Higher Education in Post-Mao China

Book excerpt: Since the death of Chairman Mao in 1976, China has embarked upon the Four Modernizations reform programme that has transformed the social, economic and political landscape of the world's most populous nation. Higher education has been ascribed a key supporting role and has itself undergone major reforms. This book looks beyond the articulated goals and accomplishments of the modernization of higher education in China. It delves into the grass roots reality and identifies the true achievements, the unintended outcomes and the major obstacles that still have to be overcome. Incorporating twenty chapters from the new generation of scholars from inside and outside China, Higher Education in Post-Mao China presents in-depth analyses of the impact of educational reforms on tertiary educators, the curriculum, the economic structure, women, and students' values and aspirations. In conveying the Chinese experience of higher education reform over the past two decades, this book makes a major contribution to contemporary sinology and comparative education.