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Abstract
Highly educated people are an essential asset in today's global governance architecture. Global governance is, from this perspective, dependent on a broad access to higher education. Indeed, it is only through a broad access to higher education that the respect of principles such as the rule of law, democratic rule, and public accountability can be developed and, accordingly, that the less developed countries can participate in global governance frameworks. This article asserts that combining internationalization strategies in higher education with a proper use of information and communication technologies (ICTs) can provide a significantly wider array and easier access to higher education resources in the less developed countries. Additionally, the article suggests that Canadian policy-makers could draw significant political benefits from this initiative by collaborating with institutions in the poorest countries and using existing programs within international organizations like la Francophonie. While the article underlines several budgetary and organizational constraints, it provides a broad and insightful analysis of the policy and educational resources currently available to Canadian policy-makers interested in the implementation of such an innovative international development project.
Notes
1. This article does not deny the importance of improving the access to other levels of education in less-developed countries for developmental objectives. However, it focuses on the transmission of specialized knowledge and skills as a means to improve less-developed countries' ability to participate in global governance frameworks and for which Canadian universities could be mobilized.
2. On the brain drain issue and the associated challenged for higher education see, for example, Carrington and Detragiache (Citation1999).
3. Following the 2013 federal budget, CIDA has been merged with the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade (see Mackrael Citation2013).
4. Formerly the Agence de coopération culturelle et technique.
5. The importance of and recent changes in Canadian internationalism are also assessed in the 2010 Special Issue of the Canadian Foreign Policy Journal on Multilateralism (see Black and Donaghy Citation2010, and the articles following it in the Special Issue).
6. This decentralized organization of the higher education field in Canada is related to the division of associated powers between the federal and provincial governments.
7. These programs are administered by the AUCC. The Canada Corps University Partnership Program was replaced, in 2006, by the Office for Democratic Governance, which was thereafter dissolved.
8. See, for example, the Canada-United States Fulbright program, the Commonwealth scholarship and fellowship program and the diverse Government of Canada Awards. However, the funding for the main scholarship program managed by DFAIT (the Canadian Studies Program) was recently abolished.
9. Through organizations and programs such as the Canadian Education Centre Network and a five-year initiative called “Edu-Canada”.
10. See, for example, the Canadian Bureau of International Education, the Canadian Information Centre for International Credentials, the World University Service of Canada or the Office franco-québécois pour la jeunesse.
11. See most particularly the programs managed by CIDA, the Commonwealth scholarship and fellowship program, and the Canada-Caribbean Community Virtual University initiative.
12. For other examples of distance online learning services and resources, see the Open University (United Kingdom) or the Canadian virtual university (Canada).
13. For more data on individual countries see ITU (Citation2013b).
14. Such educational resources could rely on the existence of curricula in both civil and common law in Canadian universities.
15. Such educational resources could complement the extensive involvement, since the beginning of the 1990s, of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) and other Canadian police agencies in international peace operations.
16. Such educational resources could focus on training school teachers in the deliverance of classes in multicultural settings, which is a growing educational challenge around the world and, arguably, a particular Canadian strength and dimension of the Canadian national identity.
17. These topics are only indicative of the appropriate foci and public around which these initiatives could be developed as these should necessarily be identified in collaboration with partners in targeted countries.
18. However, COL only provides online education in English.
19. For further reading on the use of ICTs and online educational initiatives in the context of less-developed countries, see, for example, Karsenti and Tchameni Ngama (Citation2007), Karsenti et al. (Citation2011), and Loiret (Citation2013).
20. Incidentally, there is already some sense of international community within these international organizations, which should help to promote and implement such projects.
21. Accordingly, Canadian policymakers should focus on projects that can secure provincial government consent and participation.