At this point, some MoE officials signalled to the nine universities that they would support and upgrade this elite ‘university symposia network’ to a ‘university alliance’. In particular, during an annual university consultation meeting in early 2004, an education vice minister held a private meeting with a few presidents from the nine institutions about this proposal.72 A university president who attended that meeting recalled:
The minister asked us whether we would consider forming a new university group, something like a network or association of research universities. We discussed the idea at that meeting. Tsinghua University agreed to follow up and help draft a proposal on this initiative. Some logistical issues were later sorted, including the formal registration of a civil organisation supervised by the MoE … We then had another meeting at Tsinghua which involved a key MoE official … The MoE was involved in most of the following negotiation and progress of the group.
Given that the Chinese government restricts associations or groups in important economic and societal areas (Unger & Chan, 2008, pp. 66-68), and that the MoE generally deals with
universities separately, why was a formal alliance of elite universities more applauded than an informal network? One may see that formalising an elite university group was
counterproductive for the MoE to maintain its authority and the order and equity agenda in the sector.
There is a good explanation. At that critical time, the MoE was facing difficulties in securing a commitment from the top leadership for the future of Project 985 funds. The risk of losing Project 985 permanently was extremely high, with potential serious consequences. The suspension or loss of the 985 funding was the MoE’s greatest fear. It would considerably reduce the portfolio and resources of education and worsen the low-clout status of the ministry in the central bureaucracy. The desperate and low-profile MoE had to find a creative and potent way to promote Project 985, seek attention, maximise influence, and secure support from the leadership and key central organs. It believed that a collective advocacy and
72 As noted in Chapter 1, the MoE hosts the Chinese university consultation meeting (gaoxiao gongzuo zixunhui 高 校工作咨询会) at the end of each calendar year, attended by senior officials (e.g., state councillors and senior executives from the MoE and other ministries) as well as university leaders (presidents and party secretaries) from a wide range of universities. It invites national universities as well as a small number of local universities to
voice of the presidents from the best Chinese universities would make an impact and help its case. It was a strategic decision to take advantage of the nine backbone universities of Project 985, and mobilise a powerful policy advocacy group to jointly target and persuade the central decision-makers. Additionally, due to the MoE’s tight control over these universities, the risks of them challenging its authority would be relatively low. Hence, the MoE went against its normal preferences and practices, proposing to formalise a coalition of elite universities. Essentially, it was patronage from the MoE to advance certain interests within the government’s political structure. One interviewee recalled:
In the MoE’s plan, this university alliance would not target the MoE, but the top leaders, the State Council, the Leading Small Group for Science, Technology and Education (LSGSTE), the National People’s Congress (NPC), the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), as well as the public.
Because Tsinghua was nominated as the chair and the location of the secretariat of the group, the MoE provided guidance and assistance directly to Tsinghua to resolve the group’s legal and operational issues, including the formal application and registration with the Chinese Ministry of Civil Affairs as a civil group and the sponsorship of MoE as its supervisory authority.73 Tsinghua also drafted a group constitution (zhangcheng 章程).74 Despite its policy advocacy in nature, the university coalition was self-portrayed as a ‘high-level education forum’ which would ‘drive the development of Chinese research universities and raise the public profile of higher education in China’.
In early April 2004, SJTU hosted the second ‘Building world-class universities serial
symposium’, which was chaired by the then SJTU President Xie Shengwu, and attended by the nine institutions and government officials from the MoE and the State Council.75 Its theme was ‘Exploring and optimising funding resources to achieve development targets’. SJTU announced its latest results of Chinese universities’ positions in the ARWU world ranking system,
highlighting the significant gaps and disadvantages between them and some leading foreign research institutions (ARWU, 2004b; Tsinghua, 2004). The nine universities again argued that
73 In China, all civil groups must be registered, authorised and supervised by a formal government agency. In this
case, the MoE offered to sponsor the new group as its central supervisory organ.
74 The constitution states that the group’s goal is to provide a high-level education forum on the development of
leading research universities as well as on the higher education reforms, theories and practices, which helps build Chinese world-class universities. The group strives to raise education and research quality and performance, raise universities’ public profile, drive research universities’ development, and share research findings and work experiences (Tsinghua, 2004).
the government should concentrate its limited resources on a few leading players to achieve the best outcomes. They suggested that it was imperative for the government to commence the second funding round of Project 985 as soon as possible, and give the leading research universities a greater institutional autonomy.
As an important agenda of this symposium, the nine universities formally discussed a ‘self- initiated’ university group.76 Tsinghua briefed on its preparation and progress, circulated the draft constitution, and iterated the group’s objectives and operation. Especially, Tsinghua presented its study on the successful international models of university groups, including the US’s AAU (Tsinghua, 2004, p. 120). However, the nine universities did not reach a formal agreement at the meeting, partially because several university presidents were absent, and partially due to a shared concern of the political sensitivity around formalising an interest coalition. In the end, the participants tentatively agreed to establish a group at ‘an appropriate time’. They emphasised that when established, the new group should ‘limit the size of its membership’, and should ‘handle the relationships with other universities discreetly’. Several participants of that meeting told me that they sensed an uneasiness during and after the meeting. Many felt that it was still too risky and premature to formalise a new policy- focused university coalition at that time, despite the initial endorsement by some MoE
officials. A C9 university president pointed out that the MoE also seemed to be pulling away its support:
Despite its initial support, we sensed that the MoE had some hesitation and declining enthusiasm, so we just decided to let it [the proposal] sit for a period. However, our university coalition had already taken shape and solidified in practice, and the nine members had started collaborating closely, even though the group was not formally registered with the Ministry of Civil Affairs as a civil organisation.
The change of MoE’s attitude may be well explained by the fact that in early 2004, the national leadership eventually capitulated and accepted that Project 985 funding should continue, and that the top universities would enjoy the largest share of the funding. ‘Catching up with world- class universities’ became more important than equity again. Maintaining the order of the
76 Based on the MoE’s advice, Tsinghua proposed that the group might be called ‘Association of Chinese Research
Universities’ (ACRU) (zhongguo yanjiuxing daxue lianhehui 中国研究型大学联合会). This is not to be confused with the other association of research universities which was unsuccessfully proposed by Renmin University in
university sector also became more important. Hence the political urgency to support this university coalition and influence the national policy sharply declined.
Nevertheless, undoubtedly the MoE played a key role during the early years of the group in providing political patronage, cultivating the idea of a university advocacy alliance, and facilitating the formalisation of the group. These leading universities saw the benefits of collective actions and were keen to sustain and strengthen their interest alignment to further advance their competitive advantages in the government policies.