China and Europe on the New Silk Road: Connecting Universities Across Eurasia 2020937526, 9780198853022, 0198853025

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China and Europe on the New Silk Road

China and Europe on the New Silk Road Connecting Universities Across Eurasia Edited by

Marijk van der Wende, William C. Kirby, Nian Cai Liu, and Simon Marginson

1

1 Great Clarendon Street, Oxford, OX2 6DP, United Kingdom Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries © Oxford University Press 2020 The moral rights of the authors have been asserted First Edition published in 2020 Impression: 1 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, by licence or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics rights organization. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above You must not circulate this work in any other form and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press 198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016, United States of America British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Data available Library of Congress Control Number: 2020937526 ISBN 978–0–19–885302–2 Printed and bound in Great Britain by Clays Ltd, Elcograf S.p.A. Links to third party websites are provided by Oxford in good faith and for information only. Oxford disclaims any responsibility for the materials contained in any third party website referenced in this work.

China and Europe on the New Silk Road

China and Europe on the New Silk Road Connecting Universities Across Eurasia Edited by

Marijk van der Wende, William C. Kirby, Nian Cai Liu, and Simon Marginson

1

1 Great Clarendon Street, Oxford, OX2 6DP, United Kingdom Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries © Oxford University Press 2020 The moral rights of the authors have been asserted First Edition published in 2020 Impression: 1 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, by licence or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics rights organization. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above You must not circulate this work in any other form and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press 198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016, United States of America British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Data available Library of Congress Control Number: 2020937526 ISBN 978–0–19–885302–2 Printed and bound in Great Britain by Clays Ltd, Elcograf S.p.A. Links to third party websites are provided by Oxford in good faith and for information only. Oxford disclaims any responsibility for the materials contained in any third party website referenced in this work.

Preface The global order, based on international governance and multilateral trade mech­an­ isms, built in the aftermath of World War II, is changing rapidly. Notably Brexit and the retreat of the USA from multilateralism have created waves of uncertainty, not the least in the field of higher education, regarding international cooperation, the free movement of students, academics, scientific knowledge and ideas. Meanwhile, China is launching new global initiatives with its “New Silk Road” (NSR), “One Belt One Road” (OBOR), or “Belt and Road Initiative” (BRI). Maps show the belt and road as lines that trace the routes of ancient “Silk Roads” that traversed Eurasia and the seas between China and Africa. But China’s current geopolitical ambitions are clearly broader, covering economic as well as strategic goals and including a “Pacific Silk Road,” a “Silk Road on Ice” that crosses the Arctic Ocean, and even a “Digital Silk Road” through cyberspace. China is developing its higher education and research systems at speed, and is actively seeking to cooperate with academic partners along the New Silk Road. While clearly boosting the internationalization of Chinese higher education ­institutions, it is unclear how these new relationships will affect European higher education and research; how this cooperation will contribute to addressing the global challenges we are all being faced with, and to the global common good; how this emerging reality can conform with current Western views and growing criticism of China concerning the key values of an open society, the belief in fundamental human rights, dignity, and the rule of law; and how the growing tensions between US and Chinese trade and security agendas and neo-nationalist trends influence col­ lab­or­ation. How can universities tackle these and stand firm to defend internatio­ nalization, autonomy, and academic freedom? Clearly, this is not a time to be silent. Therefore the ambition of this book is to be open to the various perspectives and controversies surrounding the NSR, to build understanding for both sides, and to strengthen hope for continued global col­lab­or­ ation. It aims to critically explore the possible implications of the NSR for higher education and research cooperation between China and Europe, by looking at the main challenges and opportunities, including a consideration of the risks and uncer­ tainties in the context of growing sensitivities in relationships between China and the West. It thus seeks to move away from the Chinese government’s slogans on OBOR/BRI, to the more complicated reality in the areas of the New Silk Road that are relevant for higher education. We seek to address questions regarding how academic mobility and cooperation are taking shape along the New Silk Road, under which conditions, defined by whom,

vi Preface and based on which values? And what, if any, difference will the New Silk Road make in the global higher education landscape? To this end, this volume presents a rich collection of contributions from an inter­ national and interdisciplinary group of scholars from Europe, Asia (notably China), the USA, Russia, and Australia, who were engaged in a two-year dialogue under the research project on “The New Silk Road: Implications for higher education and research cooperation between China and Europe”.1 The project’s overarching frame­ work combined perspectives from anthropology, computer sciences, economics, education, history, law, political science, philosophy, science and technology studies, sinology, and sociology. The dialogue was facilitated by a series of seminars, held in Utrecht (March 2018), Oxford (October 2018), Beijing (April 2019), and Shanghai (October 2019). These inspiring encounters not only intensified the continuous dialogue among the researchers involved in the project, but also extended it to include external experts who critically reflected on the project’s evolving outcomes. The final results were planned to be disseminated at an international conference in Hanover (May 2020), which had to be postponed due to the outbreak of the Corona virus. But as the global pandemic makes our findings only more relevant, we engaged in online panel discussions, focusing on how the main trends and issues in col­lab­o­ r­ation between China and the West, as concluded from the study, may be affected by the pandemic.2 Which trends in academic cooperation with China will be sustained, enhanced, rebalanced, delayed, or even reversed? What is most at stake in the chan­ ging geopolitical order: international collaboration, competition, trust, open science, globalization as such? We could obviously only provide initial answers and sketch some possible scenarios. By and large this new global context provides abundant food for thought and a wealth of questions for further research. It remains our con­ viction that this research should be undertaken in close collaboration between China and the West. The Editors

1  A project coordinated between 2018–2020 by Professor Marijk van der Wende at Utrecht University. https://www.academicsilkroad.org/ 2 See: The New Silk Road in time of global pandemic: changing views on academic cooperation between China and the West? https://www.academicsilkroad.org/events/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FvKBdN8-Wcw&feature=youtu.be

Acknowledgments We would like to sincerely thank the following organizations and persons for their valuable support for this project. Utrecht University, the University of Oxford, Tsinghua University, the Harvard Center Shanghai, the University of Göttingen, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, and the Vienna University of Economics and Business for hosting the research meetings and public seminars that facilitated the fruitful dialogues underpinning the final outcomes of the New Silk Road research project. The Centre for Global Challenges at Utrecht University for its financial support to various project events, the Leiden Asia Center for their contribution to the start seminar in Utrecht in March 2018, and the Volkswagen Foundation for their generous support to the final dis­sem­in­ ation conference in Hannover in late 2020. Cong Cao (University of Nottingham Ningbo), Maia Chankseliani (University of Oxford), Hamish Coates (Tsinghua University), Trisha Craigh (Yale-NUS), Wim van den Doel (Leiden University and Dutch Research Council, NWO), John Douglas (UC Berkeley), Marcus Düwell (Utrecht University), Marcin Grabiec (EU Delegation to China), Manfred Horvat (Vienna University of Technology), Jeff Lehman (NYU Shanghai), Reinout van Malenstein (HFG Shanghai), Frank Pieke and Ingrid d’Hooghe (Leiden University), Peter-Paul Verbeek (Twente University, UNESCO Committee), Philippe Vialatte (EU Delegation to China), Yi Wang (Harvard Center Shanghai), and Lan Xue (Tsinghua University–Schwarzman College) for sharing their expertise and providing valuable feedback during the various research mee­ tings and seminars. Lily Sprangers (Leiden Asia Center) and Lilian Wei (Harvard Center Shanghai) for their professional support in the organization of events in Utrecht and Shanghai. Joris van Schie (Amsterdam University College), Lin Tian (Shanghai Jiao Tong University), Stijn van Deursen (Utrecht University), Andreas Weis (University of Göttingen), Xenia Otmakhova (Schwarzman Scholar), and Joshua Bishay (Utrecht University), graduate students who served as research and editorial assistants, for their invaluable help, curiosity, and enthusiasm for engaging in a joint journey on the New Silk Road.

List of Figures 1.1. Chinese students studying abroad, returnees, and international students in China (2000–2018)

4

1.2. Shifts in the world share of top 10 percent highly cited scientific publications

5

3.1. Competencies of the European Union

34

3.2. China’s top scientific areas compared to EU28 in share of publications and impact

45

3.3. H2020 researcher mobility per disciplinary fields

49

3.4. Focus of publications in Chinese journals from EU-funded research

49

3.5. Sources of international students in China

50

3.6. EU–China cooperation potential by 2030 and Roadmap planning

55

4.1. China’s research publication output has increased ten-fold in this century

72

4.2. Chinese science has also become much more internationally collaborative in recent years

72

6.1. The map of sample alliances along the Road

105

6.2. Percentage of membership from EU countries

107

6.3. Percentage distributions of countries on WCU members and ARWU 2018

108

6.4. The percentage of four major countries/regions on three phases

110

6.5. The percentage of member universities by ARWU ranking in the three phases

111

6.6. The percentage of WCU member universities from Road countries and other countries in three phases

112

7.1. The location of the city of Suzhou and the province of Jiangsu in China

121

7.2. China international student mobility in tertiary education, 2006–2017

123

7.3. XJTLU undergraduate degrees completed; number of students, 2010–2017

125

7.4. XJTLU postgraduate degrees completed; number of students, 2010–2017

126

7.5. IBSS student enrolment; number of students and percentage of total, 2007–2018127 7.6. China: university relevant age group population, 1950–2100

130

7.7. Growth and distribution of XJTLU Suzhou and Liverpool student populations132 8.1. Main routes of the ancient Silk Road

141

8.2. One Belt, One Road (maritime and terrestrial routes)

148

9.1. The hierarchy of China’s Higher Education System

165

xii  List of Figures 10.1. The number of Chinese graduates of a first university engineering degree program by year (2007 data not available)

182

10.2. The number of Chinese engineering students currently enrolled at first university degree level by year (2007 data not available)

182

10.3. Number of Chinese universities in top positions in the ARWU ranking (engineering field) (left) and QS ranking (engineering and technology) (right)183 10.4. Number of international students in China

190

10.5. Number of international students in China from OBOR countries

190

10.6. Number of international engineering students in China

191

13.1. Share of global publication output in AI, 1998–2017

245

13.2. Annual number of AI publications 1998–2017

246

13.3. China’s AI paper output and as a percentage of the global total 1997–2017

247

13.4. Top five institutional contributors per region by number of AI publications, 2013–2017248 14.1. Anglo-American spheres of social action

260

14.2. Confucian spheres of social action

263

List of Tables 1.1. Subject fields in which China holds number 1 position and/or more than 20 percent of global top 50 (based on ARWU Academic Subjects Ranking 2017–2019) excluding Hong Kong

6

1.2. Scientific impact per field (based on Leiden ranking, Centre for Science and Technology Studies 2017–2019) excluding Hong Kong

7

3.1. Historical overview of research cooperation between EU (and its predecessors) and China

36

3.2. China’s participations in EU Framework programs

43

3.3. Chinese participation in Erasmus+

50

4.1. Chinese international co-publications are unequally distributed across global regions (2010–2018)

73

4.2. Chinese international co-publications are unequally distributed across major fields of worldwide science (2010–2018)

73

4.3. Growth rates of Sino-European research cooperation are slightly higher in small European countries

75

4.4. Sino-European research cooperation profiles differ per country (2010–2018)

76

4.5. Preferred fields of Sino-European research cooperation differ per country

77

5.1. Selected participants of the Program (before and after participation in the Program)

91

5.2. List of Chinese Universities and Research Institutions involved in the Program

93

6.1. The list of sample alliances

104

6.2. Top ten membership from Road and non-Road countries

106

6.3. The ARWU top 100 universities with the most members

108

6.4. Three phases of sample consortia along the Road

109

6.5. The missions/goals/visions of sample consortia

114

9.1. Overview of the Education Action Plan for BRI (Form 1)

173

14.1. Smaller self and larger self in Chinese tradition

264

17.1. Four case universities in this study

317

17.2. The population of this study (N = 16)

318

17.3. Code names for different participants in interviews

318

17.4. A comparison of universities’ functions in promoting the NSR Initiative

326

18.1. BRI-related initiatives

337

18.2. Summary of CEIBS characteristics

340

xiv  List of Tables 18.3. Summary of ACEM characteristics

342

18.4. Summary of BFSU New Silk Road Institute’s characteristics

343

18.5. Summary of Renmin New Silk Road School characteristics

345

18.6. Some similarities and differences in HE internationalization China–EU

348

19.1. Largest source countries for inbound international students, China, 2012 to 2018

372

20.1. Characteristics of higher education in China, Russia, and Central Asia

382

20.2. Sino–Russian International University Alliances, 2019

387

20.3. Sino–Russian joint programs, 1995–2013

387

20.4. Russian language programs in higher education institutions in China, 2018

388

20.5. Chinese students enrolled in Russian universities: 2000–2001 to 2015–2016

389

20.6. Number of programs in Asian and African Studies, and foreign regional studies, bachelor and masters levels (cities: main higher education centers), 2013–2018

390

20.7. Number of Chinese language continuing education courses at Russian universities (cities-main higher education centers) 2013 to 2018

390

20.8. Russian students enrolled in Chinese universities: 2003 to 2018

391

20.9. Number of Central Asian students enrolled in China: 2010–2018

394

List of Contributors Ton van den Brink is associate professor of European Law at the Europa Institute of Utrecht University. He is responsible for the daily management of the Europa Institute and member of the Management team of the Utrecht Centre for Regulation and Enforcement in Europe (RENFORCE). His researches focuses on issues of European Constitutional Law, the national dimension of the European integration process, and the legal aspects of the current economic crisis. Ruoqi Cao works as an analyst in the Laboratory for University Development in the Institute of Education at National Research University “Higher School of Economics” in Moscow, and is currently completing her PhD in Education Economics, with full scholarship support from the Russian government and CSC China. She is a visiting lecturer in the Faculty of World Economy and International Affairs at HSE. Stijn van Deursen is a PhD student in the School of Law at Utrecht University. His research focuses on the societal impact of judicial decisions. He holds a LLM degree, with a specialization in the role of fundamental rights and principles in regulating (international) societal and techno­logic­al developments. He was research assistant in the project “The New Silk Road: Implications for higher education and research cooperation between China and Europe.” Dascha Düring is a postdoctoral researcher at the National Technological University Singapore. Her research focuses on the philosophical pre­sup­posi­tions of contemporary Chinese and Western discussions on modernity and modernization.

She previously worked as a lecturer in Philosophy at Utrecht University, where she defended her PhD thesis “Of Dragons and Owls: rethinking Chinese and Western narratives of modernity.” Zhuolin Feng is an associate professor at the Center for World-Class Universities, Shanghai Jiao Tong University. Her research interests are performance evaluation and excellence initiatives on world-class universities. She is also an active practitioner of consultation exercises. Her consultation reports have been accepted by policymakers of central government and higher education institutions. Isak Froumin is head of the Institute of Education at National Research University “Higher School of Economics” in Moscow (Russia). He is co-leader of the research project “China–Russia Comparative Research Project on Educational Modernization Towards 2030.” He was previously leading the World Bank education program in Russia and an advisor to the Minister of Education and Science of Russia Federation. Jie Gao is a postdoc at the Danish School of Education, Aarhus University in Denmark. Her research interests include anthropology of education, higher education policy and ­internationalization of higher education institutions, and the geo­pol­it­ics of university alliances. Previously she worked as coordinator in a Sino-Nordic partnership in Shanghai, China. Luyang Gao is a research associate at the Center for World-Class Universities, Shanghai Jiao Tong University. Her research work concerns research excellence initiatives

xvi  List of Contributors on world-class universities and international university consortia. Lynda Hardman is manager Research and Strategy at Centrum Wiskunde and Informatica (CWI), Amsterdam, professor of Multimedia Discourse Interaction at Utrecht University, and director of Amsterdam Data Science. She is the European director of LIAMA, a ­Sino-European research collaboration in computer science, automation and applied mathematics between INRIA (France), CWI, and the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Futao Huang is professor at the Research Institute for Higher Education, Hiroshima University, Japan. Before he came to Japan in 1999, he taught and conducted research in several Chinese universities. His research interests include internationalization of higher education, the academic profession, and higher education in East Asia. Yaxin Huang is a graduate student majoring in higher education at Shanghai Jiao Tong University, China. Her research interests include ­engineering students’ international learning experiences and entrepreneurship education. William C. Kirby is Spangler family professor of business administration at Harvard Business School and T. M. Chang professor of China studies at Harvard University. He is a university distinguished service professor. Professor Kirby serves as Chairman of the Harvard China Fund, the University’s academic venture fund for China, and faculty chair of the Harvard Center Shanghai, Harvard’s first university-wide center located outside the United States. Henk Kummeling is the rector magnificus of Utrecht University and distinguished university professor of constitutional law and comparative constitutional Law. He previously served as dean of the Faculty of

Law, Economics and Governance. He has lectured in China, Indonesia, the United Kingdom, the United States, Suriname, and South Africa. Nian Cai Liu is director of the Center for World-Class Universities and dean of Graduate School of Education at Shanghai Jiao Tong University. His research interests include world-class universities and research universities, university evaluation and academic ranking, research evaluation and science policy, globalization and internation­ alization of higher education. He is a member of the Executive Committee of “IREG Observatory on Academic Ranking and Excellence” and serves on the editorial/ advisory boards of several international and national journals. Simon Marginson is professor of higher education at the University of Oxford and a Fellow of Linacre College. He is director of the Centre for Global Higher Education, and leads CGHE’s global higher education engagement research program, is editor-inchief of the journal Higher Education, and a member of the editorial board of the Tsinghua Journal of Education. Simon previously worked as a professor of higher education at the Institute of Education at University College London, the University of Melbourne, and Monash University. Charles van Marrewijk is professor of economics and research director at Utrecht University School of Economics. He previously worked at Xi’an Jiaotong– Liverpool University (2014–2017) in Suzhou, China, where he was also head of research of International Business School Suzhou (IBSS). His research focuses on international economics, geographical economics, economic growth, development economics, and urban economics. Gerard Postiglione is honorary professor at the School of Education, Hong Kong

List of Contributors  xvii University (Division of Policy, Administration and Social Sciences Education). He is the co­ord­in­ator, Consortium for Higher Education Research in Asia (CHERA). His expertise lies in comparative sociology of Asian higher education, access and equity, graduate employment, the academic profession, cross-border partnerships, and China–USA educational relations. Dominic Sachsenmaier holds a chair professorship in “Modern China with a special emphasis on global historical perspectives” and is the executive director of the Department for East Asian Studies at Georg-August-Universität Göttingen. His main current research interests include China’s transnational and global connections in the past and present. Furthermore he has published in fields such as Chinese concepts of society, the global contexts of European history, and multiple modernities. Barbara Sporn is distinguished ­university professor at the Vienna University of Economics and Business. As professor of higher education management she heads the Institute of Higher Education Management in the Department of Strategy and Innovation. She previously served as vice-rector for research, international affairs and external relations of Vienna University of Economics and Business from 2002 to 2015. She is member of the management board of CEIBS (China Europe International Business School), Shanghai, China. Lin Tian is a PhD candidate at the Center for World-Class Universities (CWCU), Shanghai Jiao Tong University. Her research interests include roles and mission of world-class universities and internationaliza­ tion of higher education. She was a visiting graduate student at Utrecht University and research assistant to the project on “The New Silk Road: Implications for higher

education and research co­oper­ation between China and Europe.” Robert Tijssen holds the chair of science and innovation studies at Leiden University in the Netherlands. He leads the Science, Technology, and Innovation Studies (STIS) research program at the Centre for Science and Technology Studies (CWTS). His main interests concern the development and application of analytical frameworks and measurement models to assess general trends and patterns within the “knowledge triangle” (higher education, scientific research, technological innovation), one of the main drivers of today’s knowledge-based economies. Sybe A. de Vries is professor of EU single market law and fundamental rights and Jean Monnet Chair in the Faculty of Law, Economics, and Governance at Utrecht University. His research and his education focuses on EU single market law and the interconnection between EU free movement law and fundamental rights. He was the founding academic director of the Utrecht Centre of Global Challenges. Anthony Welch is professor of ­education and member of the China Studies Center and the Sydney Southeast Asia Centre at the University of Sydney. His research focuses on national and international policy and practice, including multiculturalism, indigenous minorities, international students, higher education reforms, internationalization of higher education in the Asia Pacific, and changes to the academic profession. Marijk van der Wende is distinguished faculty professor of higher education at Utrecht University’s Faculty of Law, Economics, and Governance, guest professor at Shanghai Jiao Tong University, and faculty affiliate at the Center for Studies in Higher Education (CSHE) at the

xviii  List of Contributors University of California Berkeley. She was a visiting scholar at the Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies at Harvard University. She initiated and directed the international research project on “The New Silk Road: Implications for higher ­education and research cooperation between China and Europe” (https://www.academicsilkroad.org/). Jos Winnink is a researcher at the Centre for Science and Technology Studies (CWTS) of Leiden University. He conducts research on the interface of science and technology. His main research interests are the identification of potential scientific breakthroughs at an early stage, the role scientific discoveries in science play in the development of new technologies, and in the impact and effective­ ness of science and technology policies. Zheping Xie is associate professor at the Institute of Education of Tsinghua University. Her research interests are in higher education, international or­gan­iza­ tions, and the history of education. Lili Yang is reading for DPhil in Education at Oxford University funded by a

Departmental Studentship. Previously, Lili obtained her BA in public administration from Minzu University of China (with first-class honours), and an MA in Public Administration (education economics and policy) from Tsinghua University (China). In her doctoral thesis, she explores the similarities and differences between notions of “public” in Sinic and Anglo-American traditions, and its implications in higher education. Guoyang Zhang is a graduate student majoring in higher education at Shanghai Jiao Tong University, China. Her research interests include project-based learning, and international engineering students’ learning experiences and learning outcomes. Jiabin Zhu is an associate professor and assistant director of the Center for Education and Human Development in the Graduate School of Education at Shanghai Jiao Tong University, China. Her research interest relates to en­gin­eer­ing education. She currently serves as an associate editor for IEEE Transaction on Education.

