Internationalisation is perceived as crucial by policy makers and university managers, especially in small higher education systems, as it helps gain legitimacy and encourages policy learning as well as capacity building for these systems and their higher education institutions. At the same time, studies have shown that implementation of internationalisation is not a straightforward process in different systems due to different academic disciplinary cultures and traditions, closure of academic communities and their resistance to internationalisation when it is perceived as a threat (Leišytė, Želvys, 2022; Leišytė, Želvys, Zenkienė, 2009). This contribution focuses on the academics’ views on their institutional focus on research excellence and internationalisation and to what extent they are involved in international research activities in three small higher education systems – Lithuania, Croatia and Slovenia (Flander et al. 2022). Based on the international APIKS survey data (2022), we draw on the surveyed academics at research universities in the three Central and Central Europe systems. The findings show that even though internationalisation of research and research excellence rhetoric is high on the policy agenda across the studied higher education systems, the implications for institutions and individual academics vary due to different foci, policy approaches and historical legacies. We especially discuss differences and similarities among academic views by gender, academic rank and discipline.

Leišytė, L. & Želvys, R. (2021). International perspectives on transforming management of higher education [Sonderheft]. Acta Paedagogica Vilnensia, 46. https://www.journals.vu.lt/acta-paedagogica-vilnensia/article/view/24847/24058 Leišytė, L., Želvys, R. & Zenkienė, L. (2015). Re-contextualization of the Bologna process in Lithuania. European Journal of Higher Education, 5(1), Special Issue: Europeanization, Internationalization and Higher Education Reforms in Central and Eastern Europe, 49–67. https://dx.doi.org/10.1080/21568235.2014.951669 Flander, A., Kočar, S., Ćulum Ilić, B., Leišytė, L., Pekşen, S. & Rončević, N. (2022). Impact of internationalisation strategies on academics' international research activities: Case study of the three HE peripheries: Slovenia, Croatia and Lithuania. In M. Klemenčič (Ed.), From actors to reforms in European higher education: A Festschrift for Pavel Zgaga (S. 313–336). Cham: Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-09400-2_22