China in the global field of international student mobility: an analysis of economic, human and symbolic capitals

ABSTRACT

The global landscape of higher education is an uneven field where players like nation-states are placed in hierarchical and centre-periphery relations. This paper focuses on the global field of international student mobility (ISM) and investigates China’s place in the field using an analytical framework consisting of three key categories of ‘capital’: economic, human, and symbolic. Drawing on existing scholarship and author’s first-hand ethnographic research, the paper examines the case of China as both a source and a destination of ISM, and analyses the flows and accrual of these three forms of capital as consequences of outbound and inbound student mobilities. Analyses show that in a global ISM field characterised by asymmetries and inequalities, China’s place is arguably semi-peripheral economically and symbolically. It is argued that this country-focused macro perspective complements existing ISM scholarship’s emphasis on social reproduction at individual and private levels.

KEYWORDS:

• International student mobility
• educational mobility
• higher education
• international students
• China

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. It would be interesting to ask why in this case the Chinese government would engage in a state-to-state student mobility programme that seemingly leads to brain drain. Other than the relatively small scale of this programme in the broader scheme of things, it is important to note that since the 1990s, the Chinese state has liberalised its attitude towards the outbound student mobility, seeking not to restrict mobility to curtail brain drain. Encapsulated in the slogan ‘support study overseas, encourage returns, guarantee freedom of movement’ (zhi chi liu xue, gu li hui guo, lai qu zi you) (see Xiang 2011, 827), this liberalised attitude arguably signifies a transnational approach that views emigrated Chinese as contributing to China indirectly or as diasporic human capital who remain loyal, and can potentially be mobilised and even re-nationalised through potential return migration or overseas engagement (Xiang, Yeoh, and Toyota 2013). However, there is no systematic evidence regarding the effectiveness of this transnational human capital approach.