1 Introduction China’s Rise and the New Silk Road in Global Context Marijk van der Wende, Simon Marginson, Nian Cai Liu, and William C. Kirby

1.1  Conceptual Framework China’s rise is among the most important geo-political trends of the (early) twentyfirst century. The size of its higher education and research systems and the speed at which it develops each to global standards, will affect that of its regional partners and its global competitors. Even more so now its geo-political ambitions, as expressed in its “New Silk Road” (NSR) strategy, seem to be gradually shaping a context for its higher education agenda, in particular the goal of internationalization. Previous major geo-political trends and events such as the fall of the Berlin Wall and the establishment of the EU, have impacted international cooperation in higher education. This can also be expected of the NSR. We use the overarching term “New Silk Road” partly as a metaphor, referring to these ancient roads which were useful as a conduit for people to exchange ideas and knowledge, rather than purely as tra­ ding routes. The New Silk Road can be understood as a contextual factor, shaping broad directions and conditions at a macro level, rather than as a straightforward policy directing higher education and research, one to which we directly attribute certain effects. At the same time, we observe that the formal Chinese government’s One Belt One Road (OBOR), or Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) more specifically includes action lines for higher education cooperation. The political rhetoric is somewhat fluid and empirically, a variety of terms is being used in the field to label connected initiatives, such as the University Alliance of the New Silk Road (led by Xi’an Jiao Tong University), the One Belt One Road Economic Research Institute at Renmin University, and many others that are discussed in various chapters in this volume. If NSR may be seen as a “floating signifier,” then interpretation matters, and different and perhaps even contrasting perspectives on its meaning and impact are of interest. Consequently, in this book no prescribed definition, concept, or single narrative has been adopted. Authors have used a conceptual perspective best

Marijk van der Wende, Simon Marginson, Nian Cai Liu, and William C. Kirby, Introduction: China’s Rise and the New Silk Road in Global Context In: China and Europe on the New Silk Road: Connecting Universities Across Eurasia. Edited by: Marijk van der Wende, William C. Kirby, Nian Cai Liu, and Simon Marginson, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198853022.003.0001

2  Marijk van der Wende, Simon Marginson, Nian Cai Liu, and William C. Kirby attuned to their research focus, methods, disciplinary and cultural positioning. Some concentrate more on the OBOR/BRI from a policy implementation perspective, while ­others prefer to stay further away from the Chinese government’s policy discourse on OBOR/BRI. All were encouraged to take benefit from the free, open, and diverse discussions in this project, without any restrictions in addressing the sensitive pol­it­ical issues emerging around the NSR, such as (self-)censorship, control of data, and infringements of academic freedom, or in taking account of the increasing limits on civil liberties in China. While we appreciate that OBOR/BRI is broader, also including Africa, Oceania, and even Latin America, we choose to focus on the Eurasian New Silk Road connection, since Europe and China are two of the world’s three largest blocs for research and higher education. A tighter connection between these two can be of influence on the third bloc, the US. Certainly now as trade and technology conflicts between China and the United States are threatening their academic ties, Chinese universities seem to have become more interested in European partnerships. For the European academic community, including policymakers, scholars, and students, it is crucial to learn to understand China better, both in relation to Europe as well as in the global context. In the next phase, the East will play a far more important role than being the workplace of the West and will rely less on the West for knowledge and services. Economic power is gradually moving eastward, with China playing a central role, not only as the world’s largest economy (in Purchasing Power Parity (PPP) since 2015), but also in presenting itself as a leader in globalization. Patterns of globalization are changing, and these shifts are occurring faster in Asia than elsewhere (Tonby et al. 2019). Eastern-led globalization or Easternization may well become a force in international higher education, especially if a quarter of the world’s best universities is expected to become Asian by 2040 (Postiglione 2015). We also need to improve our understanding of globalization. China’s development in higher education and research can be considered both as an object and subject of globalization. China is being reshaped by international forces and is itself reshaping the global structure at the same time. This goes beyond simple framing as globalization with “Chinese characteristics.” Globalization in the East diverges from globalization in the West. We need to understand how these differences impact integration within and across regions (e.g. EU and ASEAN), how they interact along the NSR in terms of both cooperation and competition in higher education and research, and how they relate to the contribution of higher education and research to the global common good and to an open society. The conceptual framework for this research project structured this broad scope into the following areas of inquiry: • What types of academic flows and activities emerge along the NSR? • How do universities respond? What are their rationales and what type of activities do they undertake? • Under which conditions are activities taking place, and who defines these?

Introduction: New Silk Road in Global Context  3

• What are the values underpinning the mission of the university in society? • What will be the impact of these developments on the global higher education landscape, and on the current, dominant role of the US HE sector in it?

1.2  The NSR in Global Context: China’s Rise and the Shifts in Flows and Impact Academic mobility (re-)emerged in Europe during the post-WWII period, as part of the US-led Marshall Plan for the restoration of global peace and the economic recovery of Western Europe. It increased throughout the decolonization period of the 1950–60s, into the European integration process, signified by the launch of the ERASMUS programme (1987), followed by the TEMPUS programme after the fall of the Berlin Wall (1989). Academic cooperation intensified after the signing of the Treaty on the European Union (EU) (1992), and the consequent expansion of the EU, including some former Soviet states (2004), into a total of twenty-eight member states (twenty-seven since Brexit in 2020). The EU agenda increasingly underpinned higher education with economic rationales and the aim to enhance Europe’s pos­ ition in the global knowledge economy. As in most OECD countries, higher education became increasingly contextualized by globalization, competition, and related trends such as deregulation and privatization (Marginson and van der Wende 2009). It even became an “export industry,” with Anglo-American countries recruiting growing numbers of fee-paying international students. These came for large and increasing extent from China; over five million between 2000 and 2018 (Figure 1.1). With 662,100 students going abroad in 2018, China still is the world’s largest exporter of student talent. Yet the growth has slowed considerably since 2016 and seems to be shifting away from the USA and Australia, toward destinations in Asia and Europe that are less expensive and perceived as more welcoming environments (Education Rethink 2019). At the same time, China itself is quickly becoming a destination, welcoming 492,185 international students in 2018, close to its aim of 500,000 in 2020 (MOE 2019). These come increasingly (around 50 percent) from Asia and Africa, partly supported by Chinese scholarships available for NSR/BRI countries. Growth from Europe and the USA is less impressive and mostly (68 percent) concerns sub-degree studies, largely for the study of Chinese language. Students from NSR countries are more likely to pursue bachelor degrees (38 percent), but on the whole the percentages of international students at master or doctoral level in China remains low (Tian and Liu  2018). Nevertheless, these trends concur with a significant shift in global student flows, which for the first time in history demonstrate a stronger growth towards non-OECD countries, than towards OECD countries (OECD 2019). Figure  1.1 also shows significant growth in the number of Chinese returning home after having studied abroad. Return rates rose from barely 20 percent in 2000 to 80 percent more recently, making a total of over three million returnees since 2000 (Miao and Wang 2017). Several initiatives, such as the Thousand Talents Plan

4  Marijk van der Wende, Simon Marginson, Nian Cai Liu, and William C. Kirby 700,000 600,000 500,000 400,000 300,000 200,000

Outbound students in this year

returnees of the year

2018

2017

2016

2015

2014

2013

2012

2011

2010

2009

2008

2007

2006

2005

2004

2003

2002

2001

0

2000

100,000

inbound students in this year

Figure 1.1  Chinese students studying abroad, returnees, and international students in China (2000–2018) (data: Wang, Miao, and Zheng 2019; MOE 2019)

(2008), were launched to reverse the outward flow of talent. Flows of returnees are increasing notably again from the USA. A 10 percent drop of Chinese with PhDs in STEM who were planning to stay after graduation was already noted during 2012–2015 (Okahana and Zhou 2019). As many had worked in research laboratories in their host countries, upon returning they bring important scientific and social cap­ital to China and are instrumental in linking China to global networks. Returnees continue to publish more and with higher impact at the international level than their domestic counterparts (Cao et al. 2020). China, for long seen as the “sleeping lion” and a follower in scientific and technological development, and as a generous exporter of high-fee paying international students, has been developing its own higher education and science system at unprecedented scale and speed. China has now the world’s largest system of higher education, with over 44 million tertiary education students enrolled. Over 12 million graduated in 2017 from 2,631 higher education institutions (UNESCO 2019; MOE China 2019). China’s pool of researchers is now the second largest in the world after the EU. Its R&D investments surpassed that of the EU in 2014 and is now second only to the USA (OECD 2017). It is quickly closing the gap with the EU and the US in number and quality of scientific publications, and transnational patent filings. It produces more scientific papers than the US, and its share in the global production of 10 percent highly cited papers increased from 1.2 percent in 2000 to 12 percent in 2014, mainly at the expense of the US share, which fell from 42.8 to 30.2 percent, while the EU share remained mostly stable around one third (Bukhardt et al. 2018, 156; NSF 2018; Alves Dias et al. 2019) (see Figure 1.2).

Introduction: New Silk Road in Global Context  5 World share of top 10% highly cited scientific publications: 2000 (citation window: 2000–2002) and 2014 (citation window: 2014–2016) BRIS, 2.4% Developed Asian Economies, 6.2%

2000 Rest of the World, 14.2%

China, 1.2% United Kingdom, 8.9% Germany, 6.5% EU, 33.2%

France, 4.6% Italy, 2.6% Spain, 1.7% Netherlands, 2.3% Other MS, 6.5%

United States, 42.8%

BRIS, 4.2% Developed Asian Economies, 4.6%

Rest of the World, 17.6%

2014

United Kingdom, 7.0% Germany, 5.4% EU, 31.5%

France, 3.5% Italy, 3.1% Spain, 2.6% Netherlands, 2.3% Other MS, 7.5%

United States, 30.2%

Figure 1.2  Shifts in the world share of top 10 percent highly cited scientific publications (author, data from EU 2018)

6  Marijk van der Wende, Simon Marginson, Nian Cai Liu, and William C. Kirby China’s rise as a global science powerhouse results from sustained investments in building “world class” universities, an effort that started in the 1990s with projects 211 (1995) and 985 (1998) (Zhang, Sun, and Bao 2017). These have been continued under the current “double world class” project (2017), which aims for China to have around forty universities becoming world-class by mid-century. Four universities have already reached the top 100 of the Shanghai Ranking: Tsinghua University at place 43, Peking University at 53, Zhejiang at 70, and SJTU at 82 (ARWU  2019). Strong positions are also clear from the THE World University ranking 2019 (Tsinghua 22, Peking 31, Zhejiang 101), and in THE’s Asia-Pacific University Ranking 2019 (Tsinghua 1, Peking, 6, Zhejiang 19) (Ross  2019). The QS ranking 2020 lists even six Chinese universities in its top 100, with Tsinghua at 16 and Peking at place 22 (QS 2020). A closer look at the level of subject fields (Tables  1.1 and  1.2) reveals that the strength of the Chinese system is based on a broader and quickly growing range of research universities, but almost all exclusively concentrated in STEM fields. Current policies continue to favor STEM research with over 50 percent of grant allocations (Huang 2017) and a further push of human talent development. China is by far the world’s largest producer of STEM graduates at the bachelor level (around 1.6 million in 2015) and comes third after the EU and the US for STEM PhDs. The transition of BSc to PhD degrees in these fields was in 2014 still notably lower in China (2 percent) than in the US (5 percent) or the EU (7.5 percent) (NSF 2018), Table 1.1  Subject fields in which China holds number 1 position and/or more than 20 percent of global top 50 (based on ARWU Academic Subjects Ranking 2017–2019) excluding Hong Kong Subject field

Number of institutions in top 50 2017/2018/2019

Highest position 2017–2018/2019

Instruments S&T Mining Transportation Telecom engineering Marine/ocean engineering Metallurgical engineering Aerospace Remote sensing Civil engineering Mechanical engineering Chemical engineering Energy S&E Nano S&E Biomedical engineering Automation & control Material sciences Chemistry Biotech

15/19/20 13/16/15 —/12/15 11/11/14 8/8/14 15/11/12 —/10/10 7/8/10 8/9/9 10/13/12 10/13/16 10/13/16 14/11/17 —/10/13 —/12/13 15 10 —/10/6

1/1/1–5 1/2/1 —/1/1 1/1/1–5 1/1/1 1/1/1 —/1/1 1/1/1 1/1/1 8/2/2 4/3/3 13/6/3 6/6/3 —/3/2 —/4/4 11 14 —/5/4

25/28/30

—/12/13

6/8/10

Physical sciences & engineering

Life and earth sciences

Biomedical & health sciences

8/5/4

—/4/2

1–5/1–7/1–9

1–8/1–9/1–12

1/1/1

—/6/9

17/20/23

14/18/24

21/27/30

Math & Computer sciences

48/45/36

—/16/11

3/1/1

1/1–3/1–7

Highest position(s) 2017/18/19

Number of institutions in top 50 2017/18/19

Number of institutions in top 50 2017/18/19

 

Highest position(s) 2017/18/19

Impact (number of top 10% publications)

Impact (number of publications)

Field

1/-/-

—/2/2

—/-/-

1/4/4

Number of institutions in top 50 2017/18/19

40/-/-

—/18/-

-/-/-

42/11/9

Highest position(s) 2017/18/19

Impact (percentage of publications in top 10%)

Table 1.2  Scientific impact per field (based on Leiden ranking, Centre for Science and Technology Studies 2017–2019) excluding Hong Kong

8  Marijk van der Wende, Simon Marginson, Nian Cai Liu, and William C. Kirby because many Chinese STEM students tended to go for graduate studies to top institutions in the West. This seems to be changing now. China is building graduate capacity and is reaching world-class status in STEM research, particularly in en­gin­ eer­ing. It will be able to retain more domestic talent, is attracting international students to English-taught engineering programs, with the opportunity for Chinese engineering education to go global, as discussed in Chapter 10 by Zhu et al. in this volume. The question is, however, how these professional degrees will be recognized in the EU, which is analyzed in Chapter 11 by van den Brink and de Vries. China’s progress in the humanities and social sciences appears to be less compelling. As Chapter  16 by Sachsenmaier points out, rankings in these disciplines are overwhelmingly dominated by Western institutions, and their practice in China is uneven and subject to political scrutiny. The works of China’s scholars in the humanities and social sciences are less published in international journals, while within the nation they can be suspected by a party-state which has little reason to welcome diverse notions of society and identity. Also, concerns are rising regarding constraints on academic freedom (see Chapter 2 by Kirby and Chapter 19 by Huang). Although the NSR aims to stimulate international collaboration in the humanities and social sciences, as shown in Chapter 16 by Sachsenmaier, Chapter 6 by Feng and Gao, and Chapter 18 by Sporn and van der Wende, the Chinese government tightens at the same time the conditions under which this can take place, protecting China’s educational sovereignty and imposing strict control over the entry of foreign resources, as discussed in Gao’s Chapter 9 in this volume. As Marginson and Yang discuss in Chapter 14, it is in relation to the humanities and social sciences, more so than in STEM, that the differences in political culture between China and Europe are apparent: for example in the expectation in China that higher education serves the public good by serving the state directly, compared to the larger space for civil society in Europe. Yet During’s Chapter 15 shows the potentials for critical scholarship in China’s humanistic tradition. With its weight China is shifting global research towards engineering and away from the humanities (OST 2019). The preference for STEM over humanities and social sciences may be seen by China as an internal recipe for economic growth and social and political stability.

1.3  Global Impact and Rising Tensions China’s technological successes, as demonstrated by the launch of the first satellite using quantum cryptography in 2016 and the first landing on the dark side of the moon in January 2019, generated a kind of Sputnik effect in the West. It increased awareness of the vulnerability of the Western advantage, given its weaker pool of human capital and dependence on Chinese talent in these high-tech fields. The NSR is expected to enhance China’s global competitiveness in science. “All Roads lead to China” stated Nature’s special issue on “China’s Science Silk Road” (Masoud 2019).

Introduction: New Silk Road in Global Context  9

With respect to Europe, however, it added that this concerns mostly Central and Eastern European countries that are looking to Beijing as a financial donor (Roussi 2019). Tijssen and Winnink in Chapter 4 in this volume conclude that so far only minor changes can be observed in the smaller countries of Central and Eastern Europe, suggesting some early but still emerging NSR effects (see also van der Wende and Tijssen 2019). Nevertheless, China’s potential to dominate science and to influence higher education are increasingly seen as connected to the NSR/BRI (Baker 2019; Huang Chapter 19 in this volume) and concerns regarding the conditions for such academic collaboration are rising (Economist 2019). Global tensions have been growing since Chinese President Xi Jinping began to turn away from China’s “opening up and reform” policies toward a return to Communist Party authoritarianism, while the American president, Donald Trump, abandoned multilateralism in favor of a nationalistic “America first.” The subsequent US–China trade war has enhanced US suspicion about Chinese higher education initiatives. This in turn has influenced international debates, not the least about the NSR as a geo-political strategy, leveraging China’s scientific power not only for economic growth but also to enhance military capacities. A series of reports from US, Australian, and UK sources (mostly) warned about security threats related to a loss of crucial knowledge, through the Thousand Talents Plan, alleged espionage by Chinese students, hacking by China of international universities, forced technology transfer, or espionage in cooperation with Chinese tech companies such as Huawei (Joske  2018; O’Malley  2019; Basken  2019; Volz  2019; Crace  2019; Sharma  2019a). This has led to the enhanced oversight of such ties by several top universities in the US and the UK, strengthened visa regulations for Chinese in some STEM fields, and tools for greater due diligence, for instance the China Defense University Tracker, recently developed in Australia (ASPI 2019). Research ethics and scientific integrity is another source of concern. The use of technologies such as CRISPR (e.g. the announcement of the birth of gene-edited twin babies by a Chinese scientist early 2019) and the use of artificial intelligence (AI) (for more details see Chapter 13 by Lynda Hardman in this volume), and the potential implications for civic and human rights, has fueled already existing concerns about ethical grounds and conditions for research in China (Leung  2019; Sharma  2019b). There are growing concerns also regarding infringement of academic freedom and lack of transparency in curricula of China’s Confucius Institutes (CI’s), as instruments of its soft power. This has led to the closing of several CI’s on mostly US campuses (Redden 2019; Sharma 2019c). As yet it is unclear the extent to which these issues will be addressed in terms of higher education and science or subsumed in larger geo-strategic tensions. In the United States there are signs that the debate about science and security is driven largely from outside the universities. When Deng Xiaoping orchestrated the 1978 open-door policy, which facilitated a long period of growing collaboration between Chinese and foreign universities, there was optimism in the United States that accumulating contact would lead China to political reform. That expectation was

10  Marijk van der Wende, Simon Marginson, Nian Cai Liu, and William C. Kirby shattered in 1989, but the two countries continued their collaboration with differing expectations. With Xi Jinping’s leftward turn, at the governmental level American disillusionment with China has returned to levels not seen since 1989. Nevertheless, several leading US universities are deeply and constructively engaged in China and are unlikely to walk away. Also various European university leaders—for example the President of Wageningen University, an institution with a strong global reputation and high level of engagement in China move to end of section—have openly defended continuing scientific cooperation with China given its rising excellence and weight in many areas, underlining the importance of science diplomacy, especially in times of political tensions (Fresco 2019).

