INTERNATIONALIZATION THROUGH CONVENTIONS: THE PUBLICITY OF THIS KIND OF AGREEMENT IN THE HIGHER EDUCATION INSTITUTIONS (HEIs) WEBSITES

Universities, as research centers, producers and disseminators of knowledge, are a key part of any plan of social and economic development of the national states, especially in a context of intensifying international competition in the most diverse areas that can generate some wealth. The technical-scientific improvement of societies requires that the training of qualified professionals be perennial in order to meet the ever present demand for skilled labor, fulfilling the role of the driving force of the national intelligentsia. On the other hand, the answers to the demands mentioned above may not necessarily be in the domestic environment, but in the workforce that comes from outside the country. When it comes to scientific research and development, the gray matter competes for a national state to achieve the highest successes in these criteria, a fact that has long been perceived by developed powers. The powerful strategy of co-opting brains in foreign lands often gives excellent results to those who do it, not only financially and intellectually, but especially concerning ideological and cultural issues. Attracting students and professors through the offering of scholarships, dialoguing with international entities, establishing contacts through agreements and selling the image of an open and cosmopolitan institution is becoming more and more usual among higher education institutions (HEIs) that propose to university internationalization. In this sense, international conventions play a very important role, since they are the ones who will establish dialogue and link universities from different countries, in order to generate useful cooperation for both. The conventions should be understood as legal adjustment modes between HEIs, public or private, aiming at reciprocity and establishing common scientific and technical activities for a certain period of time. Brazilian public HEIs generally publish their agreements through their websites - at least a small text - in addition to a summary, in order to comply with the constitutional principle of publicity, as far as public institutions are concerned, in the official press of each state, or of the Union, in the case of federal institutions. This paper deals with how each HEIs carries out the disclosure on its website of each agreement it signs. Fifteen HEIs, from different countries – including Brazil – and different regions of the planet were selected. We could realize each one uses different ways of publicizing their conventions. To sum up, the access to this kind of information depends on a institutional policy and interests.