The need to study this issue emanates from the following rationales and justifications. First, the internationalization of higher education is not sufficiently addressed as a subject. Most of the time, the study of this topic has been attached to major issues of the higher education such as management, funding, and to student mobility. In this study, the internationalization of higher education and the academic profession is considered as a subject in its own right from the perspectives of its major dimensions, aspects, and center and periphery. Second, the related literature on internationalization has given little attention to the principal actor and driving force of the internationalization of higher education, i.e. the academic profession. Third, a comparative research approach of the internationalization of higher education and the academic profession of the regions of Africa, Asia-Pacific and Europe has not been the concern of researchers. Particularly, a comparative inclusion of Africa into the study of Asia-Pacific and Europe seems to have been marginalized. Fourth, the connotation of the term internationalization of higher education does not clearly explain what “internationalization denotes”. This has to be explained in terms of the concept it stands for and the dimensions, aspects and features internationalization manifests and denotes. Moreover, “internationalization” lacks clear, common and comprehensive definition and meaning. As a northern theory construct, interpretation, explanation, and definition, internationalization reflects the voices of the global North, mainly centre-higher education. No adequate and comprehensive attempt has been made at the understanding, clarifying, conceptualizing, or defining internationalization of higher education and the academic profession from the perspectives of the varies aspects of activities, engagements, and voices of the peripheries. All the above factors have caused an increasing fuzziness of the concept of internationalization. These are some of the justifications for focusing on the issue of conceptualizing internationalization of higher education and the academic profession from the regional perspectives of Africa, Asia-Pacific, and Europe.
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