1.4  The NSR and the Evolving China–European Relationship The divergence between Europe and the United States under Trump challenges the European Commission to make up its own mind about NSR. The international debate is overshadowing the more than forty years of collaborative relations in research and higher education between China and Europe, which are analyzed in Chapter 3 by van der Wende and Chapter 5 by Zheping Xie. While the EU still recognized China, its largest trading partner, in 2018 as: “One of its most important strategic partners” (Juncker and Tusk  2018; Mogherini  2018), concerns have been growing in Europe as well. The NSR raises particular concerns regarding Beijing’s investments and growing influence in EU Member States that have signed into the BRI (Greece, Portugal, Italy, Hungary, Austria, and Luxembourg) and those in Central and Eastern Europe that are part of the 17+1 China–CEEC1 (Roussi 2019). Concerns relate to China’s attitude towards Europe’s key values for an open society, including freedom, democracy, equality, the rule of law, respect for human rights, freedom of the press, and of academic discourse. Notably Hungary, in conflict itself with the EU for undermining democratic rules2 and infringing academic freedom (forcing the Central European University to leave the country) is most active in BRI and hosts the China–CEE Institute3, which was established in Budapest in 2017 by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) to promote academic cooperation between China and Central and Eastern Europe. Uncertainties exist on how collaboration with China can be attuned to the specific EU regulations for trade in goods and services, for example regarding intellectual

1  Formerly known as the “16+1,” referring to the sixteen Central and Eastern European states with which China is developing ties, this cooperation was extended in 2019 to 17+1 see: https://thediplomat. com/2019/03/chinas-161-is-dead-long-live-the-171/. 2  The EU to triggered in 2018 an Article 7 disciplinary procedure against Hungary for undermining democratic rules and being “a clear risk of a serious breach of the values referred to in Article 2 of the Treaty on the European Union.” 3 https://china-cee.eu/

Introduction: New Silk Road in Global Context  11

property rights and the recognition of professional qualifications (see Chapter 11 by van den Brink and de Vries in this volume) and the protection of privacy in the exchange of personal data, as discussed in Chapter by 12 by van Deursen and Kummeling. Spurred by the growing tensions between the US and China, the debate on “dual-use” technologies and direct pressure from the US to ban Huawei from the development of 5G networks in Europe, the EU–China relationship has become even more tense. The EU described it in early 2019 simultaneously as: “A co­opera­ tion partnership with whom the EU has closely aligned objectives, a negotiating partnership, with whom the EU needs to find a balance of interests, an economic competitor in pursuit of technological leadership, and a system rival promoting alternative models of governance” (European Commission 2019, p. 1). The notion of “system rival” was considered by China to be hard talk. The EU realized that it should seek more balanced and reciprocal conditions ­go­verning the economic relationship and in order to maintain its prosperity, values, and social model over the long term, the EU itself needs to strengthen its own domestic policies and industrial base. On this more self-conscious basis the 21st EU–China Summit (April 2019) concluded with a joint statement reaffirming: “The strength of their Comprehensive Strategic Partnership, their resolve to work together for peace, prosperity and sustainable development and their commitment to multilateralism, and respect for international law and for fundamental norms governing inter­nation­al relations, with the United Nations (UN) at its core. The two sides commit to uphold the UN Charter and international law, and all three pillars of the UN system, namely peace and security, development and human rights” (Juncker et al. 2019). The new European Commission was presented in late 2019 by its President Von der Leyen as a “geo-political Commission” and as “the guardian of multilateralism.” We shall see what the NSR will imply for these ambitions and for academic co­ope­ r­ation, almost seventy-five years after the re-establishment of academic cooperation in Europe and the creation of the institutions that uphold a global order based on multi­lat­eral­ism. For not only is US support waning, also within Europe these prin­ ciples are under pressure.

1.5  The NSR and the Idea of a University As Huang’s Chapter 19 states, when China’s Ministry of Education and individual universities open initiatives in countries along the New Silk Road, the question is what they bring with them: opportunities for inbound students, vocational training programs to service infrastructure projects, collaborative research centers, or something more: a model of higher education, or as Sporn and van der Wende put it (Chapter 18), an “Idea of the University”? China may be transforming itself from a follower to a potential leader in global higher education (van der Wende and Zhu 2016). But does this mean it is exporting a Chinese model or idea along the NSR?

12  Marijk van der Wende, Simon Marginson, Nian Cai Liu, and William C. Kirby Chapter 14 by Marginson and Yang demonstrates the underlying differences in universities East and West. Even so, in higher education, and more so in science, China has copied many policies and practices from the West: its world-class university program is largely based on the Western research university; it has developed a broadly American system design; and many of its techniques for managing academic performance are familiar the world over. This is true even at the level of teaching and learning, as illustrated in Chapter  10 by Zhu, Zhang and Huang who show that teaching models initially imported from the West are now being exported by China into NSR countries, notably in engineering education and practical training. Of course, the situation in STEM cannot be generalized to the humanities. However, the Confucius Institutes as China’s vehicles for cultural diplomacy, or soft power, and even as they may sit on university campuses, cannot be considered as “the university.” It thus seems that while the idea or model of the university may travel along the NSR, it does not necessarily change because of it. Our empirical findings seem to substantiate Kirby’s position that: “Themselves products of international models, Chinese institutions have no distinct ‘China model’ to offer NSR universities.” China has pursued international collaboration even more vigorously than most Western countries. Sporn and van der Wende identify in Chapter 18 some simi­la­ r­ities in the internationalization process in China and Europe. Disciplines and types of institutions are in both cases largely decisive in the process. In terms of dis­ci­ plines, China has clearly achieved a global leadership role in STEM research. Our findings seem to nuance the black and white picture of STEM versus social scienceshumanities in China to some extent, reflecting rather a continuum of inter­nation­a­­ l­iza­tion pathways, as is also recognized in the West. Yet the question is how Chinese universities can grow into truly world-class institutions, especially regarding their ability to bridge “the two cultures,” that is, of the sciences and the humanities, in order to generate interdisciplinary and innovative work? With regard to institutional differences, Tian and Liu analyze in Chapter  17 the responses of research uni­ver­ sities to the NSR. Jie Gao shows in Chapter 9 the difference between these top uni­ ver­sities and teaching institutions with a more vocational focus, pointing to a stratification in institutional responses. Especially the drive of second-tier institutions to raise their position in the hierarchy can be recognized in the West. All the Chinese case universities studied in this project are taking the NSR as an opportunity and are responding positively to it, as also shown in Chapter 6 by Feng and Gao, who analyze the multiple NSR alliances and consortia that have emerged since the NSR was announced. The NSR has good potential to further strengthen the international agendas of Chinese universities by stimulating them to go out along the NSR. However, at the same time, conditions are being tightened by the Chinese government, with enhanced guidelines aiming to better “protect educational sovereignty against foreign infringement” (see Chapter 9 by Gao). It may be that political tensions and security concerns between the US and China, rather than the NSR create more scope for cooperation with Europe. But evidence for that to pay out in collaborative research output is still minor, as documented by Tijssen

Introduction: New Silk Road in Global Context  13

and Winnink (Chapter 4). Moreover, the US concerns are to some extent shared by Europe, especially in fields such as AI, where China has announced ambitions to become a world leader by 2030. At the same time, collaboration will remain essential, as Lynda Hardman in Chapter 13 states: “AI research and innovation is already taking place along the New Silk Road. Europe and China can benefit from each other’s perspectives—something that our AI systems are not yet able to do for us.” Dealing with China involves contextual differences. Enhanced exposure to globalization is in China not paralleled by the same degree of deregulation and autonomy as is assumed in the Western globalization paradigm. In China, an alternative ­globalization paradigm combines practices of global competition, opportunity, and openness with regulation and state control. Hence, as several chapters point out, in higher education China is more open internationally than domestically. In governance it uses forms of devolved authority closely nested in a comprehensive state, rather than a limited state along Western lines, and dual leadership exercised by a university president working alongside a party chief. All of this is difficult to export. China’s higher education will need to nuance its collaborative programs in higher education and science if the NSR in higher education is to succeed. Finally, as Chapter by 20 Froumin and Cao notes in relation to Central Asia, where Russian language and influence in higher education, grounded in the Soviet era, remain strong, the NSR programs are and will be articulated through many different political and educational cultures in partner countries. There are, in short, many unknowns. The aim of increased collaboration between universities along the New Silk Road appears both as a challenge and as an op­por­ tun­ity. At the moment the challenges may seem more evident than the rewards, but in the long run, Chinese–European cooperation on or beyond the New Silk Road offers a new landscape for higher education on both ends of Eurasia.

References Alves Dias, P., Amoroso, S., Annoni, A., Asensio Bermejo, J., Bellia, M., Blagoeva, D., De Prato, G., Dosso, M., Fako, P., Fiorini, A., Georgakaki, A., Gkotsis, P., Goenaga Beldarrain, X., Gregori, W., Hristov, H., Jaeger-Waldau, A., Jonkers, K., Lewis, A., Marmier, A., Marschinski, R., Martinez Turegano, D., Munoz-Pineiro, M., Nardo, M., Ndacyayisenga, N., Pasimeni, F., Preziosi, N., Rancan, M., Rueda Cantuche, J., Rondinella, V., Tanarro Colodron, J., Telsnig, T., Testa, G., Thiel, C., Travagnin, M., Tuebke, A., Van Den Eede, G., Vazquez Hernandez, C., Vezzani, A. and Wastin, F., 2019. “China: Challenges and Prospects from an Industrial and Innovation Powerhouse,” European Commission, Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union. Available at: https://ec.europa.eu/jrc/en/publication/china-challenges-andprospects-industrial-and-innovation-powerhouse. ARWU, 2019. “Academic Ranking of World Universities 2019,” Academic Ranking of World Universities. Available at http://www.shanghairanking.com/arwu2019.html.

14  Marijk van der Wende, Simon Marginson, Nian Cai Liu, and William C. Kirby ASPI, 2019. “China Defence Universities Tracker,” Australian Strategic Policy Institute and International Cyber Policy Centre. Available at: https://unitracker.aspi.org.au. Baker, S., 2019. “Is China’s Belt and Road Initiative boosting academic links?,” Times Higher Education, May 14. Available at: https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/ chinas-belt-and-road-initiative-boosting-academic-links. Basken, P., 2019. “US universities fall behind China security warnings,” Times Higher Education, February 5, Retrieved March 8, 2019. Available at: https://www. timeshighereducation.com/news/us-universities-fall-behind-china-security-warnings. Bukhardt, K., R. Deiss, and D. Lally, 2018. “Scientific, technological and innovation production,” in Science, Research and Innovation Performance of the EU 2018: Strengthening the Foundations for Europe’s Future, Luxembourg: European Commission Publications Office. Cao, C., J. Baas, C. S. Wagner, and K. Jonkers, 2020. “Returning scientists and the emergence of China’s science system,” Science and Public Policy 47 (2), pp. 172–183. Centre for Science and Technology Studies, 2017. “CWTS Leiden ranking 2017,” Leiden University. Available at: https://www.leidenranking.com/ranking/2017/list. Centre for Science and Technology Studies, 2018. “CWTS Leiden ranking 2018,” Leiden University. Available at: https://www.leidenranking.com/ranking/2018/list. Centre for Science and Technology Studies, 2019. “CWTS Leiden ranking 2019,” Leiden University. Available at: https://www.leidenranking.com/ranking/2019/list. Crace, A., 2019. “Australia: Belt and Road disruption warning“, The Pie News, March 25. Available at: https://thepienews.com/news/australia-belt-and-road-education-disruptionwarning. European Commission, 2019. “European Commission and HR/VP contribution to the European Council: EU–China—A Strategic Outlook,” High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy. Available at: https://ec.europa.eu/­ commission/sites/beta-political/files/communication-eu-china-a-strategic-outlook. pdf. p. 1. Education Rethink, 2019. “Rethink China: The End of the Affair,” November 25. Available at: https://www.education-rethink.com/reports-china. Fresco, L., 2019. “Wetenschap houdt de deur naar China open,” NRC, June 3. Available at: https://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2019/06/03/wetenschap-houdt-de-deur-naar-china-opena3962312. Huang, F., 2017. “Double world-class project has more ambitious aims,” University World News (476), Available at: http://www.universityworldnews.com/article.php?­ story=2,017,092,913,334,471. Accessed September 30, 2017. Joske, A., 2018. “Picking Flowers, Making Honey,” Australian Strategic Police Institute, October 30. Available at: https://www.aspi.org.au/report/picking-flowers-makinghoney. Juncker, J. C. and D. Tusk, 2018. “Joint statement by Presidents Jean-Claude Juncker and Donald Tusk on the re-appointment of Xi Jinping as President of the People’s Republic of China,” European Commission Statement, March 21. Available at: https://ec.europa. eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/STATEMENT_18_2582.

Introduction: New Silk Road in Global Context  15 Juncker, J. C., D. Tusk, and Li, K., 2019. “EU–China Summit Joint Statement,” April 9, Available at: https://www.consilium.europa.eu/media/39020/euchina-joint-statement9april2019.pdf. Leung, M., 2019. “University expels scientist behind 'illegal' gene-editing of babies”, University World News, January 22. Available at: https://www.universityworldnews. com/post.php?story=20,190,122,142,350,148. Marginson, S. and M. C. van der Wende, 2009. “The New Global Landscape of Nations and Institutions,” in Higher Education to 2030, Volume 2: Globalisation. Paris: OECD, pp. 17–57. Masoud, E., 2019. “How China is redrawing the map of world science,” Nature 569 (2), May 2. Available at: https://www.nature.com/immersive/d41586-019-01124-7/public/ pdf/d41586-019-01124-7.pdf. Miao, L. and Wang, H., 2017. International Migration of China: Status, Policy and Social Responses to the Globalization of Migration. Springer. MOE China, 2019. Ministry of Education of the People’s Republic of China (2019). http://en.moe.gov.cn/Resources/Statistics/edu_stat2017/national/201808/ t20180808_344699.html [retrieved on Jan. 4, 2019]. Mogherini, F., 2018. “Europe and Asia, Together for a More Secure World,” European External Action Service, May 28. Available at: https://eeas.europa.eu/delegations/ china/45248/europe-and-asia-%E2%80%93-together-more-secure-world_en. National Science Board, 2018. Science and Engineering Indicators 2018, Alexandria, VA: National Science Foundation. Available at: https://www.nsf.gov/statistics/2018/nsb20181/ report. OECD, 2017. Main Science and Technology Indicators, 2017 (vol. 2017 (1)), Paris: OECD Publishing. Available at: https://read.oecd-ilibrary.org/science-and-technology/mainscience-and-technology-indicators/volume-2017/issue-1_msti-v2017-1-en#page3. OECD, 2019. Education at a Glance 2019: OECD Indicators, Paris: OECD Publishing. Available at: https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/docserver/f8d7880d-en.pdf?expires=1,579, 188,985&id=id&accname=guest&checksum=35C77FFF1E3AD7A85F1E2A6A960A B5B9. Okahana, H., and Zhou, E., 2019. International Graduate Applications and Enrollment: Fall 2018, Washington, DC: Council of Graduate Schools. Available at: https://www. cgsnet.org/ckfinder/userfiles/files/Intl_Survey_Report_Fall2018.pdf. O’Malley, B., 2019. “FBI chief warns universities to guard against China threat,” University World News, May 4, Available at: https://www.universityworldnews.com/post. php?­story=20,190,503,145,355,529. OST, 2019. Dynamics of Scientific Production in the World, in Europe and in France, 2000–2016, Paris: Imprimerie Frazier. Available at: https://www.hceres.fr/sites/default/ files/media/downloads/rappScien_VA_web04.pdf. Postiglione, G.  A., 2015. “Asian universities are rising in the ranks. But opposition to foreign scholars could hold some back,” The Washington Post, April 27. Available at: https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2014/10/05/asian-universities-arerising-in-the-ranks-but-opposition-to-foreign-scholars-could-hold-some-back/.

16  Marijk van der Wende, Simon Marginson, Nian Cai Liu, and William C. Kirby QS World University Rankings 2020. https://www.topuniversities.com/university­rankings/world-university-rankings/2020. Retrieved January 19, 2020. Redden, E., 2019. “Three more universities close Confucius Institutes,” Inside Higher Ed, May 1. Available at: https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2019/05/01/3-moreuniversities-close-confucius-institutes. Ross, J., 2019. “THE Asia-Pacific University Rankings 2019: to the top of the world again,” THE World University Rankings, February 20, Retrieved March 8, 2019. Available at: https://www.timeshighereducation.com/world-university-rankings/asiapacific-university-rankings-2019-top-of-world-again?utm_source=THE+Website+ Users&utm_campaign=1d5790a046-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2019_02_19_02_10& utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_daa7e51487-1d5790a046-63242289. Roussi, A., 2019. “China Charts a path into European science,” Nature 569 (2), May 8, Available at: https://www.nature.com/immersive/d41586-019-01126-5/index.html. Sharma, Y., 2019a. “Top US research universities freeze ties with Huawei,” University World News, 11 February. Available at: https://www.universityworldnews.com/post. php?story=20,190,211,124,159,161. Sharma, Y., 2019b. “Research ethics rises up national political agenda,” University World News, March 7. Available at: https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?­story= 20,190,307,200,925,304. Sharma, Y., 2019c. “Confucius Institutes must be transparent or close: US Senate”, University World News, March 1. Available at: https://www.universityworldnews.com/ post.php?story=20,190,301,140,432,282. Tian, L. and Liu, N. C., 2018. “Inward international students in China and their contributions to global common goods,” Centre for Global Higher Education, March. Available at: https://www.researchcghe.org/publications/working-paper/inward-internationalstudents-in-china-and-their-contributions-to-global-common-goods. The Economist, 2019. “Red moon rising: How China could dominate science,” The Economist. January 12, 2019. Tonby, O., Woetzel, J., Choi, W., Eloot, K., Dhawan, R., Seong, J., and Wang, P., 2019. “The future of Asia: Asian flows and networks are defining the next phase of globalization,” New York: McKinsey & Co. Available at: https://www.mckinsey.com/featured-insights/ asia-pacific/the-future-of-asia-asian-flows-and-networks-are-defining-the-nextphase-of-globalization. UNESCO, 2019. “Welcome to UIC.stat,” Retrieved on January 4, 2019. Available at: http://data.uis.unesco.org/#. Volz, D., 2019. “Chinese Hackers Target Universities in Pursuit of Maritime Military Secret,” The Wall Street Journal, March 5, https://www.wsj.com/articles/chinese-hackerstarget-universities-in-pursuit-of-maritime-military-secrets-11,551,781,800. Wang, H., Miao, L., and Zheng, J., 2019. Annual Report on the Development of Chinese Students Studying Abroad (2016) No.5, Beijing: Center for China & Globalization. Wende, M. C. van der, and R. Tijssen, 2019.” China’s Belt and Road Initiative finds new research partners in Europe“, Nature Index, January 11. Available at: https://www. natureindex.com/news-blog/chinas-belt-and-road-initiative-finds-new-researchpartners-in-europe.

Introduction: New Silk Road in Global Context  17 Wende, M. C. van der, and J. Zhu, 2016. “China’s Higher Education in Global Perspective: Leader or Follower in the ‘World-Class’ Movement?”, in N.  Cai Liu, Y.  Cheng, and Q. Wang (eds.). Matching Visibility and Performance: A Standing Challenge for WorldClass Universities. Sense Publishers, pp. 119–37. Zhang, L., Sun, L., and Bao, W. (2017). “The rise of higher education and science in China,” in The Century of Science: The Global Triumph of the Research University (pp. 141–72). Emerald Publishing Limited.

