Researchers bypassed in international crisis response

Australia needs better research before it can put together a cogent response to the crisis in international education Strategies to deal with the crisis in international education are being developed in a research vacuum, according to two Melbourne experts on overseas student security. Monash’s Professor Chris Nyland and University of Melbourne’s Professor Simon Marginson told Campus Review that policymakers appeared unwilling to consult researchers or commission fresh research on international student welfare, even though it had become a frontline issue for Australia. “Despite the fact that, along with Chris, I am an acknowledged expert in the area of international student security, and although I am known personally to many politicians in federal and state governments, I have never been approached by a senior public servant or minister on this matter,” Marginson said. Nyland, who began highlighting concerns about overseas students’ safety well before the issue made world headlines last May, said no state or federal politician had approached him either. Nyland said there was a dearth of research into international students’ issues, even though they numbered more than half a million and contributed billions to the Australian economy. “They’re trying to develop an international student strategy, and there’s really basic stuff we don’t know about,” he said. “From a research perspective we know very little about international student housing. Keating was in government last time there was a study of international student income. And no study’s ever been done on the practices and behaviour of international students as workers.” Nyland said frontline services such as the police, fire brigade and counsellors were actively seeking input from researchers. He said Victoria Police had accepted his advice that even though Chinese students hadn’t participated in demonstrations, they needed to be included in targeted police efforts. But he said the efforts of politicians and senior civil servants – such as their visits to India over recent months – were primarily about public relations. “They go to India to tell parents that everything’s fine. What is that accomplishing in terms of putting more serious resources into student housing or establishing specialist police groups?” Marginson said the police had been placed in a difficult position on the attacks against international students. “It has been most unfortunate that the police denial of racism has been targeted in India, because this line is coming from the politicians and governments – not the police. “My observation is that the police are saying what they have been told to say. Hence the robotic nature of the response, whereby the denial that racism is a factor occurs even before the crime has been investigated.” Nyland said researchers were at a loss to understand what they saw as a superficial response to the problems in international education, given the potential threats to education exports and bilateral relations with regional giants such as India. He said one theory was that policymakers believed the issue would “blow over”, replaced by more weighty international trade matters. Marginson said politics was at the root of the response. “As the 2001 Tampa election and the Rudd government’s present position on refugees and border protection shows, Labor is at a loss to develop an internationally saleable position on the issue of globally mobile populations. “It’s the Achilles heel of the Rudd government – the only area where it does not exercise a clear advantage over the Coalition at present, mainly because Labor takes a ‘soft Howard’ position on issues like refugees. It is spooked by the spectre of a possible ‘Hanson-battler’ conjunction in the electorate.” --- Indian attacks: stats tell mixed story Recent Victoria Police analysis suggests the number of robbery victims of Indian appearance is “trending downwards”, according to Commander Trevor Carter, divisional head in Melbourne’s western suburbs. Carter said robberies had declined over the last seven months across his division, and that assaults had also declined in the Brimbank and Maribyrnong police service areas. “Police are seeing a downward trend in robbery and assault in areas where a majority of these offences have occurred in the past,” he said. He said the improvement was the result of police interventions including cooperative work with education providers. But according to official statewide figures from 2007-08 – the latest available – there were 1447 assault and robbery victims of Indian appearance, up from 1082 the previous year. Compared with national assault and robbery statistics from the Australian Institute of Criminology, these figures suggest Melbourne’s Indians were overrepresented in robbery and assaults by almost three to one. And an analysis last month by the Sydney Morning Herald suggested Indians living in Victoria were 2½ times likely to be assaulted as non-Indians. “The assault rate for Indians was about 1700 in every 100,000, against about 700 in every 100,000 for non-Indians,” the paper reported. The Herald said Victoria Police had given it 2008-09 figures showing that assault and robbery victims of Indian appearance had increased another 5 per cent to 1525. But Victoria Police disputed the report, saying it hadn’t supplied the figures. JR