The Intersection Of Security And Trade In New Zealand’s Strategic Environment, With A Focus On Higher Education
The shift to a globalised system of production and exchange that followed the end of the Cold War was paralleled by a shift in international security affairs from notions of collective security to those of cooperative security. Deterrence through credible counter-force on the part of regional military alliances in a loose bi-polar international system was downplayed in favour of mutual confidence and security building measures that addressed the root causes of conflict while emphasizing multinational military involvement peace-keeping and nation-building in a strategically unipolar system. It also allowed for the re-emergence and expansion of low-intensity conflicts rooted in primordial and pre-modern beliefs—hence the need for peacekeeping--with most of these occurring in geographic areas that were considered peripheral in the strategic logics of the Cold War, or in which modernizing dictatorships that suppressed cultural, ethnic, racial or religious expression had fallen, or where the very concept of “state” was under question. The paradigm shift in international security perspectives and re-emergence of low intensity conflicts in failed states allowed for the emergence of smaller and medium sized actors as international military and diplomatic interlocutors, New Zealand being one of them.
In the 1990s international emphasis shifted towards creation of new trading blocs amid global market integration.
Exponential increases in cross-border commerce produced by the technological revolution in telecommunications and
transportation, added to the global shift from state-centred to market-oriented economic policies and the transition
from authoritarian to electoral forms of political rule, led to the broadening of the concept of security from its
traditional emphasis on military conflict and national defense to policy areas previously seen as tangential (such as
energy, immigration, education, environment and public health). The expansion of so-called “human” security concerns in
the post-Cold War era was a natural parallel to the expansion of international economic networks because the latter also
facilitated the emergence of “grey area” phenomena that worked the gaps between national and international jurisdiction
in previously unregulated commercial areas or in weak nation-states, and which was often overlapped with weapons,
narcotic and human trafficking enterprises that were quick to capitalize on the window of opportunity presented by the
end of the Cold War. One result of this was the emergence of transantionalised unconventional warfare groups expressing
pre-modern grievances against the West using modern Western technologies and education.
The globalization of production forced nations dependent on primary good production and exports for hard currency
earnings to shift from strategies of comparative advantage based on the exploitation of natural resource endowments to
strategies of competitive advantage based upon value-added production in secondary and tertiary industries. This was
particularly necessary in boutique or niche economies such as New Zealand’s. Macroeconomic policies that promoted
financial deregulation, privatization of state enterprises, labour market flexibility and easier capital flows
(particularly venture capital) were consequently implemented in New Zealand and elsewhere regardless of the ideological
stance of the governments in question.
One of the economic areas that was targeted as a potential new growth sector in New Zealand was the field of education,
particularly English language instruction and post-secondary studies. The latter half of the 1990s and first half decade
of the 21st century saw the rise of a prolific international education industry, to include English language academies,
secondary, technical and vocational training, undergraduate programmes and post-graduate degrees. Universities and
polytechnic colleges underwent managerial revolutions in which private sector logics based upon financial bottom lines
and the pursuit of profitability in an era of diminished government subsidies became corporate mantras that endure to
this day. Educators and government officials actively worked together to negotiate educational exchange agreements with
a raft of overseas governments (to include a recent announcement that 10 million dollars will be used to set up
Education Counselor posts in New Zealand embassies and consulates in the Middle East, Asia and Latin America), and
thousands of foreign students have flocked to New Zealand to enjoy the equivalent of an educational O.E.
The events of September 2001 helped these efforts, as increased security concerns in the US and UK forced prospective
students from Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East to look elsewhere for quality English language instruction in a
variety of subjects at a number of educational levels. For the last decade, New Zealand has offered them the full range
of services, and the percentage of GNP generated by foreign student instruction has tripled. An entire industry was
created where it did not exist before, and many others expanded their focus to accommodate the education-driven
windfall: education placement agents, language tutors, foreign student landlords, student housing developers,
international student offices, student travel agencies—the list of education-dependant industries is long and the
financial impact is great. Commercialisation of education in New Zealand has been a success.
But there is a catch.
The managerial focus on profit at New Zealand universities has led administrators to be less interested in the
qualifications of foreign students and much more concerned about the revenue stream their international student fees
produce. Since these fees are three times the cost to local students, the revenue streams generated by foreign student
recruitment has consequently grown in concert with the percentage of foreign students enrolled. Foreign students now
occupy over a quarter of the total enrolments in most major universities. However, the quality of the students remains
uneven. Academic departments are ostensibly responsible for determining the prior qualifications of both undergraduate
and graduate school applicants, but often it is international officers or faculty administrators who admit students
without full consultation with the staff or recruitment committees in the disciplines involved. This has led to
instances where foreign students without any prior knowledge of the academic subjects in which they are enrolled and
with limited comprehension of English are placed in classes with local students who are better prepared on both counts.
That places them at a distinct disadvantage, to which often are added issues of cultural dissonance.
Foreign applicants are not the only source of unqualified students. The same is true for many of those coming from
disadvantaged sectors of the community who are thrown into competitive academic environments without the scholarly
preparation of their more advantaged peers, and without the academic support they need to be successful. Be they foreign
or domestic, the problem of unqualified students gaining entry is pervasive throughout the full spectrum of educational
choice. But what sets the two groups apart is that while local students may be linked to pranks, misdemeanors and
perhaps local crime syndicates, they pose little if any national security threat, specifically with regards to
ideologically motivated terrorism. Foreign students, on the other hand, do carry the potential for such a threat.