2 The International Origins and Global Aspirations of Chinese Universities Along the New Silk Road? William C. Kirby

2.1 Introduction The reputation and influence of leading Chinese universities is rising rapidly across the world. They are pursuing collaboration with international partners both at home and abroad. This is not altogether new, for Chinese universities—like China itself— have been rising and internationalizing for more than a century. Their connections— historical and contemporary—with Europe and North America are deep and are growing stronger. Despite the resurgence of nationalism as a leading ideology in China, the United States, and several European countries, and rhetoric of a “de­coup­ ling” between China and the West, the internationalist agendas of Chinese uni­ver­ sities remain robust. This trajectory would appear to be strengthened by the broad, inclusive, if utterly ill-defined mission, given to Chinese institutions by Beijing to “go out” along the “New Silk Road” (NSR). Though the international origins and aspirations of Chinese universities have been mainly shaped by Western models, the NSR’s emphasis on Eurasian partnership raises questions about the possible effects of non-Western exchange on Chinese higher education. The NSR metaphor invokes the legacy of land-based trading routes across Eurasia that, on limited occasions, connected East and Central Asian markets to those of the Middle East and Mediterranean. These were famously termed Seidenstraße, or “Silk Road” in translation, by the German explorer Ferdinand von Richthofen in 1877. In economic terms, the “Silk Road” has been as moribund in modern times as it was for large stretches of history (Kirby and van der Wende  2019, 129). Yet President Xi Jinping’s 2015 announcement that higher education co­oper­ation was to be an important element of the NSR suggested that the initiative might rehabilitate the “Silk Road” as a conduit for ideas. Chinese universities eager to build global reputations have, until now, largely overlooked collaboration with institutions on the NSR. However, with growing political incentives to partner with NSR-based institu­ tions, might the NSR become a new source of international influences in Chinese William C. Kirby, The International Origins and Global Aspirations of Chinese Universities: Along the New Silk Road? In: China and Europe on the New Silk Road: Connecting Universities Across Eurasia. Edited by: Marijk van der Wende, William C. Kirby, Nian Cai Liu, and Simon Marginson, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198853022.003.0002

International Origins and Global Aspirations  19

education? And what does partnership with Chinese universities offer systems of higher education along the NSR?

2.2  History and Memory of the International Origins of Chinese Universities China’s Internationalization. Modern Chinese history is inescapably international. During the eras of the First (1912), Second (1927), and Third (1949) Chinese Republics, the trajectory of modern China can be closely mapped to the nature of its international relations. Politically, each republic was established on international models. Each regime would seek legitimacy in the context of one or another inter­ nation­al­ly authenticated “ism,” from constitutionalism to communism. Militarily, China grew strong enough to defend its borders and, in time, to assert influence beyond them. Its military strength was made possible by industrialization, which was founded in turn on its openness to international economic influences. In business, China would prosper to the degree that its firms and entrepreneurs would be part of global markets. But perhaps no sector of modern Chinese life has been more thor­ oughly international in origin and in aspiration than that of higher education. Over the first part of the twentieth century, China developed military strength, success in entrepreneurship, and leadership in infrastructure through international partnerships and alignments (military alliances, business partnerships, and infra­ structure advisors) (Abrami et al. 2014). The same is true of education, in an era in which higher education in China was revolutionized and developed as part of an interconnected world of research and teaching. China is home to the world’s longest continuous civilization, with the longest con­ tinuing sets of philosophical and literary traditions. The study of those traditions defined not only what it meant to be a scholar, but also what it meant to have influence and power. The imperial educational and examination system brought the most learned men in the realm into the service of the state—not because they had been trained in statecraft or tax collection, but because they had deeply studied what we would today call the “humanities”; because they had studied, memorized, chanted, and metaphorically consumed the classics, and they would, in office, act according to the principles of human behavior that the study of the Analects, Mencius, and other great works set out. They would serve the state, but they would do so as truly educated men. Taking the place of the examination system and the academies associated with higher learning in later imperial times was a set of new colleges and universities on international models founded in late Qing and early Republican times. Theirs was the complex and often contradictory challenge that Wilhelm von Humboldt would have recognized: to bring global knowledge and international standards of higher education to China, while still serving the state and nation (Kirby 2017). Take the case of Wuhan University, China’s oldest modern university. Founded in  1893 (in a metropolis now known around the world for other reasons) as the

20  William C. Kirby “Self-Strengthening Institute” (自強學堂) under the reformist Viceroy Zhang Zhidong (張之洞), its early, instrumentalist focus was toward the study of those subjects that would bring about China’s return to “wealth and power” (富強), primarily mathemat­ ics, science, and business, though not at the expense of China’s educational tradition. Zhang’s famous Exhortation to Study (勸學篇), published in 1898, argued that “Chinese learning” (education in the classics) had to remain the foundation, while “Western learning” was for “practical matters” (中學為體西學為用) (Kirby 2017). By 1928, however, Wuhan University had become one of China’s first comprehen­ sive, national universities, with a distinguished and internationalized Faculty of Arts to match those in Law, Science, and Engineering. Wuhan University enjoyed a strong history of growth before 1949, and then it was nearly destroyed during the Cultural Revolution. Today, it is again a major comprehensive university, with a faculty of nearly 4,000 teaching a student body of 34,000 undergraduates and 21,000 graduate students and ranked in 2016 as fourth among Chinese universities by the University Ranking of China (sponsored by the Chinese Universities Alumni Association). It has also become the indispensable partner of the new liberal arts college at Duke Kunshan University, of which Wuhan University’s former president, Liu Jingnan, became the inaugural Chancellor. Tongji University grew into a private and then public university in the 1920s out of its origins as the German Medical School founded in 1907, and it continued to maintain its German connections. Foreign influence was also evident in the signifi­ cant number of universities and colleges established by various missionary groups, including St. John’s University, founded by American Anglicans; Yenching University, founded by American Methodist Episcopalians and Congregationalists; and Aurora University, founded by French Jesuits (Kirby et al. 2019b). Many leading scholars trained abroad and returned to adapt a broad swath of for­ eign practices and ideas to the Chinese context, further diversifying the institutional landscape. Zhang Boling founded Nankai High School, but upon returning to China after studying under John Dewey at Columbia University Teachers College, trans­ formed it into Nankai University, which became one of the top private universities in Republican China (Kirby et al. 2019b). May Fourth and Beyond. Perhaps the most famous internationalizing moment of modern China was May 4, 1919, whose centenary has recently been celebrated. May Fourth was many things. It was a protest by just a few thousand students that shook and changed the Chinese political landscape. May Fourth gave its name to an era, which we normally think of as ca. 1915 to 1925, of extraordinary creativity, experimentation, and intellectual internationaliza­ tion: a cultural revolution that was much more profound and enduring than the so-called “Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution” of Mao Zedong. And it was based to a great degree in China’s new, internationally oriented universities. The protesting students had poured out of the modern “Red Building” of Peking University (PKU) near the Forbidden City. Peking University’s president was Cai Yuanpei. Cai had passed the highest level (進士) of the imperial civil service

International Origins and Global Aspirations  21

exam­in­ation in 1890 and became a member of the Hanlin Academy (Zhang 2000). He was deeply learned in the Chinese classics. He received a doctorate in Leipzig in the first decade of the twentieth century, and in Germany he became a deep admirer of the ideas of Wilhelm von Humboldt. Thus, Cai’s training was grounded in both the European ideals of academic freedom and institutional autonomy as well as the eth­ic­al values promoted in the Chinese classical canon. He used his position at the head of one of China’s leading institutions to introduce a broad range of inter­ nation­al practices into China’s nascent system of modern higher education. Cai’s reforms were indispensable to facilitating China’s intellectual flourishing in the May Fourth era. Cai had been the first Minister of Education of the new Republic of China in 1912. In his first month in that position, Cai issued an official opinion that universities should no longer simply serve government, but should be granted institutional autonomy and be places for an “education with a worldview” (世界觀 教育). He stressed the importance, as had Humboldt, of Bildung, that is, of broad, humanistic learning as the foundation of both teaching and scientific research (in the sense of Wissenschaft) (Weston 2004). He remains today an icon of the univer­ sity, and he is preserved in bronze. And today, more than a century after he assumed the presidency of PKU, an elite liberal arts college named for Cai Yuanpei sits at the heart of Peking University. In Yuanpei College (元培學院) a select group of Peking University students choose (and can change) their course of study in the liberal arts and sciences in an intimate educational setting. As president of Peking University, Cai Yuanpei recruited to this “national univer­ sity” the philosopher Hu Shi, a student of John Dewey at Columbia, who became the leading exemplar of modern Chinese liberalism. Cai Yuanpei also recruited to the Peking University faculty the scholars Li Dazhao and Chen Duxiu, who would be instrumental in introducing Marxism to China. Cai Yuanpei’s governing principles of what Humboldt had called Lehrfreiheit and Lernfreiheit (freedom to teach and freedom to learn), together with the practice of institutional autonomy, were followed across most Chinese universities in that era, as Chinese universities rose—then as now—in global stature. By the late 1920s and early 1930s, Tsinghua University, which was founded first as a liberal arts college in 1911, had emerged as one of China’s leading comprehensive universities, home to great scholars such as Jiang Tingfu, the preeminent historian of China’s foreign rela­ tions, not to mention his student, my teacher, John Fairbank, the founder of modern China studies in the United States (Kirby 2017). Tsinghua became home to four of the most famous scholars in the land: Liang Qichao, Wang Guowei, Chen Yinke, and Zhao Yuanren—all products of both clas­ sic­al and international learning. All were at home in Chinese culture yet at the same time were cutting-edge scholars in the modern humanities and social sciences. And all were famous abroad as at home (Qian and Li 2011). Like Cai Yuanpei on the Beida campus, these four scholars are preserved in bronze at Tsinghua, in commemoration of their accomplishments, independence,

22  William C. Kirby and cosmopolitanism. When one of them, Wang Guowei, committed suicide as the Nationalist armies approached Beijing, drowning rather than joining the nationalist/ revolutionary fervor, his colleague Chen Yinke wrote on his memorial stele: “His was a spirit independent and a mind unfettered.” (独立之精神, 自由之思想) (Kirby et al. 2019a). This history is very much alive and contested. Recently, at its 2019 annual anni­ versary ceremony, Tsinghua found it necessary to wall off the Wang Guowei me­mor­ ial because too many people wanted to pay tribute to it, in particular in defense of two outspoken scholars, Professors Guo Yuhua and Xu Zhangrun, who sought to pay their respects at the Wang Guowei memorial stele, even as they were under intense political pressure and investigation for their critique of today’s Beijing government. In July 2020, Xu Zhangrun was formally detained by police. As with the mainland’s higher education institutions, Hong Kong’s universities also intentionally drew on international practices to establish themselves. Of all the universities in the space that is sometimes called Greater China, none have a more international heritage than those today in Hong Kong. The University of Hong Kong, of course, was established on a British model, and its eccentric decentraliza­ tion is in many ways a mirror of its Oxbridge models. Lingnan University was founded in 1889 in Guangzhou in the image of US liberal arts colleges. It moved periodically (to Macau and Hong Kong) in times of disruption, but maintained a focus on the international liberal arts. It would be re-established in Hong Kong in the 1980s and become formally a liberal arts university in the 1990s (“History and Development” 2019). Hong Kong Baptist University (HKBU) was founded in 1956 by the Baptist Convention of Hong Kong with the mission of providing “whole person education” in a manner that Humboldt would have understood. HKBU would grow over time in physical and intellectual strength, and in recent years it has extended its mission back to the Chinese mainland in the form of the Beijing Normal University-HKBU United International College in Zhuhai. As President Roland Chin recently put it: “We aim to become a leading, research-led, liberal arts university in Asia for the world” (Ng 2017). Architecture. Internationalization also took architectural form. For a millennium before 1905, the most learned men in China entered examination compounds around the country surrounded by high walls to be tested on classical texts. In the twentieth century, these examination compounds would give way to campuses mod­ eled after American and European universities. The Grand Auditorium at Tsinghua University, built in 1917, is modeled after the Auditorium at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, for it was the president of the University of Illinois who con­ vinced US President Theodore Roosevelt to remit Boxer Indemnity funds for the building of Tsinghua to send students to the United States. Or one can look at Tsinghua’s Main Building (主楼), constructed in the 1950s on the model of Moscow State University, a monument to an era, which lasted at least three decades, in which Soviet models of higher education dominated in China. Or one can look at the

International Origins and Global Aspirations  23

jingyuan (靜園) at Peking University, a lovely campus in Chinese style for its ­predecessor, Yenching University—designed by a New York architectural firm. Or take National Central University, established by Chiang Kai-shek in 1930 on the model of the University of Berlin. We know that it is modeled after Berlin for there is a small Brandenburg Gate welcoming one to the campus (as indeed also to Nanjing University’s new campus outside the city, with a similar gate commemorating National Central University). Today, the newest building on the Tsinghua campus houses Schwarzman Scholars, an elite international graduate program that aims to be the Rhodes Scholarship for the twenty-first century—bringing young leaders from around the world to learn together in Beijing (Kirby 2014). Schwarzman College is designed in an adaptation of a lovely Beijing courtyard style by the New York firm of Robert  A.  M.  Stern (“Schwarzman College” 2016). The point is simply this: The intellectual, institutional, and architectural origins of every major Chinese university today are international in origin. Alternative foreign models. As we have seen, individual universities have been shaped by different international models, and the same is true of China’s national higher education system. In 1922, the nominal but weak central government sought to adopt what Ruth Hayhoe has called an “American ethos” in primary and second­ ary education (Hayhoe 1996). Legislation broadened the definition of “university” to include not just institutions dedicated to theoretical studies but also those focused on professional or applied fields. This represented a shift from the Germaninfluenced model that drew a sharp distinction between universities and technical schools toward a more inclusive American conception. It also introduced the system of credits, which allowed students greater freedom to customize their studies. Reflecting the ambitions of the state, the legislation established a board of managers to make administrative decisions at universities, seeking to limit the role of profes­ sors in university governance (Hayhoe 1996, 47). This system-wide American influence, however, was short-lived.1 As the Nationalist government, strongly influenced by international trends toward greater statism in politics, consolidated power in Nanjing after 1927, it also began to exercise more centralized control over higher education. In the 1930s, it reorganized the higher education system according to recommendations from a League of Nations commis­ sion led by former Prussian Minister of Education C. H. Becker. Reforms, made with the encouragement of the commission and heavily influenced by Prussian models, led to increased government control over a nationalized system of higher education. If political authorities favored more comprehensive universities in the 1920s, the 1930s saw emphasis once again placed on science, mathematics, and en­gin­eer­ing (Kirby 1997, 455). 1  American influence in education still persisted at an institutional level throughout this period, particularly in colleges and universities established by American missionary groups. For more on this subject, see Daniel  H.  Bays and Ellen Widmer (eds.), China’s Christian Colleges: Cross-Cultural Connections, 1900–1950 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2009).

24  William C. Kirby War with Japan set in motion a new wave of adaptation and innovation within Chinese higher education. As the Japanese army encroached upon Chinese borders and occupied urban centers, universities sought refuge in unoccupied areas. This movement began with the relocation of Dongbei University to Beijing in 1931, but reached scale in the late 1930s as the Japanese army gained control in major cities like Beijing and Shanghai. By 1941, seventy-seven of the 114 higher education insti­ tutions that existed in China before the start of the war had moved to temporary, safer locations (Israel 1998, 15). An innovative institution at the apex of the higher education system was the National Southwest Associated University, a con­glom­er­ ation of Tsinghua, Peking, and Nankai Universities that remained a bastion of liberal thought and academic work despite its wartime surroundings. This changed, how­ ever, as the war of resistance transitioned to civil war and then to a new political regime, by which time most universities had returned to their original locations on China’s eastern coast. The higher education system was extensively restructured again following the founding of the People’s Republic in 1949 to support a planned economy on a Stalinist model. In the early 1950s, the higher education system changed rapidly to emulate the Soviet approaches. In 1952, institutions were reorganized to focus on very specific tasks and subjects, often resulting in the separation of theoretical fields (such as biology, found in newly reorganized comprehensive universities) and related practical fields (such as agriculture, found in specialized, separate institutions). Moreover, there was a marked separation of teaching and research: Universities were to be dedicated to the teaching and transmission of knowledge, while research activ­ ities were housed at separate academies that existed outside the higher education system (Hayhoe 1996, 78). In all this, China was following the exact model of uni­ versities across the Soviet bloc, from East Berlin to Hanoi: a model of “Western,” not Chinese origin. The short period in which Chinese universities were indeed governed by “Chinese characteristics,” in the form of Maoist zealotry, was nearly their ruin. During the Cultural Revolution (1966–1976), Chinese universities became prominent and bloody battlegrounds for factional and ideological strife at the national level. When the international orientation among Chinese universities was sacrificed to Maoist politics during the Cultural Revolution, institutions were reduced to shells of their former selves. But they would emerge from that struggle with a renewed commit­ ment to international excellence.

2.3  Global Strategies of Chinese Universities A Return to Excellence. With the advent of an era of “opening and reform,” Chinese universities re-emerged on the global stage as serious institutions of teaching, learn­ ing, and research. The last forty years have witnessed both a massification of higher education and a remarkable growth of the research mission of Chinese universities

International Origins and Global Aspirations  25

to the degree that we can say that today, China’s is the fastest-growing system of higher education in quality as well as quantity in the world. Long-term investments, such as those in faculty quality and state-of-the-art la­bora­tor­ies, have begun to pay off: The academic reputation of Chinese universities, particularly top-tier institutions, rose rapidly. In 2008, no Chinese university ranked above 200th place on Shanghai Jiaotong University’s Academic Ranking of World Universities. By 2019, four were in the top 100, including Tsinghua University at 43rd place, Peking University at 53rd place, Zhejiang University at 70th place, and Shanghai Jiaotong University in 82nd place. (“Higher Education in China” 2019). Tsinghua and Peking University were ranked 16th and 22nd, respectively, by the QS World University Rankings for 2020, the highest achieved by Chinese universities among the major international university rankings (QS World University Rankings 2019). (In this ranking, Tsinghua polled above Yale and Columbia Universities.) The Chinese government launched the Double First Class Universities Program (DFC Program) in 2017 (after releasing initial plans in 2015) to further boost the standing of Chinese universities in the world. The program was built around a core group of forty-two leading Chinese universities considered either “well on their way” (Type A) or “have the potential” (Type B) to become world-leading uni­ver­sities. All of these forty-two universities were part of either Project 211 or 985 or both. The fundamental goal of the program was to have more and more internationally top-ranked and well-respected Chinese universities both overall and across individ­ ual academic disciplines. In addition to the forty-two leading universities, ninetyfive other Chinese universities were also selected as a part of the program to become “first class in the world” in specific academic disciplines where they had existing strengths. Among the 110 academic disciplines being developed by the program, 36 percent were in engineering and technology fields where, by some measures, Chinese universities like Tsinghua were already first class or even world-leading.2 Universities selected for the program would be evaluated every five years partially through domestic academic subject rankings. Those that did not perform well would be removed from the program and lose preferential funding. International Strategies. Let us take the case of Tsinghua University. Despite the extraordinary tumult of the 1960s and 1970s, Tsinghua University never relinquished its position as a top university in China. In 1978, the university welcomed its first post-Cultural Revolution class, known as “Class of ’77,” for those who had passed the first competitive college entrance examination in a decade in late 1977. With the re­open­ing of the economy after 1978 and the regularization of the university entrance examination, Tsinghua sought to emulate world leaders in higher education. Noting that many of the best universities in the world offered a wide variety of courses and subjects, Tsinghua gradually began to return to its pre-1949 form as a 2  Calculated based on data from: “Double First-Class university and discipline list policy update,” Australia Government Department of Education (December 14, 2017), https://internationaleducation. gov.au/International-network/china/PolicyUpdates-China/Pages/Double-First-Class-university-anddiscipline-list-policy-update.aspx, Accessed March 2018.

