Academics demand coordinated approach to migration policy

Sweden’s university teachers and researchers have called for the government to take a concerted approach to the issue of migration so as not to contradict its own stated ambition of raising Sweden’s attractiveness to foreign researchers.

In an article in Altinget earlier this month, Robert Andersson, chief negotiator at the Swedish Association of University Teachers and Researchers (SULF), said the current proposals around migration were deterring people from coming to Sweden.

The call comes in the wake of a report by the Doctoral Candidates’ Association of academic union Sveriges universitetslärarförbund (SULF-DCA) published last year that found through a survey that of 40 international PhD students asked, none said they would recommend studying in Sweden to others.

Lack of coordination

In this month’s call, Andersson said the government's various reformist efforts in the area of migration showed a “lack of coordination” and said they had “repeatedly missed how the proposals negatively affect foreign doctoral students and researchers”.

“Misjudgments and lack of analysis are endangering Sweden’s attractiveness,” Andersson wrote.

“During the current term of office, a wide range of changes have been proposed in the area of migration. Fortunately, some proposals have been put forward that could improve the situation for doctoral students and researchers from other countries, as also promised in the Tidö Agreement”, a political coalition deal reached in 2022.

“Unfortunately, the proposals have not yet been implemented,” he said.

Andersson said a lack of coordination between governmental investigations and misjudgements was threatening the supply of skills to the country.

He criticised the proposed “qualification period” for social security benefits for those coming to Sweden for work, as well as the proposal that one should not be allowed to retain a granted permanent residence permit if one stays abroad for more than one year.

Lack of evidence

He said the government’s support requirements were unreasonable: “One investigation includes a proposal to introduce a support requirement for relatives of researchers,” he wrote, arguing that the measure was proposed despite a lack of evidence suggesting problems with the current system.

Andersson criticised a proposal to revoke permanent residence permits for certain groups, which affects, among others, those who have been granted permanent residence permits by being granted long-term residency (varaktigt bosatt) status, which affects, among others, certain doctoral students and researchers.

He claimed that none of the government’s proposals have been accompanied by an analysis of how it will affect doctoral students and researchers “and thus Sweden’s attractiveness”.

“All of this highlights that the reform work has gone far too quickly and that there are major shortcomings in the coordination between the investigations.”

He said SULF was demanding that the government “take a comprehensive approach” that takes into account how its proposals affect doctoral students, researchers and other highly qualified people who are in Sweden or who could come here in the future.

“All proposals that make the ambition expressed by the government [to attract talent] more difficult should be thrown in the trash, and those proposals that make it easier should be implemented as soon as possible,” Andersson said.

The government is expected to present a new bill in early March on better conditions for doctoral candidates and researchers, he said.

Mixed signals

Agneta Bladh, former secretary of state for higher education and research and chair of the Swedish Research Council (2016 to 2022), who oversaw an investigation into Sweden’s increased internationalisation of universities and university colleges in 2018 to 2019, told University World News the “different signals” coming from the Swedish government was “very worrying for Sweden’s international collaboration” and its recruitment of good PhD students from other countries.

“Together with the strong focus on security, this reduces the possibilities for international collaboration, deeply needed in most academic disciplines for securing a good international standard,” Bladh said.

“At the same time there are more opportunities than ever in recruiting excellent researchers. So, the Swedish government talks with a double tongue: a hostile attitude towards immigrants is apparent in many remarks at the same time as an official science policy promoting international collaboration and responsible internationalisation,” Bladh said.

Topias Tolonen-Weckström, former chairperson of the Doctoral Committee at the Swedish National Union of Students, told University World News Sweden should aim for “as high a satisfaction rate for international doctoral students as possible so that they would consider staying in Sweden, recommend Sweden to their highly skilled peers, and, if applicable, return to Sweden if they have relocated somewhere else during their career”.

He said, as SULF’s notes show, such a rate is currently not high.

“While some of the legislation reforms proposed targeting doctoral students and researchers are well-intentioned and very welcome, the long implementation times, unclear policy goals, and the high number of changes create an unstable legal foundation for migration matters in Sweden.

“This, combined with the difficult goal of the Swedish government to simultaneously tighten migration for some and make it easier for others, creates a feeling of distrust and uneasiness which international researchers must tolerate while planning their career and life in Sweden.”

Tolonen-Weckström said that without a clear strategy and inclusion of international researchers in planning, it was difficult to see the Swedish government reaching its goals to make Sweden more attractive for international researchers and doctoral students.

Policies to limit immigration

Asked whether he believed the reforms were being deliberately delayed because of the influence on government of the right-wing Sweden Democrats (SD), Dr Bernd Parusel, senior researcher in political science at the Swedish Institute for European Policy Studies and an expert on migration, said: “I haven’t heard that reforms that would make a positive difference for doctoral students were being delayed intentionally.

“But as regards Swedish immigration policy as a whole, it is clear that SD has a strong influence on what the government is doing. And policies to limit immigration have certainly taken priority over policies that would encourage people to come to Sweden or to stay.”

Parusel said since the current government took office, many changes to Swedish migration had already been made, while others were still at the inquiry stage or at some other stage in the legislative process.

“And more ideas are being put forward. Swedish immigration law is constantly changing, and there have been so many changes that even experts have trouble following and understanding everything.”

Parusel said some inquiry results and proposals have also met strong criticism from various stakeholders, which meant it was “not an entirely easy task for the government offices to deal with”.

“And then there is the problem that it doesn’t always seem possible to keep policies to attract certain groups (such as researchers, high-skilled workers, and students to some degree) entirely separate from strict and deterrence-orientated policies targeting other groups (such as asylum seekers, low-skilled workers, and people migrating for family reasons),” he said.

“There can be certain overlaps between these policies when it comes to, for example, conditions for faily reunification, the temporariness of residence permits, the rights that come with residence permits, and immigrants’ welfare entitlements,” he noted.

However, Parusel said Sweden still had the “overall ambition” to control and limit immigration flows.

“It wants to be attractive for highly skilled people and international talent, but … if the overall message is that migration is a problem for Sweden rather than a benefit, then it becomes hard to talk about more generous and flexible regulations,” he concluded.