https://www.thelygongroup.com/what-we-do

The article raises issues of opportunity and benefit, but I think avoids the salient question of the hour. Because should Australia have been building an obligate economic/research/education relationship with any nation that has a surveillance and security apparatus that embraces a ‘Social Credit Score’ domestically and seeks to monitor their own citizens and diaspora in Australia?

By positioning themselves, along with others like the Lygon Group, as businesses dependent upon OS students, Australian universities have damaged their independence in then appealing to ideals of development/collaboration/benefits etc (i.e. noble causes). Originally Australian policies were predicated upon an expectation of ‘democratic’ and governance reform in China that did not happen. That value gap is widening. Unfortunately, by throwing in attitudinal survey results without proper context (other analysis is far worse), Australian universities risk further alienating themselves from the general public. A proper and respectful conversation about differences in values should have originally informed Sino-Australian policy a very long time ago, before it became the lynch-pin for the viability of so much. Such relationships are not, and never should be, unconditional and open ended. Now, asking for a conversation about the ‘value of collaboration’ and that universities ‘need to be heard’ sidesteps a giant problem of omission – the Australian public has not been heard for a very long time. It might be the university/business axis that should be doing a share of the listening.

It seems pretty transparent to most that the current tertiary education business plan was based upon neoliberal ideas that see tertiary education as a business. Governments of all stripe have cut public money to force unis to develop new markets using a guiding corporate governance structure. Most people can see this, and it makes post hoc noble cause arguments less convincing; even to the point of seeming desperate. That there is ‘value in collaboration’ has never been a point of serious contention as far as I am aware. Who has ever contested this?

Conflating collaboration on international goals in the region with the nature of the Australian tertiary education business model is another bridge too far.

But ask whether tertiary education should be a ‘business’ that allows public institutions to profit while ignoring the values of the client nation and you might be getting closer to the guts of the main concerns. Several issues are just not being discussed honestly and this includes whether OS students are getting value for their money and, overall, who should decide the culture and values of the Australian tertiary education sector? Those who profit from the status quo?