China's Soft Power and Higher Education in South Asia

Rationale, Strategies, and Implications

Romi Jain

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9781000388817
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Didattica
• Subtopic: Didattica generale

This empirical work illuminates how China uses the higher education mechanism in South Asia to advance its national interests and investigates the outcomes for China, including both challenges and opportunities.

Using a soft power theoretical framework, this book employs the case study of Nepal, a South Asian country of profound geostrategic value for the two competing powers of China and India. Illustrating how higher education is the mechanism for achieving soft power goals, it draws on data analysis based on archival sources and interviews with China and South Asia experts, including academics and politico-bureaucratic elites, as well as interviews with Nepalese students and alumni. Importantly though, this book advances an innovative conceptual model of geointellect to trace the evolving dimensions of China's global dominance in higher education, research, and innovation paradigm, especially in the context of the Belt and Road Initiative and ultimately reveals how foreign policy and higher education policy reinforce each other in the context of China.

China's Soft Power and Higher Education in South Asia provides an empirically rich resource for students and scholars of education, international relations, Asian studies, and China's soft power.

Part 1

1 Introduction

Soft Power and the Internationalization of Higher Education

Introduction

In his address to the 19th Congress of the Chinese Communist Party, 2017, President Xi Jinping said, “The great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation is no walk in the park or mere drum-beating and gong-clanging” (ZD, 2017). Indeed, China’s meteoric rise in terms of economic and military capabilities has been fundamentally powered by an unceasing turbine of the national ambition to emerge as a superpower, replacing America—though not officially claimed. Some Sinologists interpret this quest as a characteristic of “the Middle Kingdom mentality” (Xianlin and Sigley, 2000), while some view it is as a resurgence of Tianxia (French, 2017). Regardless of the nomenclature, China’s resurgence as a global power is indubitable.

A quick flashback of Communist China’s power trajectory reveals the driving role of the three major developments at domestic and international levels. First, under the visionary leadership of Deng Xiaoping, the architect of the open-door policy, economic reforms brought about a fundamental shift from centralized planning to “emancipation of the productive forces” (Jain, 2017, p. 69). Second, China fortuitously got an enviable opportunity to emerge as an influential actor in world politics, following the demise of the Soviet Union in December 1991. Third, China derived a maximum benefit from joining the World Trade Organization (WTO) in December 2001, following 15 years of relentless pursuit of its membership. This was possible as the WTO, a watchdog of a fair and rule-based international trade regime, provided a level-playing field in global trade, commerce, and investment areas.

China’s success story in the economic domain was prominently noticeable when its GDP growth rate averaged 10.5% between 2001 and 2010. Its impressive economic performance earned the epithet of the “Beijing Consensus,” though controversial (Kennedy, 2010), denoting vindication of the Chinese model of “authoritarian capitalism” in contrast to the Washington Consensus based on the “primacy of the market.” The growing economic might enabled China to initiate mega flagship projects such as the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI)—a colossal transnational program of infrastructural connectivity across Asia, Africa, and Europe—the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), and the Shanghai-based New Development Bank, setting off on the path to building a China-centric economic order (Jain, 2018). More so, in the Asia Power Index, which measures national power in economy, military capability, defense, and culture, China ranks second—after the United States—among 25 countries in the Asia-Pacific region.

More important, China’s influence is outspreading beyond military and economic domains of global power with its proactive policy of internationalization of higher education (Mok and Ong, 2014). It is evident from a host of practices—promotion of Chinese language and culture via Confucius Institutes, international students’ recruitment, student exchange programs, and international scientific and technological collaborations with universities and research institutions. In statistical terms, China has the world’s largest higher education system in terms of student enrolment, which rose to 38.33 million in 2018 from 36.9 million in 2016, with a gross enrolment rate¹ of 48.1%. Also, the number of its higher education institutions went up from 1,867 in 2006 to 2,914 on May 31, 2017, of which 2,631 are ordinary institutions (including 265 independent colleges) and 283 adult colleges and universities (Ministry of Education, 2017).

Realistically enough, higher education lies at the vortex of several critical goals for the Chinese central leadership (Jain, 2019). First, it is a nation-branding asset. According to the Chinese Ministry of Education report of 2019, a total of 492,185 international students from 196 countries/areas were studying in 1,004 higher education institutions in mainland China’s 31 provinces/autonomous regions/provincial-level municipalities, “marking an increase of 3,013 students or 0.62% compared to 2017” (Ministry of Education of the People’s Republic of China, n.d.). Chinese universities have consistently advanced in international rankings, with Tsinghua University and Peking University figuring among the top 25 universities in the Times Higher Education World University Rankings, 2020.

Of late, China has embarked on expanding the frontiers of its higher education and research enterprise in different regions of the world—a subset of its global power project. I term it geointellect (Jain, 2019), discussed in Part II of this book. It merits a mention that with the launch of the BRI, China is poised to expand its global footprint in higher education, driven by its quest for building “empires of knowledge” (Wojciuk, 2018). Other than that, China’s higher education and research engagement in different parts of the world are deemed indispensable for supporting the BRI flagship projects that require a massive supply of human capital. According to China Daily, “The Chinese Academy of Sciences has trained nearly 5,000 high-level scientific and technology students from countries and regions involved [in] the Belt and Road Initiative since 2013, including more than 1,500 doctoral and master’s degree students” (Zhihao, 2019, April 20).

