Higher Education Transformation in China and Its Global Implications

CIGI Policy Brief #3

John Whalley Yao Li Shunming Zhang Xiliang Zhao

May 1, 2008

A major transformation of higher education has been underway in China since 1999 and will have potential impacts for the global educational structure. Reflecting China's commitment to continued high growth through quality upgrading and the production of ideas and intellectual property as set out in both the tenth (2001-2005) and eleventh (2006-2010) five-year plans, this transformation focuses on major new resource commitments to tertiary education and also embodies significant changes in organizational form. Potential major impacts follow for China, the global economy, and for the global educational structure, reflecting the increasing global importance of China's educational system and the competitive impacts on global educational delivery.

About the Authors

John Whalley

Yao Li

Yao Li has worked on several CIGI research projects since May 2007. Currently a PhD candidate in the Department of Economics at the University of Western Ontario, her major fields of study are international trade, international macroeconomics and applied econometrics.

Between 2003 and 2005 she worked as a research fellow in the Planning Research Institute of China's Ministry of Information Industry. She holds BA (2001) and MA (2003) degrees in Economics from Peking University.

Shunming Zhang

Shunming Zhang is Professor of Economics and Finance at Xiamen University, China.

Xiliang Zhao

Xiliang Zhao is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Economics and the Wang Yanan Institute for Economic Studies at Xiamen University, China. He holds a PhD in Quantitative Economics from the School of Economics and Management, Tsinghua University, China.