Security And Trade In NZ’s Strategic Environment

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.

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