Re-imaging Chinese students abroad: Political subjects in the making

• In Event: Constructing identities through studying abroad

Proposal

Against the backdrop of world order reconfiguration marked by the rise of China and the weakening of many Western economies particularly after the 2008 financial crisis, the majority of globally mobile students from China have chosen major Western countries as their destinations for higher education. Despite the fact that democracy is a noteworthy marker of political difference between China and the West, the issue of these students’ experience of Western model of liberal democracy is yet to receive its due attention among the international education communities.

The neglect of this issue is partly due to that the existing literature on international education has constructed three primary images for Chinese international students, namely learners across cultures (Barker, 1997; Cortazzi & Jin, 1997; Forland & Kingston, 2008), consumers of international education market (Fang & Wang, 2014; Simpson & Tan, 2008), and important human capital (Bail & Shen, 2008; Biao, 2006; OECD, 2008; Pan, 2010; Zweig, 2006). Moreover, this neglect has been perpetuated by neoliberalism as policy, ideology and governmentality (Larner, 2000). As Brown (2011) argues forcefully, this neo-liberalization of higher education jeopardizes the very existence of democracy because it tends to force universities, particularly public ones, to neglect their duty to educate students to become “a people oriented toward common concerns and governing itself” (p. 36).

With recourse to history, this paper argues that Chinese international students should also be imaged as political subjects in the making during their stay in host countries, an image that may have bearings not just on the Chinese politics but even on world politics in the 21st century. The argument is mainly built on a critical review of the history of China’s democratization since the late 19th century, a history divided into three periods: the Late Qing Period (1840 AD - 1911 AD), the Republican Period (1912 AD - 1949 AD), and the Socialist Period (1949 AD - present). The review will highlight the extremely important, if not the central, role of Chinese students with formal and/or informal international education experience in China’s democratization process, particularly their contributions to theories, policies and practices regarding Chinese democracy. The paper will conclude by suggesting three key thematic areas that may underpin the long overdue inquiry into the political subject formation process of Chinese students abroad, namely the political dimension of these students’ international education experience, their meaning making of the concept of democracy, and their engagement with democratic practices in host countries.

Author

• Gang Li, University of British Columbia