26  William C. Kirby comprehensive university. It expanded its curricular offerings, and by 1984 had established the first new graduate school and the first School of Economics and Management in China. A School of Humanities and Social Sciences was established in 1993, and in 2012 it was divided into separate schools. Tsinghua’s Law School was reestablished in 1995. In 1999, the former Central Academy of Arts and Design became part of Tsinghua, as did Peking Union Medical College in 2006. In November 2009, Tsinghua reopened its famous Institute of Chinese Studies. The Tsinghua School of Economics and Management began to lead the university in reforming its general education curriculum. And at the university’s 100th anniversary in 2011, a magnificent New Tsinghua Academy (新清華學堂) was dedicated not to the fields of engineering, science, and technology, for which Tsinghua has been best known in recent decades, but to the performing arts (Kirby 2014). In research, government funding through Project 211 and Project 985 supported an enlarged research budget and graduate program. The university also began to encourage faculty members to publish in international journals, to the extent that in some departments, the publication of three articles per year in international journals was a de facto requirement of employment (Kirby et al. 2019a, 4). With the transition to a knowledge-based economy on the horizon, early twentyfirst-century Tsinghua focused on innovation in order to better support human cap­ ital development. Encouraged by government initiatives, Tsinghua pushed ever harder toward achieving world-class status. Weaving through Tsinghua’s approach to excellence in faculty recruitment and research, student achievement, and administration was a growing push toward internationalization. This had begun in the realm of faculty. As Tsinghua sought to raise its profile on the international stage, it focused on recruiting overseas Chinese scholars, especially those who were Tsinghua alumni, to return to China as faculty. The eminent economists Qian Yingyi and David Daokui Li were part of this early wave of returnees. Qian would become Dean of the School of Economics and Management, and Li would go on to serve as Founding Dean of Schwarzman College. In 2008, Tsinghua University convinced Princeton Professor Shi Yigong to turn down a $10 million grant from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute to take up the deanship of Tsinghua’s School of Life Sciences. While this approach to recruit­ ment was not unique to Tsinghua, Tsinghua carried the advantage of prestige, fund­ ing, and a large alumni base from which to recruit. Once onboard, faculty faced pressure to publish in international journals and with international co-authors, which would contribute to higher rankings (Kirby et al. 2019a, 9). Students at Tsinghua also found themselves amongst an increasingly international cohort. The 2016 opening of the Schwarzman Scholars program brought even more international students, faculty, and media attention to Tsinghua. The program was made possible by a US$100 million donation from the American businessman and philanthropist Stephen A. Schwarzman, who led the fundraising for an endowment for the program of nearly US$600 million. Tsinghua hosted a total of 3,014 international students in 2018 from 116 countries around the world. The university opened an International Students and Scholars

International Origins and Global Aspirations  27

Center in 2016 to better coordinate international activities and serve foreign nationals on campus. The Center provided “one-stop shop” service that included legal advice, visa paperwork, health insurance, scholarship, work-study, and housing. The Center also organized activities and work to better integrate international students and scholars into campus life (Kirby et al. 2019a, 12). In addition to opening its doors to international cooperation on campus, Tsinghua expanded its international cooperation elsewhere. In 2014, it announced the opening of the Tsinghua–Berkeley Shenzhen Institute in Shenzhen in partnership with the University of California, Berkeley, to promote global research collaboration and graduate student education in environment science, new energy technology, informa­ tion technology, data science, precision medicine, and healthcare. Tsinghua’s relation­ ship with Berkeley further expanded with the establishment of the Berkeley–Tsinghua Joint Research Center on Energy and Climate Change in May 2016. In 2015, Tsinghua became the first Chinese university to build a satellite program outside of China when it announced a partnership with Microsoft and the University of Washington to form the Global Innovation Exchange Institute, a new, Seattlebased graduate school for technology and innovation. Tsinghua’s international pres­ ence expanded further in 2018 with the opening of the China–Italy Design Innovation Hub and Tsinghua Arts and Design Institute in Milan (“The Unveiling Ceremony” 2019). A Tsinghua Southeast Asia Center opened in Indonesia in 2018 along with a Latin America Center in Santiago, Chile (“Ground-breaking” 2019). Italy, Indonesia, and Chile were all important partners in China’s ambitious Belt and Road Initiative, which sought to build closer relations between China and countries in Asia, Europe, Africa, and Latin America through infrastructure development, investments, and education. Tsinghua was not alone in its internationalization. Peking University—not to be left behind by Tsinghua’s Schwarzman program—established its Yenching Academy, bringing young scholars from abroad for an intensive program in Chinese studies. PKU also established a business school in Oxford. And, as Welch and Postiglione’s Chapter 8 notes, Xiamen University opened a $300 million campus in Malaysia in 2016, which is home to 4,600 students as of 2019 and aims to eventually host 10,000 on its 150-acre campus (Liu 2017). Internationalization according to world-class models of higher education is the backbone of Chinese universities’ resurgence in international rankings and research. Tsinghua is in vanguard of this trend, but its pursuits are representative of the actions and aspirations of many ambitiously international Chinese universities.

2.4  The Silk (or Other) Roads for Cooperation between China and Europe? What then are the implications of the rise and internationalization of Chinese higher education for the “New Silk Road” (NSR), otherwise known by the less metaphorical name, the “Belt and Road Initiative” (BRI)? This ambitious concept of multilayered

28  William C. Kirby cooperation between China and some 127 Eurasian, African, and Latin American countries is predicated on Chinese institutions “going out” into the world to make their mark, be it in business, infrastructure, or education (“New Starting Point” 2019). By deploying the “Silk Road” metaphor and legacy to support the initiative, the NSR seems to redirect, at least rhetorically, the trajectory of Chinese higher edu­ cation’s Western-focused internationalization. Chinese students, who have long “gone out” to seek education abroad (more than 800,000 in 2017), have largely flown over or by NSR countries to seek their educa­ tion in North America, Australia, the United Kingdom, or the European Union. As van der Wende’s Chapter 3 in this volume shows, students from NSR countries have indeed come to China to study in increasing numbers (at least 10,000 on Chinese government scholarships annually, representing over 50 percent of international stu­ dents on scholarship in China). Scientists from NSR countries have been recruited to newly established “Belt and Road” laboratories. But at the moment, this is a oneway street: Precious few Chinese find their way to graduate programs in Karachi or Almaty (Li 2018). Aiding China’s rise as a destination for international students are the recent nationalist turns in the US and UK, long the top destinations for inter­ nation­al students, which have led students to increasingly consider institutions in alternative locations. This development may “internationalize” Chinese universities in new ways. Instead of adopting world-class standards, Chinese universities may begin to internationalize their reputations and research agendas through educating increasingly global student bodies. In the long run, if the historical pattern of Japan and Taiwan higher education is any measure, continued improvement in the higher education sector at home in China may lead to fewer students seeing their higher education abroad, but for those that go, their destinations will largely be European, North American, or Australian. Still, as Lin Tian and Nian Cai Liu show in Chapter 17 in this volume, institutions between China and Europe have taken advantage of the NSR initiative to explore new forms of cooperation. The twenty-first-century Maritime Silk Road Consortium, with four British research universities as members, is one case in point. While the longer-term impact of the Consortium, as with other NSR initiatives, is not yet clear (as Marijk van der Wende’s Chapter 3 shows: To date, of all the EU countries, only Greece, Portugal, Italy, Hungary, Austria, and Luxemburg have formally presented themselves as members of the NSR), the steady accumulation of NSR/BRI initiatives would appear to offer umbrella organizations for further cooperation. In Zhuolin Feng and Luyang Gao’s Chapter 6 in this volume, other early evidence from the NSR era suggests that Chinese universities are increasingly initiating new consortia themselves, such as with 2015’s University Alliance of the Silk Road and 2016’s Asian Universities Alliance, and are taking greater responsibilities in existing ones. Should this trend continue, Chinese universities could gain greater influence in inter­nation­al consortia, but what these developments mean for cooperation with world-class universities remains unclear. Perhaps new institutional cooperation along the NSR will come easier with the former “socialist brother countries” of central and eastern Europe. Chapter  4 by

International Origins and Global Aspirations  29

Robert Tijssen and Jos Winnink, in this volume, notes that the establishment of the China–CEE Institute in Budapest, Hungary may be a step in this direction. Which partnerships along the NSR prove substantive, and which remain symbolic, may help us understand the aims and aspirations of the initiative and of contemporary Chinese universities. “One Belt, One Road” research centers in NSR countries, funded by China’s government and universities, often include a focus on the humanities and social sciences (“Yi Dai Yi Lu” 2019). These institutes may increase the quantity of Chinese scholarship in the humanities and social sciences, as their generous funding creates strong incentives for collaboration with academics from real NSR countries. As Sporn and van der Wende argue in Chapter 18 in this volume, the NSR has emphasized aca­ demic exchange in the humanities and social sciences. It is, however, unlikely that NSR higher education cooperation will do much to help Chinese universities achieve world-class quality in humanities and social science research. Indeed, Jie Gao’s Chapter 9 shows that improving the quality of education along the NSR is sub­or­din­ ate to the Chinese government’s efforts to “build People-to-People ties,” or increas­ ing China’s soft power, through NSR educational cooperation. On the other hand, universities along the NSR may themselves benefit from exchanges with increasingly well-ranked Chinese institutions, which have adopted some world-class practices in teaching and research. The risk is that if BRI financing is closely tied to political agendas, research produced by NSR institutes may be more guided by China’s geopolitical aspirations than by serious research questions. Much attention is paid to an apparent link between the NSR/BRI and China’s quest for technological innovation. To the degree that there is a connection between these efforts, they would appear to favor cooperation with the developed higher edu­ cation systems of Europe and North America, not the emerging economies of the NSR. But if “Made in China 2025” (a phrase that seems to have been temporarily retired) truly means “self-sufficiency,” this would be a recipe for reduced co­oper­ ation and an intellectual isolation that would be at odds with the entire history and trajectory of Chinese higher education. In my view, that is unlikely. At the moment, both the Chinese government and its international educational partners give very conflicting signals. New cooperative consortia are praised at the same time that the Ministry of Education terminated more than 200 cooperative agreements with foreign universities (Feng  2018). European institutions have to date been mostly hesitant to develop either a strategy or the ambition to use the framework of NSR/BRI to frame enhanced Sino-European cooperation. Foreign uni­ ver­sities are hard pressed to pursue fully possibilities for collaboration with Chinese institutions when such uncertainty about the Chinese government’s commitment to international higher education cooperation hangs in the air. Perhaps more to the point: Has not the rhetoric and propaganda of the NSR and BRI far outpaced the development of a coherent strategy on the Chinese side? Higher education cooperation along the New Silk Road can make Chinese uni­ver­sities more “international” in their posture, but the nature of such institutional exchanges may do little to aid Chinese universities’ pursuit of world-class status.

30  William C. Kirby So far, it would appear that Chinese universities’ decisions to allocate resources to  exchanges with real NSR countries and institutions in Central and South Asia have been driven largely by political considerations, not by what is best for the global reputation of China’s universities. What is clear is that, as Chinese universities seek to build ties with NSR institutions, they will face little competition from the world’s most highly ranked universities (still largely located in the West) (Kirby and van der Wende 2019, 139).3 The point here is—as Marijk van der Wende and I have argued recently—that leading Chinese universities have been, and see themselves as, a part of a web of elite global institutions, and today measure themselves above all vis-à-vis their counter­ parts in Europe and North America (Kirby and van der Wende  2019, 139). They may have ever more students from the New Silk Road countries, but they recruit their faculty from, and focus their premier research partnerships with, the leading “Western” universities.4 Tsinghua’s joint research institute with the University of California, Berkeley, in Shenzhen and satellite program with the University of Washington in Seattle are examples of such cutting-edge research collaborations between China and “the West.” Today, the path towards global excellence of Chinese universities lies clearly in cooperation and competition with European and American institutions. Is there a “Chinese model” for universities that may be exported along the New Silk Road? Is there such a thing as “a university with Chinese characteristics”? The answer is basically no. What distinguishes leading Chinese universities today is how they have grown as part of an international system of higher education and research, now buttressed by enviable financial support by the Chinese state. Just as Americans developed universities of a high reputation by plagiarizing the norms of German and British institutions, Chinese institutions have learned from other global leaders over the past century, be they European, American, or Soviet. In university govern­ ance, for example, the “Chinese model” of the role of Party Secretaries is hardly a Chinese invention: One can find the same in every “socialist brother” country from East Germany to Outer Mongolia. This is, in any event, not a readily exportable model, unless your export market is limited to Vietnam, Cuba, and North Korea. As Marijk van der Wende and I concluded a year ago, the “New Silk Road” may offer a roadmap for new directions for overseas Chinese investment, and in time, research and study. It may well lead, through new funding opportunities, to greater cooperation between Chinese and European universities. But it is unlikely to remake the global landscape of higher education. Just as Richthofen’s “Silk Road” invented a history of Eurasian exchange that was less robust and coherent than his imagination of it allowed, the implications of the NSR for the internationalization of Chinese education are likely to be less significant than many envision. Chinese universities

3  See, for example, the top ten universities in “QS World University Rankings.” 4  A group of Shanghai-based universities launched a joint recruitment drive for professors in the United States in October 2017, see http://www.china.org.cn/china/2017-10/24/content_41782596.htm.

International Origins and Global Aspirations  31

remain firmly modeled on international prototypes of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and it is that company that they wish to keep, to compete in, and to lead. The future of Chinese universities, just like the future of Chinese companies, is not in Central Asia (Kirby and van der Wende 2019, 141). Their greatest challenge is, at present, at home, with the founding ideals of great institutions such as Peking University and Tsinghua University in tension with a powerful—and powerfully insecure—Chinese Communist Party, which limits debate in the humanities and social sciences, even as Chinese researchers become recognized as global leaders in the pure and applied sciences. This is not a new ten­ sion in China, and it is worth reflecting on the country’s dramatic rise in national strength since China’s rebuilt universities were allowed to adopt international best practices in the aftermath of the Cultural Revolution. On its face, the NSR offers Chinese universities greater resources to internation­ alize, supported by alluring examples from the historical “Silk Road” of China strengthening itself through exchange with foreign ideas. However, the NSR’s higher education cooperation, as envisioned by Xi Jinping, is guided more by the state’s geo-political ambitions in the region than by a quest to compete with world-class universities. Indeed, pressure to establish partnerships along the NSR may lead Chinese universities to redirect resources away from efforts to adopt international best practices in higher education. In the long run, stronger and more enduring than any Party directive is the legacy of the founders of modern Chinese universities, such as Cai Yuanpei, committed to institutions and education with a “world view.” Chinese universities that embrace this legacy will be well positioned to both com­ pete for world-class status and capitalize on opportunities for collaboration along and well beyond the New Silk Road.

References Abrami, Regina M., William C. Kirby, and F. Warren McFarlan. 2014. Can China Lead? Reaching the Limits of Power and Growth. Boston: Harvard Business Review Press. Feng, Emily. 2018. “China closes a fifth of foreign university partnerships.” Financial Times. July 17. https://www.ft.com/content/794b77e8-8976-11e8-bf9e-8771d5404543. “Ground-breaking of the Tsinghua Southeast Asia Center in Indonesia.” 2019. Tsinghua University. http://eng.ee.pbcsf.tsinghua.edu.cn/web/news_info.php?newsid=51. Hayhoe, Ruth. 1996. China’s Universities 1895–1995: A Century of Cultural Conflict. New York: Routledge. “History and Development.” 2019. Lingnan University. https://www.ln.edu.hk/historyand-development. Israel, John. 1998. Lianda: a Chinese University in War and Revolution. Stanford: Stanford University Press. Kirby, William C. 1997. “The Internationalization of China: Foreign Relations at Home and Abroad in the Republican Era.” China Quarterly 150: p. 433.

32  William C. Kirby Kirby, William  C. 2014. “The Chinese Century? The Challenges of Higher Education.” Daedalus 143 (2): p. 145. Kirby, William C. 2017. The World of Universities in the 21st Century. Lecture. Academia Sinica, Institute of Modern History. Kirby, William C., and Marijk C. van der Wende. 2019. “The New Silk Road: Implications for Higher Education in China and the West?” Cambridge Journal of Regions, Economy, and Society 12 (1): p. 127. Kirby, William  C., Joycelyn  W.  Eby, and Yuanzhuo Wang. 2019a. “From Preparatory Academy to National Flagship: The Evolution of Tsinghua University.” HBS Case No. 316-013. Harvard Business School Publishing. Kirby, William C., Joycelyn W. Eby, and Yuanzhuo Wang. 2019b. “Higher Education in China: Internationalization in Turbulent Times.” HBS Background Note No. 316-066. Harvard Business School Publishing. Li, Aisi. 2018. “ ‘One Belt One Road’ and Central Asia: A New Trend in Internationalization of Higher Education?” International Higher Education (92): pp. 14–16. Liu, Coco. 2017. “Belt and read: how China is exporting education and influence to Malaysia and other Asean countries.” South China Morning Post. July 30. https://www. scmp.com/week-asia/politics/article/2097965/belt-road-and-books-how-chinas-tryingsoft-power-outreach. “New Starting Point, New Vision and New Journey—Wang Yi on Outcomes of the Second Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation (BRF).” 2019. Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People’s Republic of China. https://www.fmprc.gov.cn/mfa_eng/ zxxx_662805/t1660860.shtml. Ng, Naomi. 2017. “Hong Kong Baptist University looks to hire 100 of the ‘best and brightest’ professors.” The Star. November 28. https://www.thestar.com.my/news/ regional/2017/11/28/hong-kong-baptist-university-looks-to-hire-100-of-the-bestand-brightest-professors. Qian, Yingyi, and Li Qiang (eds.) 2011. Lao Qinghua de shehui kexue [Social Sciences in Old Tsinghua]. Beijing: Qinghua daxue chubanshe. “QS World University Rankings.” 2019. QS. https://www.topuniversities.com/universityrankings/world-university-rankings/2020. “Schwarzman College.” 2016. Robert A. M. Stern and Associates. http://www.ramsa.com/ projects/project/schwarzman-college. “The Unveiling Ceremony of the China–Italy Design Innovation Hub and the Tsinghua Arts and Design Institute in Milan.” 2019. Tsinghua University. http://news.tsinghua. edu.cn/publish/thunewsen/9670/2018/20180419085251549569880/201804190 85251549569880_.html. Weston, Timothy B. 2004. The Power of Position. Berkeley: University of California Press. “Yi Dai Yi Lu, Zhongguo Zhiku Dong Qilai” [One Belt One Road, Chinese Think Tanks Moving Out]. 2019. State Council. http://www.gov.cn/xinwen/2019-03/29/content_ 5377949.htm. Zhang, Lizhong. 2000. “Cai Yuanpei.” Prospects: The Quarterly Review of Comparative Education 23: p. 147.

3 EU–China Cooperation along the New Silk Road A Balanced Approach Towards Common Goals? Marijk van der Wende

3.1  Introduction: the EU–China Cooperation in Higher Education and R&D This chapter focuses on the relationship between the European Union (EU), including its predecessors since 1952, and the People’s Republic of China (PRC) since its ­re-opening in 1978. While recognizing the importance and diversity of the role of individual EU Member States, this focus on the EU as a whole allows to gain the bigger picture of what the EU Member States have undertaken together in building their relationship with China, noting that smaller Member States may even completely rely on these EU–China policies for their higher education cooperation with China. Moreover, it is indeed foremost the EU that has the power to deal with China as an emerging global player in higher education and research (as much as in many other areas). However, in order to analyze EU–China cooperation in these fields, we need to make a distinction between the EU’s legal competencies in higher education and in research, because these differ quite substantially, which will first be briefly explained in the next section.

