To restore social licence, we need an international commission on HE

Over the past few decades, our respective countries have become magnets for international students. The reputations of our leading research universities have made the UK and Australia (alongside Canada and the US) the most popular receiving countries around the globe, with about 750,000 and 850,000 international students, respectively.

And for some time, both of our countries hailed the direct benefits of this to our economies. International education was welcomed as a key funding source for our higher education systems, and it was routine for both sector leaders and politicians to celebrate higher education as a leading “export industry”. The indirect benefits were also well understood, in terms of soft power, human capital development and growth for both sender and receiving countries.

But just as the world economy moved past peak globalisation in 2008, higher education now appears to have done the same, albeit 15 years later. Various concerns – which transcend the usual left-right political boundaries – have come to dominate the narrative about international education.

Some of those are linked to migration flows and have led to student visa regime changes. More worryingly, there has been an apparent erosion of our universities’ social licence, amid accusations that they have focused too much on international student flows at the expense of the student experience and the returns that domestic students and the state receive in return for student loan expenditure in a rapidly changing labour market.

Concerns have also been raised about the impact of large institutions on local communities – relating not only to housing availability (notwithstanding the rapid growth in student accommodation) but also to pressures on other local amenities and services at a time of continuing economic instability.

In the next phase of international education, therefore, it is unlikely that academic reputation alone will be enough to draw students. Countries whose universities retain public trust and political legitimacy may enjoy a competitive advantage over those whose systems become trapped in cycles of backlash and restriction.

Hence, as some of our colleagues highlighted at a recent U21 summit at the University of Glasgow, nations that have traditionally enjoyed the largest share of the international student market now need to reflect seriously about how to manage the delicate balance between internationalism and domestic social licence.

The need to rebuild the latter is not a new concern. Nearly a decade ago, the UPP Foundation led on the need to reconnect UK universities with stakeholders through the Civic University Commission. And we believe that this example points the way forward regarding internationalisation, too. Understanding – and then acting on – social licence requires more data and better analysis.

Specifically, with more volatile trends in international student flows and more major host countries emerging (as the “big four” receiver countries become the “big 14”), we think there is a need to look at the interplay between international education and social licence through a comparative framework that takes in all the major destination countries.

Effective international student policy requires coordination between the various branches of government that oversee higher education, migration and foreign policy. This is difficult in itself. Moreover, no single country’s policymakers, looking only at their own system, have access to a comprehensive picture of global flows and patterns. An international commission could offer that.

The recent comparative study by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development – covering Australia, Canada, France, Germany, the Netherlands and the UK – provides evidence on trends, shared challenges and emerging policy responses. But the study does not capture the full system-wide interdependencies that would emerge from looking at both economic trends and public opinion surveys in sender and receiving countries alike.

Comparative analysis could also illuminate the dynamics of national policy choices. Immigration policies in Australia, Canada and the UK are reshaping international student mobility, with European and Asian countries emerging as fresh alternatives for students from south Asia, east Asia and Africa. Students, in short, are redirecting from restricted to more open destinations. But national policymakers acting unilaterally have an uncertain effect on bilateral flows given the complex interdependencies that affect student choices in sender countries. Understanding this requires precisely the international analytical and data lens that any single national inquiry cannot provide.

The other major trend in international education is a massive drive from sender countries to encourage leading research universities in receiver countries to establish new campuses, especially in the Middle East and south and east Asia. This has sparked a headlong race towards transnational education (TNE), even as the business models are still evolving.

In part, the renewed enthusiasm for TNE from institutions in receiver countries derives from their sense that educating international students in their home countries offers at least a partial solution to the social licence question. But it is important to understand how this is perceived by students in sender countries, as they weigh the choice of attending a TNE campus in-country or undertaking study abroad.

Finally, and most importantly, a comparative analysis could explore what creates social support for international education – and whether that can be nurtured and restored. Such knowledge would be a competitive advantage for universities in receiving countries.

But the task is not easy: the British Future report, recently published by King’s College London’s Policy Institute, asked why, despite falling net migration statistics in the UK, negative attitudes towards immigration for work and study persist. As Bobby Duffy, the director of the institute, pointed out, public opinion about immigration is still focused on the risks.

Socio-political conditions are unique to each country, but we would argue that the “big four” share common structural drivers for internationalisation – such as the substitution of international student fees for public funding, or the linkages between international student flows and trade policy – and common concerns about social licence. It would be interesting to see if these might also impact on emerging destination countries.

Analysis at a deeper level of the key socio-economic drivers that determine how students in sender countries make their choices to study abroad – and how people in receiving countries feel about their presence – could be carried out by a team of experts across many countries, with the support of an analytical team.

A commission that coordinated this work, examining the evidence and providing plausible recommendations, would be a significant step in supporting better policymaking on international education across the globe.

Glyn Davis is a public policy specialist and interim vice-chancellor of the University of Melbourne. He served previously in the role from January 2005 to September 2018. He was secretary of the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet and head of the Australian public service from June 2022 until June 2025.

Anton Muscatelli is distinguished honorary professor at the Adam Smith Business School, University of Glasgow. He was Glasgow’s principal and vice-chancellor from October 2009 to October 2025. He is president of the Royal Society of Edinburgh.