Let nine universities blossom: opportunities and constraints on the development of higher education in China

ABSTRACT

China’s pursuit of global superpower status compels the country to make coordinated efforts across numerous sectors. Global leadership in higher education is one example and provides a case study in how resource support and strategic vision can generate ‘quick wins’ in reputation and rankings. The ascendancy of Peking University, Tsinghua University and Fudan University, among others, has positioned China to attract top-tier faculty and supports local innovation ecosystems through collaborative research capacity. However, universities with global visibility account for only a fraction of China’s university enrollment, and reputational stagnation among universities outside the elite ‘C9 League’ has implications for regional economic development, geographic diffusion of innovation, and workforce competitiveness. This article offers explanations for why China has not developed a cadre of globally competitive non-elite universities in the same vein as many Western countries. Issues explored include the institutional and political contexts of university governance, national strategic focus on high-visibility institutions, near-exclusive emphasis on KPIs measured by university ranking indices, and concerns about academic freedom and their cooling effects on research and faculty recruitment.

KEYWORDS:

• China
• higher education policy
• managerialism
• political ideology
• university rankings
• knowledge economy
• knowledge competition

Acknowledgment

We thank Dr. Alex He, Education University of Hong Kong, for helpful insights.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 In 2020, China is expected to have 8.74 million new tertiary graduates (Xinhua, 2019), outpacing the United States twofold (3.96 million; NCES, n.d.).

2 The C9 League is considered the country’s most prestigious group of universities. It includes: Peking University, Tsinghua University, Fudan University, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Nanjing University, University of Science and Technology of China, Zhejiang University, Xi'an Jiao Tong University, and Harbin Institute of Technology. (http://en.people.cn/203691/7822275.html; accessed 9 Aug 2020)

3 The motivations behind this policy change are addressed in (https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-00574-8 accessed 9 Aug 2020)