3.2  The EU’s Legal Competencies in Higher Education and Research The EU’s legal competencies are defined by the EU Treaties. The first Treaty on the European Economic Community (EEC) was signed in Rome in 1957. It had economic objectives and established the European Common Market. Since then a series of Treaties has extended the objectives beyond the economic sphere, into areas such as justice and home affairs, foreign, security, and monetary policy. Consequently, there are currently two main Treaties (the Consolidated Treaties), which together set

Marijk van der Wende, EU–China Cooperation along the New Silk Road: A Balanced Approach Towards Common Goals? In: China and Europe on the New Silk Road: Connecting Universities Across Eurasia. Edited by: Marijk van der Wende, William C. Kirby, Nian Cai Liu, and Simon Marginson, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198853022.003.0003

34  Marijk van der Wende out the competences of the EU: the Treaty on European Union (TEU, signed in Maastricht in 1992) and the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU, signed in Lisbon in 2007) (Eur-Lex 2016). The development of the EU has impacted higher education institutions primarily in their research function. Its role to stimulate, coordinate, and finance research has been recognized since 1958 in relation to the EEC’s industrial policies. It only became a ­formal competency under article 3 of TEU in 1992 and was confirmed as a shared competency under article 4 of TFEU in 2007 (see Figure 3.1). This implies that now both the EU and EU countries are able to legislate and adopt legally binding acts, with in the case of research the specific limitation that “the Union shall have competence to carry out activities, in particular to define and implement programs; however, the exercise of that competence shall not result in Member States being prevented from exercising theirs” (Reillon  2016). But obviously, with a budget of nearly €80 billion for the Horizon2020 framework program for R&D (2014–2020) (and a proposed budget of over €100 billion for 2021–2027), the EU plays an im­por­ tant role and the European Research Area (ERA) gradually evolved from a concept to an objective of this shared competency. The EU’s influence on the education side is weaker (Figure 3.1), since it only has a supporting competency under article 6 of TFEU and can thus only intervene to ­support, coordinate, or complement actions of Member States. This is based on the subsidiarity principle, which is strictly upheld by Member States as to preserve the quality, linguistic, and cultural diversity of their education systems. EU-led programs such as ERASMUS were embraced for cooperation, exchange of students, staff, establishment of joint programs, degrees, and the recognition of qualifications. This initiative ultimately led to a convergence of national higher education systems, through the Bologna process (named after an agreement signed there in 1999). It should be noted, however, that this was an intergovernmental (bottom-up) initiative by Member States and neither the process nor the resulting European Higher

Education (art 6 TFEU) Supporting competency EU can only intervene to support, coordinate or complement the action of EU countries Research (art 4 TFEU) Shared competency EU and EU countries are able to legislate and adopt legally binding acts Trade (art 3 TFEU) Exclusive competency EU alone is able to legislate and adopt binding acts

Figure 3.1  Competencies of the European Union

EU–China Cooperation along the New Silk Road  35

Education Area (EHEA, which extended into forty-eight countries) have ever been fully entrusted to the EU at supranational level (Huisman & van der Wende 2004; European Higher Education Area n.d.). Despite the many related activities funded by the EU, its series of policy papers, and the growth of the budget for ERASMUS to the current nearly €15 billion (for 2014–2020 and proposed to be tripled for 2021–2027, which actually provides the funding for many EHEA actions), the legal competency of the EU in (higher) education belongs to the weakest category. Especially as compared to the exclusive competency that the EU has in the field of trade, where it alone is able to legislate and adopt binding acts under article 3 of the TFEU. Not only it sets rules for the internal market, also trade outside the EU, i.e. the negotiation of trade agreements with third countries or trade blocs, is an exclusive responsibility of the EU, although they can be enforced only after ratification by the Parliaments of the Member States. The EU’s competencies in trade are mentioned here as they may be relevant for research-related topics such as IPR or data management (see Chapter 12 by Kummeling and van Deursen in this volume) and to education-related topics such as the recognition of degrees (see Chapters 9 by Gao and Chapter  10 by Zhu et al. in this volume). Such arrangements may be part of trade agreements with other regions, for instance under the provisions for trade in professional services of WTO/GATS (Vlk et al. 2008). When analyzing EU–China relationships in higher education and research, these very different levels of competence of the EU and their fragmentation across the ­various aspects of higher education should be taken into account. Consequently, the  historical overview of these relations focuses on research and education as ­separate categories.

3.3  A Short History of EU–China Relations in Research The history of academic relations between individual European countries and China goes back many centuries (see Chapter 2 by Kirby in this volume; Kirby and van der Wende  2016,  2019), but as our focus is on the EU–China relations we start our analysis in the midst of the twentieth century, when the People’s Republic of China (PRC) was created in 1949 and the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) (first predecessor of the EU) in 1952.1 We recognize that while during these seven decades China has been one integrated country, the EU has been emerging from an initial community of six to eventually a union of twenty-eight (twenty-seven since Brexit) Member States. As presented in Table 3.1, the development of cooperation between the EU and China in research has on the EU side (left column) been driven and framed by a

1  The author would like to acknowledge the valuable input and feedback of Prof. M. Horvat (senior adviser for International Science, Vienna, Austria and chairman, advisory board, URBAN EU–CHINA) and Mr. Marcin Grabiec (former Counsellor for higher education at the EU Delegation to China).

 

 

 

1975: Official diplomatic relations established between EEC and China  

Start of Sino-European Cooperation in S&T for Development 1985: Agreement on trade and economic cooperation

1952: European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) established by the “Treaty of Paris” 1957 European Economic Community established by the Treaty of Rome.

1958: “Treaty of Rome” establishing the European Atomic Energy Community (EURATOM) First basis for EC to stimulate, coordinate, finance, research.

1971: Creation of European Cooperation in Science and Technology (COST) for coordination of national R&D activities.

 

 

1984: launch of 1st European R&T Framework Program (FP1)

1986: Single European Act enshrined research policy in the EEC Treaty

EU–China

EU

1986: Establishment of National Natural Science Foundation of China, supporting Program for R&T, Innovation, Universities & Infrastructures

1982: China Science and Technology Exchange Centre (CSTEC) created to promote research interactions between China and foreign counterparts

1978: Third Plenum of the Eleventh Central Committee. Adoption of Deng Xiaoping’s economic reform and open-door policy. 1st National Science Conference

1966–1976: Cultural Revolution

1949: establishment of PRC Establishment of Chinese Academy of Science (CAS) 1953–1957: 1st 5-Year Plan for Economic and Social Development of the PRC 1956–1967: 1st Mid- and Long-Term S&T Plans

China

Table 3.1  Historical overview of research cooperation between EU (and its predecessors) and China

Five-Year Plans for Economic and

1984–1987 FP1  Intra-European

1987–2002: FP2–FP5     2002–2013 FP6-FP7 Cooperation      Focus on global competitiveness  

2003: Creation of the EU–China Comprehensive Strategic Partnership 2009: China–EC Science & Technology Partnership Scheme

 

 

 

2000: Lisbon Declaration Adoption of European Research Area (ERA) concept. 2007: Establishment of the European Research Council (ERC) 2009: Lisbon Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU). Research (ERA) becomes shared competence of the EU   and Member States (art 4) 2010: Europe 2020 for smart, sustainable, inclusive growth 2012: EU–China Joint Declaration on Innovation Cooperation Dialogue

2010: Administrative Agreement between DG RTD and NSFC

1995–1998: Policy to develop the country through science and education 1995: launch of Project 211 1998: launch of Project 985

1998: EC–China S&T Cooperation Agreement

 

2010: National Outline for Medium and Long-term Education Reform and Development 2010–2020 2012: The innovation capacity improvement plan for HEIs

 

 

Start of EU–China dialogues on Science and Technology

1992: Maastricht Treaty on European Union (TEU). EC to promote research and technological development (Art 3) in coordination with Member States

Table 3.1  Continued Social Development  &  Mid- and Long Term S & T Plans

EU

2021: Launch of Horizon Europe (FP9 2021–2027)

 

 

2014: Launch of Horizon 2020 (FP8 2014–2020)

Table 3.1  Continued China

2018: 20th EU–China Summit Joint Programming Initiative Urban Europe 2019: 21st EU–China summit reaffirmed the importance of adhering to international scientific standards. 

2017: ICD3 Extension of JRC-CAS cooperation Roadmap for EU–China S&T Cooperation 

2015: ICD2 ERC-NSFC Agreement on Research Cooperation 2016: EU adopts new policy framework for EU engagement with China

2013: 1st Innovation Cooperation Dialogue (ICD1) China–EU 2020 Strategic Agenda for Cooperation

EU–China

2015: Reform of the S&T system R&D as element of NSR/OBOR Launch of Made in China 2025 2016: National Innovation-Driven Development Strategy Launch of the 13th Five-Year Plan for Science and Technology Development in HEIs 2017: Belt and Road Summit hosted by President Xi in Beijing in May 2017 Launch of Double first-class project BRI STI Cooperation Action Plan Belt & Road Initiative NSFC  

2013: Launch of New Silk Road (or One Belt One Road) strategy

Focus on global competitiveness

EU–China Cooperation along the New Silk Road  39

series of Treaties reflecting the integration and extension of the EU and its growing competencies in the field of research. Early actions were structured with the creation of European Cooperation in Science and Technology (COST) in 1971 as an intergovernmental initiative of different countries for coordination of their national R&D activities. These were enlarged from 1984 onwards as a European Community activity under a series of Framework Programs with increasing scope and budgets (nearly €11 billion annually for FP8 or Horizon2020). This approach introduced a competitive strategic program focusing on transnational cooperation of distributed teams drawn from the growing number of Member States. With the EU’s Lisbon Declaration in 2000 aiming “to become the most competitive knowledge economy in the world”, R&D became gradually more geared towards global competitiveness. In 2007 the European Research Council (ERC) was established as an even more competitive research funding mechanism, targeting individual researchers (rather than teams) without the requirement of transnational mobility. However, a serious setback caused by the global financial and ensuing Euro crisis, tempered the Lisbon ambitions and aims (van der Wende, 2009). The consecutive Strategy on Europe 2020 for Smart, Sustainable, Inclusive Growth (published in 2010) expressed more realistic aims and actions. Budgets for research were further enlarged with a view to the “Grand Challenges” that the EU was facing in the twenty-first century. Table 3.1 (right column) demonstrates that China’s research policies, based on its tradition of long-term planning, has been guided by a series of Five-Year Plans for Economic and Social Development (the first from 1953–1957 and the 13th FYP running from 2014–2020) and of Mid- and Long Term Science and Technology Plans (the first from 1956–1967 and the 7th STP running from 2006–2020). However, ­during the dark period of the Cultural Revolution nearly all Chinese universities were ruined and consequently all infrastructure and human capital had to be built up again thereafter. This started in 1978, when Deng Xiaoping’s economic reform and Open-Door Policy was adopted and the first National Science Conference was held. A series of such conferences followed (in 1995, 1999, 2006, 2012, and 2016) and an impressive range of policy initiatives has been taken, especially since the mid-1990s when China decided to spur the development of its higher education sector by building a reputation of excellence aimed at creating “World-Class Universities”, through projects 211 and 985 (China Education Center  2004). These efforts were initially undertaken in the context of the country’s own advancement, aimed at training high-level professional manpower to implement the national strategy for social and economic development. With the launch of China’s New Silk Road, or One Belt one Road (OBOR) or Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), geo-political strategy in 2013, they became gradually more important in enhancing China’s global competitiveness, as confirmed in 2015 when the Science, Technology, and Innovation (STI) policy became a key element of this strategy. The Double World-Class project and the Made in China 2025 strategy were announced in the same year. In 2017, the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC) followed President Xi’s Belt and Road Summit, by presenting a Belt and Road Science Technology and

40  Marijk van der Wende Innovation (STI) Cooperation Action Plan, echoing the BRI aims, as proposed by President Xi. The center column of Table  3.1 highlights that the first official diplomatic relations established between EEC and China (1975) actually predated the launch of Deng Xiaoping’s reforms. This opening and reform policy quickly became to include student and researcher mobility to the US (signed in 19792) and the UK. The China Science and Technology Exchange Centre (CSTEC) was created in 1982 to promote research interactions between China and foreign counterparts, marking the start of Sino-European Cooperation in S&T for Development. Although cooperation with China had played a role in FPs from the start, it was formally established under the 1985 Agreement on Trade and Economic Cooperation. The EU–China dialogues on Science and Technology started in the early 1990s and were one of the first areas of cooperation between the European Commission and China, as confirmed in the EC–China S&T Agreement signed in 1998 (Horvat and Lundin 2008). The EU–China partnership in this area was further developed over the next ­decade and resulted in an agreement between the EU’s Directorate for Research and the NSFC in 2010 and in a EU–China Joint Declaration on Innovation Cooperation Dialogue in 2012, presenting the decision to set up a dedicated High Level Innovation Cooperation Dialogue (ICD), which has been held since in 2013, 2015, and 2017. Meanwhile, a China–EU 2020 Strategic Agenda for Cooperation (2013), and ERC-NSFC Agreement on Research Cooperation (2015), an Extension of JRC-CAS cooperation and a Roadmap for EU–China S&T Cooperation (2017) have been jointly developed and agreed, leading to a new Joint Programming Initiative on Sustainable and Livable Cities and Urban Areas3 (see also section 3.5), which was inaugurated during the 20th EU–China Summit in 2018. The 21th EU–China Summit in 2019 was held under more tense circumstances (as also discussed in the introductory Chapter 1 of this volume), foreshadowing a renewal of the EU–China Scientific Cooperation Agreement, as concerns over research ethics and (unwanted) technology transfer were on the rise, thus including in the joint statement that: “Two sides reaffirmed the importance of adhering to international scientific standards” (European Union 2019a). From this analysis we can conclude that although international cooperation and exchange as instruments played a role from the start, the aim of EU’s and China’s research policies went from an initial internal focus on developing a national know­ledge economy, to one gradually more oriented towards global competition. This happened for China more than a decade later than in the EU. Yet, the EU was far more seriously set back by the global financial and consequent Euro crisis between 2007–2012 than was China, which mostly spurred its economic growth and (both domestic and foreign) investment in the same period. It is also clear that 2  The US–China Agreement on Cooperation in Science and Technology was signed by US President Jimmy Carter and Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping on January 31, 1979. 3  The Joint Programming Initiative Urban Europe (JPI Urban Europe) was created in 2010 and has currently fourteen member countries, including China, see https://jpi-urbaneurope.eu/about/intro/.

EU–China Cooperation along the New Silk Road  41

co­oper­ation has been intensified and that it has obtained a more strategic character, especially since 2012. The actual aims, focus, investments, instruments, and their effects will be discussed in more detail in section 3.5. We can also conclude that the role of China’s BRI has become more pronounced as a frame for China’s R&D policies since 2015. However, it is so far unclear how this actually affects the EU–China cooperation in R&D. It that respect, it should be noted that European Heads of State or Government were mostly absent, or sent lower-level representatives and observers, at President Xi’s Belt and Road Summit in 2017. Additionally, a joint declaration proposed at the International Symposium on Funding Science and People Cooperation for a Prosperous Belt and Road hosted in the same year by NSFC was “welcomed” but not signed by European partners. At the next Belt and Road Summit, held in April 2019, the representation of European leaders was not overwhelming either. Only seven Heads of State from EU countries were present (Austria, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Portugal) as well as one from Switzerland (EFTA) (The Diplomat 2019), but major Northwestern European EU members remained absent. Moreover, the European Commission was not invited, and has so far not subscribed to the BRI. Only Greece, Portugal, Hungary, Austria, Italy and Luxembourg have done so in 2018/2019. China, applies a bilateral foreign-policy type of approach with its BRI. Considering the important role of the EU in R&D and even more so in trade (see section 3.2), the question is how effective such an approach will be in terms of its impact on research co­oper­ation? We will get back to this question in the final section.

3.4  A Short History of EU–China Relations in Higher Education As in research, cooperation in higher education between European countries and China has a long history. But as set out in the introductory Chapter 1, after China ­re-opened to the West, the twentieth century has seen it mostly considered as a developing country and a follower, which sent increasing numbers of its students to the West to study. Many students came to Europe with support from the Chinese Service Center for Scholarly Exchange (CSCSE) which collaborated on a bilateral basis with national exchange services in European countries, such as the British Council and the German DAAD. Multilateral collaboration was shaped under the EU–China Higher Education Cooperation Program, which ran from 1997 to 2001 (see the Chapter 5 by Xie in this volume). Around the turn of the millennium and along the rebuilding of its higher education system, China started to push forward the progress of mutual recognition of academic degrees with European countries. In 2002 the Chinese government signed the first agreement on Equivalence of Academic Degrees in Higher Education with the government of Germany, in 2004 an Agreement on Mutual Recognition of Academic Degrees in Higher Education with the government of UK,

42  Marijk van der Wende and has since signed such agreements with in total twenty-one European countries, most recently in 2018 on quality assurance and the recognition of degrees with Ireland (Quality and Qualifications Ireland 2018). This is done on a bilateral basis, as authority over such issues rests with the national governments of the EU Member States (see section 3.2). The EU established in 2004 the ERASMUS Mundus program, open for graduate students from around the world, including China, which quickly became the largest provider of non-EU students for joint masters and doctoral degrees in this new part of the ERASMUS program. China from its side launched in 2010 “Campus China” aimed at promoting China as a destination for international students supported by the China Scholarship Council (CSC), which gradually attracts also more students from Europe (see Figure 3.5 in section 3.6). Over the past decade the EU and China have built up their cooperation in the areas of (higher) education, training, culture, multilingualism, and youth through a series of “policy dialogues”. These were integrated in 2012 into the EU–China High Level People-to-People Dialogue (HPPD), complementing the EU–China High Level Economic and Trade Dialogue and High-Level Strategic Dialogue. It is held every two years as the overarching mechanism which accommodates all EU–China cooperation and exchange and also provides a framework for bilateral initiatives between China and individual EU Member States. The EU–China Higher Education Platform for Cooperation and Exchange was created alongside and the EU–China Tuning project (Tuning China n.d.), aimed at strengthening the compatibility of EU and China education systems as well as enhancing outcome-based education. As one of the most remarkable initiatives in this area, it commenced during the first part of 2012 and was actually launched after the second in 2014. In 2015 the third HPPD was held and the EU opened the ERASMUS+ program for China.4 In addition to these regular HPPDs, and in response to China’s BRI initiative, a special China–EU education ministers’ conference was held in 2016 on “Building a China–EU Education Silk Road towards the future”, where further agreements on academic recognition and exchange were signed. The 5th HPPD is foreseen to take place in Brussels in 2020 and might discuss further guidelines for academic recognition, building on the results of the Tuning Project and the work of the Groningen Declaration Network (Groningen Declaration 2019), of which China became a signatory country in 2017. Clearly, EU–China activities in higher education are more limited and more recent than those in research. This is likely due to several reasons. First, the more restricted legal competencies of the EU in this area (see section 3.2) and consequent extra bilateral efforts needed. Second, the initially strong intra-EU focus of the ERASMUS program, enhanced by the Bologna Process in the first decade after its signing. Even though the latter was intergovernmental and voluntary, it virtually urged all European countries to reform their higher education systems demanding 4  For more information on Erasmus+ for higher education in China, see: https://ec.europa.eu/assets/ eac/erasmus-plus/factsheets/asia-central/erasmusplus_china_2017.pdf

EU–China Cooperation along the New Silk Road  43

substantial efforts and spurring intense internal debate (Huisman and van der Wende, 2004). Third, China’s relatively late opening up to international education on a mutual basis in 2010. It is only since then and marked by the start of the HPPDs in 2012, that EU–China relations in higher education are becoming more comprehensive and systematic. The modus operandi and effects will be discussed in more detail in the following sections.

