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China education
CommentUnited States
Philip G. Altbach
Philip G. Altbach

Opinion | How academic progress in China and the West will suffer as a result of growing mistrust

  • Universities in the US and elsewhere have responded to growing suspicion of Chinese intentions by cutting joint programmes and restricting Chinese researchers
  • It surely won’t be long before China begins to curtail student numbers abroad

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Illustration: Craig Stephens
Philip G. Altbach

Universities in major countries have come to rely on Chinese students for enrolment, dependent to some extent on them to balance budgets and, in some cases, fill empty seats. A significant number of postdoctoral researchers, necessary for staffing research laboratories and who sometimes teach, also come from China. But China’s global higher education role is about to change significantly – with implications for the rest of the world.

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One-third of the 1.1 million international students in the US are from China. Similar proportions are found in some of the major receiving countries, such as Australia (38 per cent) and the UK (41 per cent of non-EU students). This has created an unsustainable situation of overdependence.

There are also major challenges relating to China’s Confucius Institutes and Chinese participation in research in several host countries, as well as other issues. In short, there are a number of key points of conflict and crisis that are affecting China’s higher-education relations with important partners.
Notably, China’s footprint in the sector is huge. It is by far the biggest exporter of students, with more than 600,000 studying abroad in 2017. Moreover, China is itself active as a host of international students in higher education. About 490,000 students from abroad, the large majority from other Asian countries, are studying in China. The multibillion-dollar “Belt and Road Initiative” has a significant higher-education component.

Within China, several important transformations are taking place. Demographic trends combined with the dramatic expansion of its higher-education system mean there are now more opportunities for study in the country. Billions have been spent upgrading the top 100 or more Chinese universities. Geographically mobile students will find China’s best universities more accessible than ever.

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