Revisiting Equality and Equity Issues in Chinese Higher Education: A Discussion in the Post-Massification Era With a Focus on Regional Disparities

• In Event: 28.044 - Analyzing Equality and Social Justice in Higher Education in China

Abstract

This paper revisits issues relating to equality and equity in Chinese higher education—with a particular focus on the regional disparities, and the manner in which these issues have been characterised and examined in the relevant discourse. Broadly speaking, this paper looks at the post-1990s situation, and gives particular attention to the important and very new government initiative, the so called “dual first-class” initiative (aiming to boost first-class universities and first-class discipline programs on Chinese soil), which in turn has changed and complicated the dynamics with respect to regional as well as institutional inequality in Chinese higher education. The discourse is unfolded in two ways: on one hand, Chinese government has been putting in efforts (and resources) to address inequality issues; on the other hand, the new initiative inevitably fuels competition, which in turn boosts inequality in various ways, in terms of both material and human resource, as well as emergence of new higher education centers such as Shenzhen, Qingdao and Suzhou.

Specifically, this paper aims to address such questions: 1) In the post-massification era, is the Chinese situation of equality and equity in higher education improved or deteriorated? 2) What makes the core issues with respect to equality and equity in Chinese higher education? 3) How do those core issues evolve or change over the time, and what does the evolution or change indicate and entail? Methodologically this paper carries certain characteristics of a mixed-methods study, using a bibliometric analysis to detect the focuses/themes in literature and their changes over the time. Then it looks into each thematic terrain to gain insights into the equality and equity issues as well as their evolutions/development. In general, this paper provides a timely and critical reflection on evolution of the situation of equality and equity in Chinese higher education since the late 1990s, and the discourses analysing issues of inequality.

Author

• Qiang Zha, York University