3.5  Policy Mechanisms and Instruments The relationship between the EU and China has been developing towards a more equal partnership over the last decades, moving from one defined initially by European aid to one of mutual cooperation. More recently in certain research areas the relationship is becoming more competitive. This is reflected in the type of policy mechanisms and instruments used. Rather than aiming to present an exhausting overview, the main trends therein will be ­analyzed in this section (for a more comprehensive overview, see: Horvath 2018; European External Action Service 2016): • Cooperation has grown in scale and intensity, which was initially mostly supported through the opening up of EU programs to China. In research, Chinese participations were funded by the EU starting under FP2 (see Table 3.2). • Cooperation in both areas became more systematic since 2012, guided by ­regular sectoral policy dialogues (ICD for research and HPPD for education). • Cooperation is more geared towards equal partnership and mutual benefit. The EU gradually promoted more reciprocity in cooperation and China’s Policy Paper on the EU (2014), also expressed the aim to “Deepen the China– EU Comprehensive Strategic Partnership for Mutual Benefit and Win-win Cooperation” (China Daily 2014). The EU–China cooperation in research was thus continued from 2014 onwards under Horizon 2020 (FP8) with co-funding from China’s Ministry of Science and Technology through its Co-Funding Mechanism (CFM). China intends to sponsor 200 million RMB (about €28 million) and the EU €100 Million annually through the CFM (H2020 and China 2013). EU data confirms the increase in China’s contributions since

Table 3.2  China’s participations in EU Framework programs Framework Program Chinese participants Source: Horvat 2018 *As of Sept 2018

FP4 1994–1998 109

FP5 1998–2002 155

FP6 2002–2006 400

FP7 2007–2013 651

H2020 (FP8)* 2014–2020 369

44  Marijk van der Wende 2014, although in 2017 still only around 50 percent of the intended budget. Its participation as the second most active non-associated country after the US, presents a strong focus on food technologies and more recently on energy. A large share of participations concerns Marie Skłodowska-Curie (MSCA) grants for researcher mobility (European Union  2017a; European Union  2018a; European Union 2018c). In 2015, Chinese researchers also gained access to ERC grants (Euraxess China 2017). • Since China bypassed the EU’s gross domestic spending on R&D (in 2014, see introductory Chapter), the EU insisted further on seeking more balance in its cooperation with China. As an outcome of the 13th EU–China Joint Steering Committee on Science and Technology Cooperation and the 3rd ICD in 2017, a Roadmap for EU–China S&T cooperation was developed (European Union 2017a). It aims to better balance the flow of researchers between the EU and China, through an increased budget for MSCA Global Fellowships to stimulate more European researchers to conduct their research in China. It includes new mechanisms, such as Joint Programming Initiatives (functioning within the EU since 2010 and opened to China in 2018 firstly on sustainable urbanization and secondly on water) and Priority Flagship Initiatives with continued cofunding by the EU and China through the CFM. • The cooperation agenda and Joint Initiatives became also more strategic, based on a careful assessment of China’s strengths and weaknesses as compared to the EU’s, in terms of its share in world publications, international co-publications and citation impact (see Figure  3.2). It highlights not only China’s 2011–2013 strengths in material sciences, (bio)chemistry and various en­gin­eer­ing areas, but also its relative weakness in the social sciences and humanities. Since H2020 is more innovation-oriented than its predecessors; i.e. “from lab to market” and thus open to participation by companies, an assessment was also made of China’s success in filing patents (European Union 2017a, 23). The importance of mutually beneficial cooperation with co-funding was re-emphasized for a number of strategically selected areas of common interest in: food, agriculture, biotechnology, energy, water, and ICT (H2020 and China 2013). A further set of Flagship Initiatives and Priority Areas, including aviation, biotechnologies, sustainable urbanization, and health (among other themes) have been identified by joint task forces, working groups, and mutual consultation for 2018–2020 (European Union 2019b; European Union 2017a). EU–China cooperation in research was further enhanced by the opening of a branch office of the European Institute of Technology (EIT) in Beijing in early 2020. The EIT already has such outposts in Silicon Valley and Israel. This move underlines that the EU now also perceives China at this level of scientific standing. The office will aim to drive European influence in China and bring maximum value for Europe by helping researchers forge links with Chinese colleagues by facilitating networks advocating for European interests—especially in the area of climate research. The EIT will seek accreditation from the Chinese Ministry of Science and Technology (Upton 2019).

EU–China Cooperation along the New Silk Road  45 Citation impact Scientific Area

Share Share of in International Difference world cowith EU output publications 28

Materials Science: Biomaterials

17.4%

28%

+0.56

Chemical Engineering:Catalysis

23.1%

23%

+0.51

Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology: Biophysics

15.2%

22%

+0.36

Chemistry: Electrochemistry 26.1% High Materials Science: Surfaces, Coatings and Films 22.2% Publication Output Chemical Engineering: Bioengineering 18.5%

18%

+0.26

19%

+0.15

25%

+0.1

8-year trend ▲ ▲ ▲

▲

▲ ▲ ▲

Materials Science: Ceramics and Composites

25.8%

18%

+0.07

Environmental Science: Pollution

17.1%

22%

+0.06

Chemistry: Organic Chemistry

19.8%

16%

+0.04

Environmental Science: Waste Management and Disposal

19.4%

22%

+0.04

-

Arts and Humanities: Archeology (arts and humanities)

1.4%

62%

+3.44

-

Pharmacology, Toxicology and Pharmaceutics: Miscellaneous

2.2%

50%

+3.29

-

Social Sciences: Archeology

1.5%

61%

+1.79

-

▲ -

▲

Social Sciences: Miscellaneous Low Publication Social Sciences: Anthropology Output Arts and Humanities: Music

1.3%

58%

+0.73

1.0%

51%

+0.7

0.8%

48%

+0.62

Arts and Humanities: History

0.6%

34%

+0.57

Arts and Humanities: History and Philosophy of Science

▲

0.6%

72%

+0.55

-

Veterinary: Small Animals

1.8%

17%

+0.5

-

Chemical Engineering: Colloid and Surface Chemistry

18.2%

29%

+0.45

▲ -

▲

Figure 3.2  China’s top scientific areas compared to EU28 in share of publications and impact Source: DG Research and Innovation – International Cooperation Data: Elsevier Sc/Val; extraction date: 6/8/2017; publications’ window: 2011–2013: citations’ window: 3 years Note: These tables show scientific areas in which the country’s academic publications have a higher citation impact than EU28, and whether this difference has decreased, increased or remained the same in the past 8 years. They are grouped in two tables. The top table focuses on areas with high share of publications in the country’s total output of publications and the bottom table on those with low share of publications. Scientific areas based on Elsevier ‘All Science Journal Classification’. For each area, the country’s share in the world output of publication and the share of International co-publications are also shown

46  Marijk van der Wende Apart from the EU programs discussed above, which opened up to China and specific EU–China cooperation initiatives, China has also made some programs open to internationals, thus providing funding for international participation, including those from EU countries. In research, these concern the Thousand International Talents program (launched in 2008) and the NSFC International Young Fellowship program (2015). Also, the BRI STI Cooperation Action Plan, which was announced by President XI in 2017 (Chinese Government 2017) aims to create between 2017–2021 more opportunities for exchange: 2,500 short-term research visits to China for young foreign scientists; training of 5,000 foreign scientists, engineers, and managers; and joint initiatives such as laboratories, science parts, and technology transfers. Developments in higher education cooperation followed the above trends only to some extent. The Erasmus Program was “opened up to the world” including China (Mundus in 2004 and ERASMUS+ in 2015). Under Erasmus+, China participates in international programs, such as: • International Credit Mobility (short-term mobility for Bachelor, Master, and Doctoral students and for staff), • Erasmus Mundus Joint Degrees (excellent integrated masters courses offered by a consortium of HEIs from around the world, offering scholarship opportunities and degrees), • Capacity Building for higher education (international partnerships with longlasting structural impact on modernization and internationalization of HEIs and systems), • Jean Monnet Actions (promotion of European integration studies through Modules, Chairs, Centers of Excellence, Institutions, Networks, and Projects). Regular HPPD and Higher Education Platform meetings generally discuss common challenges, best practice, how to promote further cooperation, and reports on the implementation of reforms. The 2017 HPPD affirmed China as the top beneficiary of the ERASMUS+ program through capacity-building projects including: new curricula, joint degrees, learning/teaching methodologies, staff development, quality assurance, governance, and other “Bologna tools” (European Union 2017b). This reflects to some extent the character of the Bologna Process itself—wide-ranging conversation, but limited competencies on the EU side to actually undertake far-reaching activities unless the Member States sign into it (see section  3.2). EU actions are thus complementary with what individual Member States and/or their institutions undertake in col­lab­or­ ation with Chinese counterparts, such as joint programs, branch campuses, or other types of collective university partnership—e.g. the Sino-Danish Centre (Sino-Danish Center n.d.). In addition, and as observed by EC officials, European universities are very autonomous, initiatives are taken bottom-up (see also Chapter 18 by Sporn and van der Wende in this volume), and the typical EU networking instruments are thus relatively weak, including Jean Monnet chairs active in China, which represent a very loose and diffuse network (according to EU representatives in China).

EU–China Cooperation along the New Silk Road  47

On its side, China opened the Chinese Government Scholarship (CSC) Program for international applications in 2010. It encouraged Chinese institutions to build international collaboration, such as the University Alliance of the New Silk Road, led by Xi’an Jiao Tong University (2015, 31 countries, 128 universities) (see Chapter 6 by Feng and Gao in this volume for more examples). This increasingly took place in the context of BRI, with new guidelines for (higher) education published in the fall of 2019 (see Chapter 9 by Gao). Joint programs have come under stronger scrutiny from the Chinese authorities. Around 200 were unilaterally closed by Chinese authorities in 2018 (Feng  2018), while new ones were announced half a year later on revised conditions, bringing such collaborations more tightly under Chinese campus regulations (Runhua 2019). Such tightened conditions, as set by the Chinese–Foreign Cooperation in Running Schools (CFCRS), seem to reflect China’s transformation from a relatively passive importer of foreign educational programs to a discrete regulator which strategically selects and allocates foreign educational resources, to a proactive mobilizer and exporter of educational partnerships (see for more detailed discussion Chapter 9 by Gao). EU representatives have observed that China is tightening control over ideological education, and may occasionally prohibit students or staff to participate in events organized by foreign organizations, or even require Chinese counterparts to keep detailed registrations of international participants for their campus events. European universities have become critical about a lack of transparency in shared governance of joint programs (Bothwell 2016). A planned branch campus of a Dutch university in China was called off in 2018 over concerns about academic freedom and shared governance. Meanwhile, the BRI seems to represent for Chinese universities new and welcome opportunities for internationalization, especially with “Belt and Road countries” in (Central) Asia, extending possibilities to attract international students and start new programs in for instance language and area studies, comparative studies, etc. This is positively referred to by Chinese participants as “opening up 2.0” and the “4th mission of the university” (see Chapter 18 by Sporn and van der Wende). In sum, this section has shown that EU–China cooperation in research and higher education has intensified and become more systematic since 2012. In research, a more equal partnership is being sought as the EU now recognizes China as a major player in R&D, a global competitor, or even a leader in specific areas. Thus, col­lab­or­ation is also becoming more strategic, while seeking more convergence in the (joint) mechanisms and instruments used, and more balance in the contributions made. Such convergence, however, is challenged by the increasing competition and unsolved controversy over standards and conditions in certain areas of joint action. In higher education, the relationship still seems to be more uneven and based on capacity-building— i.e. EU helping China to modernize. Indeed, China tends to see itself still more as a follower in this area. Chinese experts for instance stating that “it will take at least a decade to build something like the EHEA.” However, it is also observed that in the sphere of cooperation, China is becoming more self-confident, sharpening its conditions for collaboration, and may actually prefer a different ideological basis, thus making cooperation undeniably more complex and convergence not a given.

48  Marijk van der Wende

3.6 Effects As discussed in the previous section, new mechanisms for cooperation in research between the EU and China under H2020 are aiming to achieve a more balanced cooperation relationship. However, in terms of researcher mobility with Marie Skłodowska-Curie (MSCA) grants, the flow is still rather unbalanced: since the start of H2020 by mid-2018 a total of 775 Chinese researchers had used these grants to come to the EU versus 376 EU researchers who went to China (European Union 2018a). Furthermore, China still invests less (€28 Million p.a.) to the H2020 cooperation scheme than the EU does (€100 Million). Mobility flows can, of course, be uneven because of the size of countries’ populations (as is also the case within the EU). But that argument would not support the unbalance in terms of investments. China’s success in H2020, as the second most active non-associated country (after the US), could also be explained by its large number of high-quality (above threshold) proposals and above-average success rate: 19.7 percent compared to 17.5 percent for non-associated countries and 15.8 percent overall for collaborative actions and 23.7 percent versus 18.9 percent for non-associated countries for MSCA mobility (European Union 2018a). The disparity is even more impressive when we look at the disciplinary fields where there is cooperation, with a striking focus on STEM: almost two-thirds of researchers’ mobility concerns engineering (Figure 3.3). As an illustration, the focus of some 90 percent of articles published from collaborative research under prior EU Framework Programs are in the natural sciences (Figure 3.4). With regards to education, student mobility under ERASMUS is similarly far from balanced, as shown in Table 3.3, but again, this could be explained by the difference in population size. Looking at the disciplinary focus of Chinese participation in ERASMUS+, also there a strong bias towards STEM can be observed (i.e. at least two-third of Joint Masters degrees and capacity building projects), with the exception of Jean Monnet actions, which are by their nature (European studies) mostly focused on social sciences and humanities (Dragon-Star Plus 2016). Student flows under ERASMUS concern mostly credit point mobility (i.e. shortterm exchange); degree mobility is supported only for joint masters or doctorates. The numbers are negligible when compared to the free degree mobility flows between China and Europe. The impact of mobility and cooperation sponsored under ERASMUS+ would also be minor as compared to the total amount of transnational education (TNE) activities involving European and Chinese higher education institutions (see Chapter 9 by Gao). Such flows are not administered under an exchange scheme and are thus more difficult to balance. That may actually not be the aim; China has been sending for decades much-wanted high fee-paying students to Europe (see introductory Chapter 1); in contrast, European students were much less interested in studying in China, which in turn offered little opportunity to participate besides typical Chinese language and culture programs. But now China also wants to attract international students itself, these numbers are indeed

EU–China Cooperation along the New Silk Road  49 Project distribution by scientific panel (CN) ECO 2.99% CHE 4.48%

ENG 62.69%

SOC 7.46%

CHE ECO ENG ENV LIF MAT PHY SOC

PHY 5.97% MAT 2.99% LIF 4.48%

ENV 8.96%

Figure 3.3  H2020 researcher mobility per disciplinary fields (2020: Marie SklodowskaCurie Actions (MSCA), Country Factsheet: China (People’s Republic of) (CN), last refresh date 25/11/19)

Research focus of academic articles published in the Chinese journals between 2002–2015 based on research funded by EU framework programmes: 184; 10%

Natural Sciences Social Sciences

1658; 90%

Figure 3.4  Focus of publications in Chinese journals from EU-funded research

50  Marijk van der Wende Table 3.3  Chinese participation in Erasmus+ Activity

Flow direction

2015

2016

2007–2013

International Credit Mobility  

China to EU EU to China

939 518

927 525

1700  

Joint Masters and doctoral degrees

China to EU for: masters degrees Doctoral degrees

156

 

33

Data: EC 2019

Sources of international students in China

Asia

16

15

20

14

20

13

20

12

Africa

20

11

20

10

America

20

09

20

08

20

07

20

06

Europe

20

05

20

04

20

03

20

02

20

01

20

20

20

00

300000 270000 240000 210000 180000 150000 120000 90000 60000 30000 0 Oceania

Figure 3.5  Sources of international students in China

on the rise, although mostly from within Asia (Figure  3.5). The number of European students going to China grew to around 50,000 in 2016. But the imbalance is still quite considerable as the twenty-eight EU countries had more than 170,000 Chinese students in the same year and over 250,000 Chinese students who studied in the forty-five EHEA countries (in 2014) (UNESCO n.d.) (Tian and Liu, 2019).5 Between 2006–2016, the number of international students in China increased almost three-fold, while the percentage of those who received a Chinese scholarship rose from 5 percent to 11 percent. The share of those scholarships for students from Europe decreased from 22 percent to about 12 percent in the period, while the share of students from Asia (“BRI or OBOR countries”) increased to over 50 percent (Jiang and Shi 2019).

5  Especially considering the high percentage (at least 50 percent) of non-degree students in China. i.e. European students who study for language or summer courses, sub-degree level programs.

EU–China Cooperation along the New Silk Road  51

3.7  Goals and Rationales As seen above, EU–China cooperation in research and higher education has become gradually more comprehensive, systematic, and strategic, especially since 2012, although at much larger scale and more intense in research than in education. This section will explore whether the historically diverse goals driving EU and Chinese policy, respectively, did gradually converge over time. At first glance, the EU and China seem to be increasingly working towards common goals. The recent (2018 and 2019) EU–China Summits confirmed that both will work towards fighting global challenges, support the implementation of the UN’s 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (i.e. the Sustainable Development Goals or SDGs), and reinforce their climate-related cooperation in the context of the Paris Agreement (European Union 2019c). Both also consider research and innovation as key contributors to achieving these global societal challenges (Jinping 2017) and higher education generally as a global common good according to the UN (UNESCO 2015; Tian and Liu 2018). China’s subscription to these global goals characterizes its recent transition to a leading global actor. Previously, it rather positioned itself in these global debates as a developing country, not responsible to contribute to global solutions as much as developed countries. More recently it expresses ambitions to take the lead on sustainable development and a “more sustainable, equitable, and inclusive version of globalization” (Woetzel, et al. 2017). However, and despite the global common goals and joint UN proclamations, there are still areas which demonstrate less convergence; notably regarding human rights, the rule of law, and civil society, as essential European values of an open society, and in which the EU “will continue to work with China and its people” (European Union 2019c). With strong reference to the UN Charter and international law, the joint statement of the 21st EU–China Summit reaffirmed that: “All human rights are universal, indivisible, interdependent and interrelated” and that the regu­ lar Human Rights Dialogues will be continued and enhanced cooperation in this area, in particular in UN fora, will be encouraged (European Union 2019c). Yet it is unclear what will actually be delivered and how. The EU–China cooperation in higher education as facilitated by the HPPDs, aimed at building mutual trust and consolidating intercultural understanding, are important vehicles for such dialogue. These are long preceded by other forms of bilateral ­cooperation in cultural and educational domains, including the Confucius Institutes. Europe hosts the largest number (173 or 33 percent) of the worldwide total of research institutes in 2017. However, these institutes have become surrounded by growing concerns about the growing influence of China’s soft power, constraints to open discussion of Western values in Chinese classrooms, infringement of academic freedom, and free speech (Sharma  2019; Xie and Xinqi  2019; Lei  2019).6 Such concerns in 6  The new guidelines stress that military courses at universities must be based on President Xi Jinping’s thoughts on building a strong military and his instructions on education. China Daily (Lei 2019).

52  Marijk van der Wende Europe seem to be mostly fueled by signals from the US, Canada, and Australia (Lloyd-Damnjanovic 2018). In Europe CI’s are generally seen more as a Chinese version of cultural diplomacy institutes through which European countries themselves have for long been promoting their language and culture, such as the Alliance Française, The British Council, the Goethe-Instituten, the Institutes Cervantes, etc. The Dutch Minister of Education, for instance, did not see the need for investigation of CI’s and left the decision on cooperation to the autonomy of universities (Government of the Netherlands 2019a). Nevertheless, questions have been raised about China’s aims in these educational endeavors. One Dutch university decided to cut its ties with CI. A conservative Human Rights Commission asked for a review of all existing arrangements and a moratorium on new ones in the UK (Hunter 2019; McKie 2019; Huygen 2019;). Warning reports have been published by intelligence agencies (O’Malley  2019). Belgium refused a visa for a CI director accused of ­intelligence activities (Struys 2019; Wintour 2019). All of this is, of course, greatly unhelpful in building mutual trust. Questions are emerging about the actual evidence and scale of these problems, and whether there is undue demonization of Chinese students for Western political purposes (Grove 2019). Divergence may also be observed in the policy aims of China and the EU’s R&D policies, in the sense that the relationship is becoming more competitive. Cooperation with China has, for decades, been strengthening the EU’s own know­ ledge economy by trading its knowledge and infrastructure for China’s talent and resources. But in 2017, the EU realized that its performance lead in STI was decreasing rapidly, with China improving more than seven times faster than the EU (Hollanders and Es-Sadki 2017) and spending more of its GDP on R&D than the EU (2.15 percent in 2017 with a target of 2.5 percent in 2020). It thus recognized China as a global player in STI and adjusted its rationale for cooperation with China accordingly; i.e. international cooperation for global competition. This is phrased as joint efforts in tackling global challenges (SDGs), and for enhanced relations: “Science and international research cooperation can provide a common basis for engagement, trust, and facilities with shared governance that can be a blueprint for governance of broader issues (science diplomacy)” (Vialatte 2017). Diplomacy is essential, especially when trust is at stake and political tensions are on the rise. It is not only the increased tensions in the US–China trade relations that have spurred the EU’s growing assertiveness, but also the rising awareness by the EU itself of China’s swift rise as a scientific and technological superpower. A JRC report presented to the European Commission in late May 2019 portrays China as “An Industrial and Innovation Powerhouse” (Preziosi et al.  2019) and reports on the success of its “Made in China 2025” strategy. Launched in 2015, this strategy supports the transition of China from a manufacturing country towards a knowledge economy, by increasing China’s competitiveness in cutting-edge industries and moving the country’s manufactured goods up the value chain, while also reducing its reliance on foreign technology (SupChina  2018). The JRC analysis points to a combination of industrial, research and innovation, trade, and foreign

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direct investment policies—which may allow China to become a world leader in ten key industrial sectors (Preziosi, et al. 2019, 9): 1. Next-generation IT; 2. High-end numerical control machinery and robotics; 3. Aerospace and aviation equipment; 4. Maritime engineering equipment and high-tech maritime vessel manufac­turing; 5. Advanced rail equipment; 6. Energy-saving vehicles and new energy vehicles; 7. Electrical equipment; 8. Agricultural machinery and equipment; 9. New materials; 10. Biopharmaceutical and high-performance medical devices. The report criticizes China for the still uneven playing field and technology transfer from foreign sources, thus undermining WTO rules regarding market access and IPR, blaming it for ‘innovation mercantilism’ (Preziosi et al. 2019, 17). This relates to another controversial area: trade. The EU is still negotiating an agreement on investment and a means to level the playing field to gain more access to markets, and balance its trade deficit with China,7 and “[encourage] China to play a more active part in the WTO and other multilateral initiatives, in particular strengthening the open, rules-based international trading system” (European Union 2019c). These points were sharpened in the 2019 EU–China Strategic Outlook (EC, 2019) and reconfirmed in the Joint Statement, mentioned above. China’s efforts in research (STI) are not only geared towards further strengthe­ ning its own profile as a knowledge economy, thus creating a competitive edge with the EU, but also demonstrating growth in global ambitions beyond the economic sphere. As stated by President Xi in his speech at the 19th Congress of the CPC in 2017: “These efforts will provide powerful support for building China’s strength in science and technology, product quality, aerospace, cyberspace, and transportation; and for building a digital China and a smart society” (China Daily 2017). He made clear to be pushing now beyond “Made in China 2025” to “Created in China” and into becoming a global power in space by 2045 (Yang 2017). China’s technological successes (see introductory Chapter 1) are undeniable and its STI is increasingly geo-political and geo-strategic in character. The Belt and Road Initiative may play an important role in this respect, as Xi set out in the same speech: “China will actively promote international cooperation through the Belt and Road Initiative. In doing so, we hope to achieve policy, infrastructure, trade, financial, and people-to-people connectivity and thus build a new platform for international cooperation to create new drivers of shared development" (Liangyu 2018). 7 EU exported to China €198 BILLION and imported €375 BILLION in 2017; it exported €38 BILLION of services to China, while China exported €30 BILLION to the EU in 2016 (European Union 2019).