Second, higher education is an instrument of statecraft in fulfilling specific geopolitical and geoeconomic objectives such as carving out the sphere of influence and ensuring the expansion of global markets for its products, including cultural goods. For example, Qiang, Shen, and Xie (2019) find that cultural diffusion through Confucius Institutes significantly contributed to China’s inbound tourism. Third, higher education is the key to operationalizing China’s strategic plan to prepare a pool of “huge talented resources by 2020” and beyond, with the target of generating revenue of 2 trillion yuan (about $303.7 billion) from the human resources industry (“China aims to expand,” October 12, 2017). Indeed, the quality of human capital is categorically important for driving technological innovation—the cornerstone of the new growth model as envisaged in China’s 13th five-year plan. It constitutes a major departure from the export-reliant and carbon-based unsustainable growth. Fourth, in realizing the “Chinese Dream” of national rejuvenation, higher education serves as a platform for promoting Chinese culture, language, and civilizational values globally. This, in Chinese perception, might help reverse its negative image as an expansionist and aggressive nation.

Fifth, the higher education domain serves as the “vanguard” of reaffirming the legitimacy of the monolithic Communist system and firming up the grip of the ruling leadership under Xi Jinping in maintaining the regime’s absolute control. This essentially requires ideational regimentation through a well-calibrated strategy of circumscription of the frontiers of discourse, information dissemination, research, and knowledge through regime-sanctioned ideological and cognitive concepts (such as the “sinicisation of Marxism”). It also involves political indoctrination-oriented courses, “acquiescence” (Perry, 2015) of intellectuals, and research in indigenous “discourse power.” For example, Pan and Lo (2018) argue that “PRC’s sovereignty over Hong Kong (HK) has diverted HK’s higher education policy from its British past to conform with the mainland Chinese paradigm” (p. 56). Examples include harmonization of HK’s education system with China’s (such as changing HK’s three-year undergraduate curricula four years); emphasis in HK’s new curricula on “identity” and “competitiveness” as citizen attributes; and a mandatory senior secondary Liberal Studies course to “teach about HK development, modern China, and the world, and to nurture students’ simultaneous identities as local, national, and global citizens” (p.67). In effect, the twin but opposite undercurrents of diffusion (global outreach) and domestic control underpin China’s higher education policy, of which the former constitutes the focus of this book.

The unforeseen development in the form of the COVID-19 pandemic, originating from China’s Wuhan, seems to have taken the sheen off China’s profile in the internationalization of higher education, at least temporarily. Dennis, an expert in international student recruitment, opines that “Chinese master plan to become the #1 importer of international students is in question. University deans and recruiters will be hard-pressed to recommend, without reservation, future exchange programs on Chinese campuses.”² On other hand, Altbach and de Wit (2020) argue that the mobility of international students could be momentarily affected but “at least in the areas of higher education internationalization, the status quo will largely prevail” (“Strategic Planning” section). In any case, the book focuses on China’s goals, strategies, outcomes, and challenges, vis-à-vis its higher education project in South Asia from a long-term perspective.

China and South Asia

With a population of 1.67 billion, accounting for 24% of the world’s population with a one-fifth of its population between 15 and 24 years of age, South Asia comprises seven countries—Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal, Pakistan, Maldives, and Sri Lanka³—the last two ones are littoral states situated in the Indian Ocean. Of them, Bhutan, India, Nepal, and Pakistan share borders with China.

Beijing has leaped across military and defense cooperation to deepen its strategic footprint in this geostrategically significant region, sitting astride “the strategic sea lanes of communication between the Orient and the Occident through the Indian Ocean” (Muni, 1991, p. 117). Moreover, South Asia is known not only as a cradle of ancient civilization but also as a mosaic of linguistic, ethnic, religious, and cultural diversity. In terms of global trade and commerce, the region is the hub of “future middle-class growth” (Wenqian, 2016). However, it turned out as a flashpoint of conflict following India and Pakistan carrying out nuclear weapons tests in May 1998, inviting the attention of the international community. It is a well-known fact that Pakistan became a nuclear-armed state because of China’s transfer of “nuclear and missile materials and technology” (Paul, 2003, p. 1). The Sino-Pakistan relationship, traced to the 1963 Border Agreement, is “a model of friendship” in world politics, facilitating China’s strategic presence in South Asia. With its strengthened military and economic muscles, China has been able to expand and stabilize its political and security stranglehold on South Asia with an aim to counter India’s traditionally predominant influence over the region through the policy of India’s “strategic encirclement” (Daniels, 2013).

India’s predominant position in South Asia is manifest from its giant size, huge population second to China’s, growing gross domestic product (GDP), and unprecedented technological, military, nuclear, and missile capabilities. India has traditionally been a principal aid donor to South Asian countries such as Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka for their economic development. As regards Nepal, a landlocked country, it has been virtually dependent on Indian ports to transport its goods for external trade. India’s close historical and cultural ties with Nepal brought the two countries closer. But however, Nepal gradually drifted away from Indian influence, especially with the installation of the Maoist government in August 2008, led by Prime Minister Prachanda with a tilt toward China. Further, India has an image of a regional hegemon among a vast majority of South Asian states. This reflects from India’s host of actions such as its direct military role in the liberation of Bangladesh as an independent nation in December 1971; the first nuclear explosion (“peaceful nuclear explosion”) carried out in May 19...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half-Title
• Series
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• List of illustrations
• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• Acronyms
• PART 1
• PART 2
• PART 3
• Index