A Critical Examination of International Education Mobility Regimes: Comparative Insights from Vietnamese Students in Canada, France, and the United Kingdom

Amidst the neoliberal commodification of international education, countries have taken various approaches to governing international students’ mobilities. This paper examines Vietnamese students’ navigation of different ‘regimes of mobility’ in Canada, France and the United Kingdom (UK). Drawing on Manderscheid’s (2020) “critique of mobility” we highlight how these regimes vary not only in openness, but also in the power dynamics they perpetuate. Based on two qualitative interpretive studies, including 25 interviews with Vietnamese students in Vancouver, Paris, and the UK (London, Northampton and Aberdeen), our thematic analysis addresses how mobility regimes affect students’ choice of destination, legal status, and post-graduation plans. Instead of a “triple win” (Brunner, 2021, p. 29) for students, sending and receiving countries, we examined how France’s, Canada’s and the UK’s mobility regimes perpetuate inequalities and prioritize their own economic interests. We argue that return migration might be an agentive way for international students to challenge Western mobility regimes.