Western faculty ‘flight risk’ at a Korean university and the complexities of internationalisation in Asian higher education

Does the internationalisation of Asian higher education give preference to Western faculty members, especially against the backdrop of internationalisation trends that call for an importation of Western pedagogical practices, ideas, and standards? This article seeks to complicate such a claim through close examination of the Western faculty members who work at a Korean university. In particular, this study reveals the systematic disempowerment of Western faculty members, which eventually leads to Western faculty members’ mass departure from South Korea. The ephemeral and transitional quality of the Western faulty members is what renders them even more helpless and commoditised for the benefit of a Korean university while the institution maintains the façade of internationalisation via the large-scale recruitment of Western faculty members by perpetually replacing those who leave with new recruits. Such a phenomenon exposes complexities within the internationalisation process that have yet to be addressed by scholars of education.