, some students may have been reluctant to talk in detail about work
experiences.
The IEAA has published a summary of cases accumulated since 1996 (IEAA,
2004).

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rsum

Migration Globale et Droits de Protection Social: La Scurit

Sociale et conomique des tudiants Migrants en Australie
Un nombre croissant dtudiants franchissent les frontires internationales afin de
raliser leurs tudes. Un march global dducation suprieure, qui est en expansion,
a t cr. Il existe toutefois des insuffisances importantes dans la gouvernance des
droits des tudiants internationaux. Tout en tant bnficiaires de services dducation,
les tudiants qui franchissent des frontires sont des migrants, des travailleurs, des
consommateurs et des tres humains. Une vision plus ample des tudiants, qui les
considre comme individus ayant droit une scurit sociale et conomique, est
prfrable celle qui les traite comme de simples sujets couverts par la scurit sociale.
En reconnaissant ce statut multiple et en utilisant les informations de 200 entretiens
approfondis raliss avec des tudiants internationaux en Australie, cet article en
conclut que le rgime de protection sociale existant ne reconnat pas pleinement les
droits des tudiants. Les problmes sont lis a lacquisition de la langue, lintgration

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Deumert et al.: Global Migration and Social Protection Rights

sociale, aux finances, au travail et la scurit personnelle. Larticle soutient, ainsi que
le fait la loi et les politiques, quun rgime de scurit tudiante doit inclure de
meilleures pratiques universitaires et des rseaux plus resserrs au niveau de la socit
civile, de mme que des ONG et une couverture OIG.
resumen

Migracin Global y Derechos de Proteccin Social: La Seguridad

Social y Econmica de los Estudiantes Internacionales en
Australia
Un nmero cada vez mayor de estudiantes atraviesa fronteras para realizar sus
estudios. Sin embargo, existen brechas significativas en la administracin de los
derechos de tales alumnos que son tanto beneficiarios de un servicio educativo como
migrantes, trabajadores, consumidores y seres humanos. Estos estudiantes deben ser
considerados desde una perspectiva ms amplia, en tanto individuos que merecen
seguridad econmica y social, y no solamente como sujetos de proteccin social. El
reconocimiento de esta condicin mltiple se aborda en este artculo que utiliza datos
de 200 entrevistas exhaustivas con estudiantes extranjeros residentes en Australia. El
estudio permiti determinar que el rgimen actual de proteccin social dista mucho de
reconocer los derechos de los estudiantes. El documento sostiene que un rgimen de
seguridad para los estudiantes debe incluir tanto leyes y polticas como mejores
prcticas en las universidades y una cobertura ms integrada de las redes de la sociedad
civil y de las Organizaciones No-Gubernamentales e Intergubernamentales.
biographical notes
A N A D E U M E RT is a sociolinguist who works in the Faculty of Arts, Monash
University, Australia. Her research covers language planning/policy, language and
migration, language contact and second language acquisition. Please address
correspondence to: Dr Ana Deumert, Faculty of Arts, Monash University, Victoria
3800, Australia. [email: ana.deumert@arts.monash.edu.au]
S I M O N M A R G I N S O N is an Australian Professorial Fellow who works on comparative
and international higher education in the context of globalization, in the Faculty of
Education, Monash University, Australia. He is Director of the Monash Centre for
Research in International Education. Please address correspondence to: Professor
Simon Marginson, Faculty of Education, Monash University, Victoria 3800, Australia.
[email: simon.marginson@education.monash.edu.au]

works on international business and the history of economic and

management thought in the Faculty of Business and Economics, Monash University,
Australia. Please address correspondence to: Professor Chris Nyland, Department of
Management, Monash University, Clayton VIC 3800, Australia.
[email: chris.nyland@buseco.monash.edu.au]
CHRIS NYLAND

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G A B Y R A M I A works on international business and social policy in the Faculty of
Business and Economics, Monash University, Australia. Please address correspondence to: Dr Gaby Ramia, Faculty of Business and Economics, Monash University,
Victoria 3800, Australia. [email: gaby.ramia@buseco.monash.edu.au]

is an Indonesian national and a sociolinguist who works on

inter-cultural communication, globalization and international education as a Research
Fellow in the Faculty of Education, Monash University, Australia. Please address
correspondence to: Dr Erlenawati Sawir, Faculty of Education, Monash University,
Victoria 3800, Australia. [email: erlenawati@education.monash.edu.au]

E R L E N AWAT I S AW I R

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