54  Marijk van der Wende The question is to what extent the EU–China relationship in research (STI) will remain about shared development towards common goals, especially if China keeps aggressively pushing its BRI. Even though the EC declared in 2018 that: “The EU regards China as one of its most important strategic partners”, witnessing “an ever deeper and broader relationship in almost every area” (European Union  2018b), almost all EU Member States (except Hungary) denounced that year the global infrastructure project for hampering free trade (giving an advantage to Chinese companies), and concerns are growing about Beijing’s influence in certain Member States, as well as its attitude towards intellectual property (Elmer 2018). Since then, concerns are growing over research collaboration in dual-use technologies (Joske and Garnaut 2018) and China’s undermining the unity of the EU (especially through its links with a range of countries in Central and Eastern Europe, known as the “CEEC 17+1”; see Witthoeft 2018)8 and are leading to a more assertive approach of the EU as a whole. At the same time, six individual countries signed up to the BRI in 2018–2019 (see section 3.3 and Chapter 1). Further convergence, or the extent to which joint efforts continue towards common goals will be continued, very much depends on the actual progress regarding international rules and standards, be they in trade, human rights, academic freedom, or scientific integrity. This is not dependent solely on China, but also on whether the EU can stand united on these issues. Furthermore, of importance is the extent to which the values of these global standards and institutions for effective multilateralism are based in actually universal and shared ideals, or if they are predominantly “Western” after all (China Daily 2014).9

3.8  Conclusions and Discussion The Evolving EU–China Relationship: More Complex Than Simply From Aid to Trade This chapter discussed how the EU–China relationship in research and higher education has evolved in the last half a century. It departed from an uneven aid relationship, gradually seeking a closer and more equal-based cooperation, eventually jointly aiming for commendable common global goals. Meanwhile, China went from being 8  This cooperation was previously known as the “16+1,” referring to the sixteen CEE states with which China (the “+1”) is developing ties: Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Macedonia, Montenegro, Poland, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, and Slovenia. The 16+1 mechanism involves quite a heterogeneous group of countries. Of the sixteen participating CEE states, eleven are EU member states (five of which are also members of the single currency eurozone), four are EU candidate countries, and one is a potential candidate state. http://www.china-ceec. org/eng/. In 2019 the cooperation was extended to 17+1 see: https://thediplomat.com/2019/03/chinas161-is-dead-long-live-the-171/ 9  China acknowledges these “disagreements and frictions on issues of value such as human rights as well as economic and trade issues. China believes that these issues should be properly handled through dialogue in the spirit of equality and mutual respect and encourages the EU to move in the same direction.”

EU–China Cooperation along the New Silk Road  55

a developing country, to be a more equal partner, and recently to be a competitor of the EU in specific R&D areas. This process reflects, in principle the typology of policy approaches to internationalization (van der Wende 2010). Yet it cannot be seen as a straight line “from aid to trade”, or as a linear process simply demonstrating increasing convergence. It is more complex as phases are partly overlapping. The unprecedented pace at which China has risen to be a global player in science research was underappreciated at first. Its fast evolvement to “Made in China 2025” and beyond, has created shockwaves, particularly when linked with growing concerns about China’s new geo-political assertiveness and geo-strategic ambitions. The New Silk Road is rolling out in times of severe uncertainty in Europe. Consequently, the EU–China relationship has become more strategic and more complex. Convergence is not a given; the relationship may in some areas be driving towards divergence.

Patterns, Paradoxes, and Dilemmas The combinations of competition and cooperation and of convergence and divergence are phenomena well known as the paradoxical effects of internationalization (or regional integration processes) under globalization (Huisman and van der Wende, 2004), as they are also observed in the case of the EU–China relationship. There are, however, also some specific dilemmas to be considered in this case. We observed that in research not only the agenda, but also the mechanisms and instruments used for cooperation in research show some convergence, for instance through joint-programming mechanisms and co-funding instruments. However, it is not obvious that the priority areas as identified by Joint Task Forces (see section  3.5) adequately cover the agenda for the next period. Figure  3.6 Areas with Highest & Lowest Cooperation potential between EU and China by 2030

Environmental management Space exploration Nuclear Fusion 80% Smart energy systems of Aeronautics 70% the future 60% Synthetic biology Hydrogen power 50% Efficient storage of electric 40% Iot and thermal energy 30% 20% Efficient use of Renewable Robotics 10% energy sources 0% Computer Architecture Safe nuclear engineering and Systems Hybrid and bio-mimetic materials Functional materials Human genome Molecular diagnostics strong & very strong

Drugs

no and low potential

Data processing and analysis Telecommunication Technologies Food biotechnologies Agricultural biotechnologies Roadmap for EU-China 5 & cooperation

Figure 3.6  EU–China cooperation potential by 2030 and Roadmap planning Source: Dragon-Star Plus 2017

56  Marijk van der Wende shows, for instance, that the cooperation as designed in the EU–China Roadmap is indeed geared towards global challenges in such areas as sustainable energies, food technologies, and environmental management. But also, that these plans do not cover, so far, other areas of high potential for the next decade, such as robotics, computer science, data processing and analysis. China wants to become the world leader in these fields by 2025 (see also section 3.7), with a strong focus on artificial intelligence (AI). Recently a surge in Chinese AI-based inventions and pa­tents are being filed (Sawahel and Sharma 2019) and the opening of 400 new big data and AI study programs was announced in early 2019 (Xi 2019). This area is particularly sensitive, as convergence is less obvious when it concerns the conditions for data privacy and data sharing (regulations are not necessarily in line with those of the EU, see Chapter 12 by Kummeling and van Deursen). This is important since all scientific data generated in China must now be submitted to government-sanctioned data centers before appearing in publications (Normile 2018). This may represent a dilemma in relation to the EU’s continued promotion of open access and open science, and seems to be feeding into persistent concerns about academic freedom and research integrity in China. Furthermore, there are concerns over the use of AI in relation to personal privacy under civic and human rights, hence the criticism of the Chinese Social Credit System, its use against minorities, and the growing concerns about the use of such technologies in Europe as well. Interestingly, a Beijing AI consortium recently published AI ethical standards, calling for international cooperation. They argue that: “The development of AI is a common challenge for all humanity. Only through coordination on a global scale can we build AI that is beneficial to both humanity and nature.” China doesn’t want to be seen as a follower here, simply adjusting to global standards defined elsewhere, stating: “The Beijing Principles reflect our position, vision and our willingness to create a dialogue with the international society" (Xinhua Net 2019). Initial responses from the scientific world to the initiative were positive. The MIT Technology Review noted: “New guidelines on freedom and privacy protection signal that the Chinese state is open to dialogue about how it uses technology . . . that might signal a willingness from Beijing to rethink how it uses the technology.” “And while China’s government is widely criticized for using AI as a way to monitor citizens, the newly published guidelines seem remarkably similar to ethical frameworks laid out by Western companies and governments” (Knight 2019). EU–China cooperation in education is less advanced and even less balanced than in research. Here China may see itself still more as a follower. Meanwhile it is becoming an important player on the international student market and recently started student recruitment events in Europe. Yet the unbalanced student flows show that it is still far from being seen as a serious competitor for Europe. Also in this area, convergence is not obvious: on the one hand China is seeking bilateral recognition agreements, but on the other it is unilaterally tightening its conditions for joint ­programs (see section  3.5). It seems also paradoxical that China is open for Jean

EU–China Cooperation along the New Silk Road  57

Monnet actions which bring European studies to China, as it continues to be ­interested to learn from and about Europe, while at the same time it constrains open discussion of “Western values” in Chinese classrooms. This paradox points to a difference between internal and external openness. Government-led initiatives in higher education, which are increasing launched under the BRI (see Chapter 6 by Feng and Gao, and Chapter 18 by Sporn and van der Wende), such as new university alliances, target primarily countries adjacent to China and across Central Asia. Here the paradox may be that one hand these seem to be more based on Eastern educational philosophy and heritage (Kirby and van der Wende, 2019) and increasingly defined by Chinese conditions (see Chapter 9 by Gao), while on the other hand applying educational models and practices originally adopted from the West (see Chapter 10 by Zhu et al). The question is whether and how Western models and standards are being adapted by China before they are consequently exported to BRI countries. In sum, this area of cooperation is undeniably also becoming more complex, and again convergence is not a given. A wider array of challenges and opportunities is opening up for Chinese universities, both domestically and internationally. This generally requires a next level of strategic management, leadership capacity, and institutional autonomy (van der Wende and Zhu 2016). The question is how these conditions will be fulfilled, as complexity is further enhanced by political and ideological factors at play. EU–China cooperation will depend on how the Chinese context will evolve in this respect. From the European perspective, two dimensions will be of key im­port­ance to the scenarios for China’s development in science and innovation: 1) the management of knowledge flows (open—creative versus isolated—technocratic) and 2) the rate of government involvement (top down—disconnected from the outside world versus bottom-up and integrated with the outside world) (Dragon-Star Plus 2017). However, it should be realized that from a Chinese perspective, strong top-down state control and management is not necessarily contradictory with in­nov­ation and global connection. Again, internal and external openness may differ.

Persistent Imbalances and Strong STEM Bias The search for more balance in the EU–China relationship has so far only been partially achieved. Uneven flows of students and researchers can be attributed to the huge difference in population size (China has more than twice the total EU population), but the unbalanced investments in cooperation cannot. Moreover, imbalances are most striking regarding the disciplinary fields in which cooperation is undertaken. The dominant bias towards STEM reflects China’s priorities, consistent investments, and successes—but raises questions with respect to further development of EU–China cooperation.

58  Marijk van der Wende Issues relate to the conditions for and uses of STEM research, as well as the scope of interdisciplinary research by bridging STEM with humanities and social sciences (see Chapter 18 by Sporn and van der Wende). The EU promotes such an approach in its programs and sees research independence in STEM as well as in the hu­man­ities and social sciences as a crucial condition to foster interdisciplinary cross-fertilization. EU efforts on innovation in higher education teaching and learning are also strongly oriented on interdisciplinarity, based on the belief that skills essential for innovation, such as creativity and critical thinking, come from studying subjects other than STEM, a combination found in the concept of liberal arts and sciences education (Kirby and van der Wende  2016), as well as in the STEM + Arts or “STEAM” concept which is becoming popular throughout Asia. China, however, does not offer an equally free environment for scholars and students to utilize all the respective fields. The problems of China’s model in policy sensitive social sciences and humanities fields are more easily and frequently highlighted than in the natural and applied sciences. Still, challenges seem to persist also in STEM fields which could not only prevent China from becoming the global leader in S&T that it wants to become, but may also represent a dilemma in certain forms of cooperation with the EU. Chinese scientists occasionally speak out about problems regarding open Internet access and governmental interference (Cheng  2017). Data from a large-scale survey among Chinese scholars in STEM (both returnees and scholars with domestic degrees) confirm a strong consensus around challenges perceived in the Chinese drive for instant-success, short-term outlook, merit-based research funding, excessive governmental/bureaucratic intervention, the evaluation system, and a too strong reliance on human relations (guanxi)—referring to incidents of academic misconduct and scientific integrity (Han and Appelbaum 2018). Lin Jianhua, President of Peking University until 2018, warned in the spirit of C. P. Snow’s lectures (1960) on “The Two Cultures” and the importance of bridging the sciences and the humanities, that: “The swift development of new technologies require the intervention of humanities and social sciences and a renewed balance between integrity and innovation” (Lin 2019). Collaboration is the best way of ensuring that Chinese science is responsible and transparent. International exchange and participation in conferences, projects, and journals gives Chinese scientists an incentive to observe international rules (The Economist 2019) or to renew the discussion around these. There is no reason to assume that they could not contribute to solving challenges in research ethics, as was demonstrated in the aforementioned case of ethical standards in AI, quoted above. Chinese researchers’ ability to remain interconnected with the global scientific ecosystem may be the single most important determining factor in whether it can rise to the top (Streitwiesser  2019). “Thus, in order to thrive in  scientific research, China will have to remain open. You can’t order science [to happen]: it is a global affair and it is global enterprise. Collaboration will have

EU–China Cooperation along the New Silk Road  59

to remain a key element of China’s strategy. Even with its size, it will not get very far if it cuts itself off again”.10 At the same time, the EU may have to (re)consider to what extent and how it can sustain its overarching paradigm of “openness”. The EU has been a great promotor of openness; open borders, open market, open (public) space for higher education (EHEA) and research (ERA), open innovation, open access, open science, and open education resources. These were underpinned by the liberal values of an open society, the great promises of open Internet for liberal democracy, as much as by the neo-liberal logic for economic growth. Meanwhile, the inherent values of freedom (e.g. civic freedoms of movement or free speech and press, but also academic freedom) and of security (personal, national, or cyber), have been taken for granted for decades, mostly so since the end of the Cold War. But now the US is challenging the principles of free trade and open borders and is weakening its security guarantee to Europe. Due to increasing instability and consequent refugee flows, the EU is struggling with the consequences of its open borders. It is seeking to respond to the challenges of a totally open and unregulated Internet and use of social media which are challenging its democratic traditions and values. The EU is reaffirming itself as a community of values, with humanism at its core, as stated recently by French President Emmanuel Macron, positioning himself as a central leader of the EU. Meanwhile, there is a growing awareness that freedom and security are under pressure. The balance between the security risks related to openness on the one hand and freedom and support for liberal democracy on the other is at stake and under debate in Europe. In attempts to regulate social media influence on democratic processes such as election campaigns, free speech has been restricted under German legislation. The EU may in fact be the only regulator in the West to be able to tame the influence of social media platforms such as Facebook in spreading fake news and politically motivated disinformation. Meanwhile, the Chinese government’s divergent mix of values, with a preference for economic growth and security over freedom (academic or entrepreneurial) is coming more to the fore. It is being argued that the Western assumptions about the virtues of an open Internet have been naive, in particular the EU’s naivety in opening its internal borders without clear control over its external borders. In that fashion the question can be asked: is the EU naive if it wants to continue its open approach, including open access (data and publishing) and open science policy, in com­bin­ation with enhanced cooperation in these areas with China? How should openness be understood? Depending on whose values are defining the framework, it could be a Western version of openness with a broad civil society and a smaller state, a Chinese version where internal openness and external openness are partly decoupled, or perhaps some kind of common understanding of openness for the sake of the global

10  Author, cited in Baker 2019.

60  Marijk van der Wende common good? This is a key dilemma for the EU, which needs to be addressed in shaping the next phase of the already imbalanced EU–China relationship. The EU has strong ambitions regarding the role of higher education for the further development of the Union itself, as well as for its global role. Not only will the EU programs for HE and R&D be substantially expanded in size and budget (see section 3.2), they have also been opened to the world. But can it continue this pathway or will it have to become more realistic, insisting on a true level-playing field in R&D and HE, i.e. requiring China to be equally open, as much as it should negotiate this in trade? Or will it become more strategic, i.e. less open itself? The start of the new European Commission (EC) on 1 December 2019 is the moment to see how these questions may be tackled. EC President Von der Leyen presented it as a “geo-political Commission” and even before, President Macron set out in early November to re-open negotiations with China and strengthen joint efforts in defense of open and multilateral trade, remarkably accompanied by the Irish Commissioner and the German Minister of Education and Research. Beijing responded by appointing a special envoy for European affairs. The new EC seems to be very aware of the global challenges ahead. The com­bin­ ation of digital affairs and competition into one powerful portfolio under EC VicePresident Vestager is an indication of a strengthening EC position as the “world’s most powerful tech regulator” (Stevis-Gridneff  2019). The EC will also act more forcefully in AI and big data, enhancing cybersecurity, and the EU’s technological sovereignty under a new Directorate General for Defence Industry and Space— headed by a French Commissioner. A more strategic approach is also emerging in higher education. Not only will higher education and research also be folded into one portfolio, the nominated commissioner quickly broke away from her predecessor’s openness by announcing that collaboration should be regarded as a “tool of union policy”, stating that specific actions will be limited to Member States if this serves “the EU’s strategic interests”. This could imply restricted access to certain programs and actions even for close allies within the European Research Area (e.g. the UK after Brexit) (Palmowski 2019). A sign of reducing external openness on the EU’s side indeed. Looking at the variation in the EU’s legal competencies, the question is how these will be used to rebalance the relationship with China in higher education and research? Considering the challenges and tensions in areas such as IPR, conditions for technology transfer, data security, professional recognition, etc. the EU may choose to organize further negotiations in a pragmatic way under trade. As discussed in s­ ection 3.2, the strengths of the EU’s exclusive competencies in trade, as compared to the weaker ones in research (shared) and education (supporting), imply that the EU can regulate both internally and externally. Such coherent response is required in dealing with China, and cannot easily be generated by lack of a consolidated EU policy in foreign affairs, although the new DG in charge of defense may gain influence in this respect.

EU–China Cooperation along the New Silk Road  61

In negotiating trade deals, pragmatism may be chosen over moralism. Moral issues may be dealt with at different tables, which the EU and China seem to be seeking in particular in UN fora, as proposed during the latest EU–China Human Rights Dialogue (Government of the Netherlands  2019b; Grove  2019). Recent European elections (2019) underline that trade negotiation is more seen as a mandate of the EU, than value-driven discussions, which are considered more the realm of nation states, and in liberal democracies are ultimately the realm of civil society. Will the EU return to the original logic, when Sino-European Cooperation in S&T was started and formally established under the 1985 Agreement on trade and economic cooperation (see section  3.3)? That is, would collaboration in HE and R&D with China be considered in the context of a trade deal? This would not be necessarily just a return to the past. More recently efforts have been undertaken to bring transnational higher education under the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) of the WTO. This was initiated by the US, but failed to be successfully negotiated under the Doha Round as started in 2000 (Vlk et al. 2008). Yet it has been suggested that Brexit may be another factor that could bring this scenario back. All this confirms the fact that the EU’s external challenges are closely related to its internal affairs, its cohesion, and its ability to act in unity.

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