The USA is the primary destination for higher education in the world. According to a report from the Institute of International Education (IIE) (1) more than a half a million foreign students study at American universities. The number of postdocs and researchers from other countries is around 86'000. It is claimed that foreign students alone spend 12 billion dollars a year.

Falling tendency

The number of foreigners at US universities had been steadily climbing, but this changed after the 11th September 2001, reports the scientific journal Nature (2003, 426: 5). Increased security measures seem to be having an effect. The number of foreign students registered at US universities stagnated this year for the first time since 1971, as the IIE states in its report. As far as physics is concerned, a survey from the American Institute of Physics shows that the proportion of foreign graduates has fallen, from a high of 55 per cent in the academic year 2000/01, by 10 per cent, writes the magazine "Physik in unserer Zeit“ in its current edition (6/2003).

Even though a lower intake from Islamic countries accounts for the most of the fall, fewer students from Western Europe are choosing to matriculate at US universities as well. This is also confirmed by a report in "Zeit", which investigates conditions and the situation of German students in the US. As for Switzerland, after a slow increase during the nineties, which peaked at 1,893 in 1999/2000, the number of Swiss students studying at US universities has fallen to 1,562 in 2002.

Few negative experiences

Does this tendency also hold for ETH students? According to an inquiry at ETH Zurich's Student Exchange Office, no difference has been ascertained. Demand has remained constant after 11th September 2001 at around 50 students seeking an exchange position each year. This is perhaps because the necessary administrative procedure for the students is undertaken by the guest university, says Rita Gilli from the ETH's Student Exchange Office. What has changed is that students now have to present themselves for an interview at the US Embassy, which means that time schedules are sometimes tight. Despite a wealth of anecdotal evidence making the international rounds about problems encountered by researchers and students wanting to enter the US, Gilli says that she personally has heard no such stories.

Nor has Ruben Kretzschmar, ETH Professor for Soil Chemistry and US citizen, had any problems to date with his trips to the US: "My team and I go to the US several times a year for experiments or meetings. None of us has ever had any problems on entering the country." Naturally security measures at the airports have been stepped up, but this is also the case in Europe. Nor have they had any trouble with material they sometimes need to take with them, such as pipettes or X-ray detectors. Kretzschmar points out that his team of researchers is made up of citizens from various European countries.

"No, I haven't experienced any of the problems that seem to beset other European postdocs or students,“ says Christiane Marti-Meyers, who, until the beginning of 2003 worked in the team around ETH chemistry professor Erick M. Carreira, and who is now on a postdoc stay at the Californian Institute of Technology in Pasadena. The researcher claims that, in general, the people in California were liberally inclined. Most of them showed an understanding, for example, of the negative reaction from most European countries to the war in Iraq.

"No free country can shut itself off"

Theo Wallimann, professor at the ETH Institute of Cell Biology is very decided in his criticism of the new immigration policies of the US. "No 'free' country can shut itself off as the US is doing at the moment in its frantic search for security," he is convinced. The security that the country hopes to achieve by this means is illusory. The situation reminds Wallimann of something Friedrich Dürrenmatt wrote: "Peace threatens to be more dangerous than war". The biologist is convinced that the US will be faced with unforeseeable and serious consequences, above all in socio-cultural and scientific areas, but also in business. He finds confirmation for his fears in the sinking number of foreign students in the US. Wallimann thinks that the US immigration authorities exaggerate. One only submits once to a body search – simply because one has the wrong profession, such as weapon's expert or journalist.

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Do students need to protest?

Is the fall in the numbers of foreign students and researchers at US universities a chance for our own? Wallimann thinks this is possible. But he also adds that the financial means in Europe would have to be assured to diminish the brain drain to the United States. In Switzerland especially austere budget cutting policies in education and research will be fatal. Developments in Germany should be warning enough. Without an increase in research funding in Europe, he predicts that a lot of scientists will try their luck in the US, despite adverse political circumstances. This is why Wallimann asks: do we really need research lobbying in Switzerland, or do students need to demonstrate on the streets as they used to?

Such protests arose in 1993 after the first attacks on the World Trade Center. As a consequence of this event the US set up Sevis, the "Student and Exchange Visitor Information System".

"If the government in Washington puts its plans for research surveillance into practice, the damage to research and teaching in America could be considerable", says Flavia Schlegel, qualified physician and Science Counselor in Washington in the Neue Zürcher Zeitung. "The next step taken by the Bush administration will show whether the principle from the Reagan era still holds, namely that the benefit of research that is as free as possible is greater than the risk of abuse.“