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Abstract
The structure of higher education in China is characterized by a high degree of hierarchy as well as strong homogeneity, differing from not only American higher education, which features a high degree of both hierarchy and heterogeneity, but also higher education in continental Europe, which exhibits a low degree of hierarchy. Previous studies have provided analysis of the structural characteristics of higher education in the United States, Europe, and elsewhere, as well as their differences, but have been unable to explain the situation in China. Drawing on Pierre Bourdieu’s field theory, this article proposes an explanatory model for the field of higher education as shaped by state power. The state created various forms of symbolic capital linked to economic capital in the field of higher education, and monopolized the quantity in which and means by which these are bestowed, thus causing differentiation in the total amount and composition of symbolic capital and economic capital between different schools, and forming a steeply stratified structure. The bestowal of symbolic capital was not restricted to a particular group of institutions of higher education: instead, the scope of this bestowal was gradually expanded, such that the vast majority of institutions of higher education regard the acquisition of symbolic capital and its attendant economic capital as the objective in their endeavors, resulting in the development of strong homogeneity between institutions. The article applies field theory to three key universities policies after the founding of New China, to describe and analyze the influence of symbolic capital on the field structure of higher education in China.
Notes
1 In China, although state power is vast, it is not wholly without competitors in terms of the demarcation of fields. In reality, discourses on traditional academic freedoms and autonomy for universities stemming from the universities of the West and the Republic of China have long been powerful competitors to state power, and are often employed by domestic scholars and school operators to strive for autonomy. Furthermore, such discourses have been partially absorbed into the policies on higher education: for instance, institutions of higher education are encouraged to formulate a charter, and are granted autonomy in student recruitment and the conferral of degrees, et cetera; these can all be regarded as acknowledgement of an concessions to university autonomy on the part of state power. In addition, following the development of globalization, a globalized field of higher education is currently taking shape, and international affairs and international planning have also become powerful competitors to state power. However, at present, the state is still the central definer of the field of higher education.
2 After the founding of the People’s Republic of China, one urgent task in the education sector was the unification of educational system. In 1951, the Government Administration Council issued the “Decision on the Reform of Educational System” (Guanyu gaige xuezhi de jueding) that enacted new educational system, and called for “the establishment of schools in higher education as various types of institutions of higher education, such as universities, specialized colleges, and technical schools.” Multiple disciplines were established at universities, while specialized colleges established a single discipline, such as finance, teacher training, agriculture, forestry, medicine, and so on. Technical programs had a shorter period of schooling compared with the other two categories, and the diplomas which they provided were inferior to institutions in the undergraduate category. Because the applied sciences encompass a number of rather specialized disciplines, this category was divided into multidisciplinary applied sciences and monodisciplinary applied sciences: Harbin Institute of Technology was an example of the former, while Beijing Institute of Posts and Telecommunications was an example of the latter. This article primarily focuses on the phenomenon of stratification and homogeneity among undergraduate institutions, so it does not provide an analysis of technical schools.
3 The 1951 “Decision on the Reform of Educational System” stipulated that “Universities and specialized colleges may establish graduate departments, with a term of study of two years or more, for recruitment of university and specialized college graduates or those with equivalent educational attainment, to train qualified teachers for institutions of higher education and talented personnel for scientific research, in cooperation with the Chinese Academy of Sciences and other research organizations.” The “Notice on the Issuance of the Provisional Methods for Training of Graduate Students at Institutions of Higher Education (Draft)” (Guanyu fabu gaodeng xuexiao peiyang yanjiusheng zanxing banfa [cao’an] de tongzhi) issued by the Department of Higher Education in 1953 stipulated that: “Any higher school which has engaged experts from the Soviet Union (or experts from people’s democratic countries) or has relatively good conditions in terms of qualified teachers should take on the task of training graduate students, with the aim of cultivating qualified teachers for institutions of higher education and talented personnel for scientific research.”
4 The 1959 policy on key universities clearly stated, “Without the approval of the central authorities, it is not permitted to further expand the size of a school, nor is it permitted to increase the number of enrolled students or add subjects and departments”; it also provided clear and specific stipulations in the form of lists with respect to the number of majors, annual undergraduate student recruitment, and the maximum scale of the undergraduate program at the then-16 key universities. In April 1964, the special dispatch “Report on Authorization of the Scale of Development and Establishment of Majors at National Key Institutions of Higher Education” (Guangyu shending quanguo zhongdian gaodeng xuexiao fazhan guimo he zhuanye shezhi de baogao) make adjustments based on the circumstances at each school, reducing the former scale of student recruitment, determining principles for the restructuring of majors, and providing stipulations with respect to the maximum scale of the then-61 key universities (not including 3 institutions subordinate to the Military Commission), encompassing the undergraduate, graduate, and advanced teacher training programs, along with annual undergraduate recruitment quotas derived from the scale of the given institution. In May 1959, Premier Zhou Enlai 周恩来 warmly urged Tianjin University to control its quotas: “There are nearly ten thousand students now, which must certainly be controlled in the future; one must not always pursue high-speed development in terms of quantity, thus reducing quality.”
5 The 3 institutions of higher education originating in the Liberated Areas were: Renmin University of China, Harbin Institute of Technology, and Beijing Institute of Technology. The 14 institutions established after Liberation were: Beijing Agricultural University, Beijing Institute of Aeronautics, University of Science and Technology of China, East China Normal University, Harbin Military Institute of Engineering, Jilin University, Dalian Institute of Technology, Nanjing Institute of Technology, South China Institute of Technology, Jilin University of Technology, Central South Institute of Mining and Metallurgy, and Chengdu Institute of Radio Engineering. The remaining 20 institutions of higher education listed in Table 1 all originated as universities in the Republican era.
6 Another version of the list of national key universities, which has been widely distributed online, includes 99 institutions. In comparing the two lists, 93 of the institutions coincide, and are not disputed, while another 9 institutions diverge. The China Education Yearbook includes China Medical University, the University of International Relations, and Guangdong Institute of Chemical Technology, while the other version of the list includes Nanjing Agricultural Institute, Nanjing Pharmaceutical Institute, Beijing Language Institute, Chengdu Institute of Technology, First Military Medical University, and Xi’an Institute of Metallurgy and Architecture. This article adopted the version found in the China Education Yearbook.
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Notes on contributors
Li Xiaohong
Li Xiaohong is affiliated with the Department of Sociology, School of Political Science and International Relations, Tongji University, Shanghai.