Internationalisation of universities: local perspectives on a global phenomenon

The policy making in internationalisation of higher education is shaped at the national level, and influenced by regional policy debates and globalisation trends, but it tends to obscure the perspectives of academics. Much of what has been written in the scholarly literature in this area has focused on institutional strategies and national policies. We argue that it is crucial to have an in-depth understanding of how academics experience and practice internationalisation in their core teaching and research because of their centrality. This study sought to examine how internationalisation is constructed and enacted at a local or micro level at a research-intensive university in Sweden. Based on the interview data collected from nine semi-structured interviews with the academic staff from various disciplinary groups and three interviews with faculty administrators, we contend that the individual agency of academics serves as a precursor for institutional policy-making.