Identity Building of non-EU Student Mobility in Europe

Scholars often relate the issue of student mobility and academic cooperation to social cohesion and identity building. The case of the Bologna Process and the Erasmus program offers a unique perspective, with the mission to foster European identity through the European program for students exchange within Europe. According to the common argument, the freedom of movement enables European citizens, in this case students, to live and study in different European countries, which makes them adapt and develop their European identity . The proposed paper will try to take these assumptions and explain it from a different perspective: the external, non-European dimension. It will examine the mobility of non-European students and scholars, who use similar mechanisms and programs (Erasmus Mundus, Tempus, Erasmus+) to enjoy freedom of movement in Europe, to work and study in Europe. Using theories of othering, and inclusion/ exclusion in this group's experience in the European continent, the paper will develop and explore different angles in the process of identity shaping and identity building. Through quantitative and qualitative research methods, the paper will reveal the effects of the mobility on non-European participants and their identities: on their exposure to European values and sense of European identity. Using higher education as a backdrop, the paper will explore the effects on identity of non-European mobility in the EU. The paper argues that this type of mobility can be understood as an EU strategy to strengthen its non-military modes of power, in particular its normative power . Thus, through the study case of higher education and the Bologna Process, another angle of identity shaping can be discussed and developed, to see if and how this process contributes to the diffusion of European values, and social cohesion.