A review of Jia, Li, and Cousineau’s landmark data-driven account of China’s national college entrance examination, arguing that the gaokao is best understood not merely as an educational sorting mechanism but as the archetype of a totalizing social tournament that organizes the entire political economy.
Abstract This paper examines the rapid growth of China’s science and technology (S&T) sector within the broader context of higher education, focusing on Hong Kong’s crucial yet understudied role in this transformation. While conventional narratives emphasize China’s relationship with the United States, our analysis reveals Hong Kong’s distinct contribution as a vital bridge in China’s scientific development. Drawing on comprehensive data from the Web of Science, institutional archives, university leader biographies, and PhD dissertation records, we identify three key patterns. First, Hong Kong ranks as one of mainland China’s key international collaborators in S&T alongside established nations like the UK, Japan, and Germany, though the U.S. remains the dominant partner. Second, this collaboration shows clear temporal characteristics, with partnerships intensifying during the 1990s as Hong Kong’s research doctoral programs matured and mainland students sought advanced training. Third, the collaboration exhibits distinct geographical patterns, with Beijing maintaining centrality despite distance, while Guangdong leverages its proximity to Hong Kong. Our findings challenge the perception of Hong Kong as merely a finance-driven city, revealing its role in fostering a robust academic community that facilitated knowledge transfer between mainland institutions and global scientific networks. This relationship thrived despite cultural and ideological differences, combining mainland China’s motivated talent pool with Hong Kong’s academic freedom and international connections. By documenting this understudied dimension of China’s educational development, this paper offers new insights into the forces behind the country’s emergence as a global scientific power. ...
Abstract Typically understood through a universal-statist framework, modern schooling in contemporary China often contributes to the disenchantment of ethnic students. Based on year-long research in a Tibetan-serving secondary school, we provide additional insight in this discussion. We argue that to treat disenchantment as a fixed state ignores the space-temporal quality of human action. The school’s social process is multiple and momentary in nature and often undermines the seemingly linear educational programming. Under the rigid school setting emerge social spaces that expand beyond academic lessons. In those spaces, students continue to interact among themselves and with teachers, where withdrawal and marginalization happen alongside negotiation, appropriation, and participation. While disenchantment anchors the classroom experience of many, it interpenetrates and enmeshes with other aspects of student lives and is interwoven over time. By considering this complex interplay of disenchantment we upend the notion of disenchantment as a singular state, and illustrate this idea through two examples. ...
A review of Le Lin’s study of China’s Supplementary Education Industry, arguing that the sector’s meteoric rise under legal ambiguity is best explained by a theory of opportunism, while raising underexplored questions about what the industry’s instrumental approach implies for the future of the teaching profession.
A review of Zachary Howlett’s ethnography of China’s Gaokao, arguing that the exam’s meritocratic promise conceals deep structural inequality while its remarkable social endurance demands more explanation than the book provides.