Understanding Values & Ideas of the University in International Organisational Policy Discourse

Abstract

This project aimed to understand the relationship between theoretical interpretations of multiple values and ideas of the universities from within and across different disciplines and their influence on higher education and its internationalisation within the real international organisation (IO) policy context. With this foundation, I derived a theoretical construct to gauge the often implicit presence of values and ideas of the university in policy. The theoretical construct consisted of: (i) an academic idea of the university from philosophy of higher education literature; (ii) a globalised idea of the university from international higher education literature; and (iii) a developmental idea of the university from international development higher education literature. To apply the theoretical construct using theory-testing via critical discourse analysis of IO policy, I framed IOs as leaders in the global governance of HE, possessing significant linguistic capital (Bourdieu, 1991) in international development higher education. I used the concept of elite capture to describe the phenomenon of IO power over knowledge and values via policy channels enabling them to “describe, define, and create political realities (Táíwò, 2022, p. 32). The theoretical claim I tested, via the two theory-testing cases of UNESCO and the World Bank, was that the values held by IOs with regards to HE and its internationalisation practically shape IO structures and policy processes. I focused on internationalisation of higher education and academic research collaboration as specific policy areas for theory-testing. I found that idealised theoretical ideas of the university are useful for this analytic approach and play a part in shaping IO structures and processes, but in complex ways not neatly represented by disciplinary-bounded theoretical categories. Further, the discursive function of IO strategic priorities shapes discursive construction of higher education policy, how higher education is broadly treated, and the bounds within which internationalisation of higher education is approached. I recommend a richer and more complex theorisation of the university to account for rationales of different stakeholders, including academic, developmental, and globalised ideas of the university, to support policy-makers in international development higher education.