University administrators assume that teaching staff will cope with the problems the presence of under-prepared students
poses for instruction and marking. However, committed lecturers are loath to dumb down class content in order to
accommodate underperforming students. What occurs in practice is that weak students are routinely given marginal passes
where failing marks were deserved, or have their marks raised after the fact so as to not jeopardize present or future
revenue streams. That only matters when unqualified graduates of New Zealand universities begin to demonstrate
incompetence in subjects or standards of practice once they enter the workforce. At that point New Zealand education as
a brand begins to tarnish, and the very worth of the degrees awarded by New Zealand universities is laid open to
question.
In a globalised system of production and exchange in which “grey” areas abound and in which transnational guerrilla
networks ply their trade, there is a more worrisome aspect to the commercialization of foreign student instruction. Many
prospective students are drawn from countries with insalubrious political histories. An exchange agreement has been
negotiated for the issuance of 1000 student visas applicants per year to Pakistan as of 2008. A similar arrangement will
bring 300 Saudi Arabian university students per year to New Zealand. There are thousands of Chinese nationals currently
studying here, as are over 600 from the United Arab Emirates. Few of these students have been security vetted by New
Zealand authorities. The reason is simple: it is undiplomatic in the extreme to demand security protocols when
negotiating international education exchange agreements with foreign governments. Even if given, reliance on foreign
government security guarantees may not always be an airtight safeguard. Bribery and corruption are not unknown in the
countries mentioned above, especially amongst the well heeled.
This is of concern because some countries have well-recognised internal problems that have impacted on the security
threat environment of New Zealand as well as the rest of the world. Saudi Arabia is a primary breeding ground for
Wahabbist thought, the militant strand of Sunni Islam to which most al-Qaeda adherents subscribe. Pakistan is regarded
by security experts as a hotbed of terrorist training and indoctrination because of its militant religious schools
(madrassas), its ties to the Taliban, the relationship of its intelligence services to the global jihadist enterprise
and the inability of the Musharraf regime to do much about curtailing the activities of militants in the tribal
homelands as well as in major urban centres. Organized and unorganized crime originating in China has found the New
Zealand student visa programme to its liking, and the Beijing regime undoubtedly has an interest in using it as a
channel for intelligence networks in the southwestern Pacific—although its agents would have impeccable, albeit rather
ordinary credentials prior to their arrival in New Zealand.
The issue is not one of race or faith. It is one of source, and the statistical probability that some source nations
have a demonstrable history of politically motivated violence, ideological zealotry and unconventional warfare tactics
within their secondary and university-age communities. Sourcing students from these countries without security vetting
invites potential disaster.
It is unlikely that a foreign student or group of students would undertake a terrorist attack on New Zealand soil. The
statistical possibility exists that someone of foreign origin could receive training in scientific fields that would
allow them to better undertake terrorist activities upon graduation. The issue is not one of quantitative significance.
Should one such individual manage to pass through the system, the damage to New Zealand’s international reputation will
be significant.
To prevent this from happening, security vetting of foreign visa applicants should naturally fall to New Zealand
government agencies working offshore in the first instance-- for example, upon receipt of application but before
issuance of the appropriate visa at a New Zealand embassy or consulate. As things stand, that does not occur, although
the NZSIS has announced that it has recently increased security vetting of foreigners entering New Zealand. In practice
to date there is no institutionalized programme for security vetting of foreign students prior to arrival. Foreign
students come to the attention of the authorities when they draw the interest of local law enforcement, such as the case
of the Yemeni flight school student who flatted with 9/11 operatives in the months leading to the attacks (and who
violated the terms of his student visa for several months before authorities were alerted by a member of the public).
His presence may well have been the catalyst for the SIS’s raised preoccupation with the potential threat posed by
foreign residents.
A similar problem exists with regards to business visas. The quest for increased foreign trade and investment has seen
the establishment of a visa programme for businesses in which a six-figure US dollar bond is the price of entry. Quality
of character is assumed rather than verified, whereas most permanent resident visas have a “good character” component
that requires local authority certification. The idea is that foreign entrepreneurs will be encouraged to invest and
trade in New Zealand due to the preferential status accorded to business visas. Since few questions of character are
asked, little security vetting is done. That is problematic because the large sums of money needed to post the entry
bond are not the exclusive province of legitimate business agents, but of large-scale criminal organizations as well
(including al-Qaeda, Russian Mafiosi, Latin American drug traffickers and Chinese gambling rackets).
The pressures of global economic competition have given rise to the commercialization of education and the expansion of
foreign student exchange programmes in New Zealand, as well as to the active solicitation of foreign investors in value
added production. This has satisfied the major concerns of the new managerial elites that run the education sector,
especially those who have spent little at the teaching end of a lectern. It has led to some interesting synergies
between the private firms and specialized education and research in pursuit of competitive advantages. But the profit
logic has also led to a sacrifice in overall educational quality in the measure that the “bums in seats” mentality
becomes entrenched. This is seen in the proliferation of cowboy language schools and the creation of diploma mills
within University departments. The overall value of a New Zealand education is diminished, something that will
accelerate in coming years because education sector growth models forecast that an increasing number of the bums in
seats must have foreign accents if profitability is to be assured (due to low local birth rates, particularly amongst
skilled labour).
Given the lack of security vetting of foreign student and business visas, should a future terrorist attack show links to
New Zealand, the damage will be military-diplomatic as well as economic. That would be a negative strategic effect in an
otherwise benign threat environment unintentionally brought about by myopic policy responses to the expanded pressures
of security and trade on a small democracy in a globalised world.
Paul G. Buchanan writes about comparative and international politics, and consults on matters of political risk and
threat assessment.
ENDS