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This article addresses the issue of the "afterlives" of the danwei (work units) in 21st-century China by examining the case of the danwei system in the university sector (gaoxiao danweizhi). It finds that two essential features of traditional gaoxiao danweizhi—i.e. universities as state appendages and the high degree of "organized dependence" (Walder) of professors on the university/state—have survived today in a reconstituted form. In particular, the weakening of professors' economic and personal dependence on the university/state has been accompanied by the strengthening of their career dependence on the state due to the governmental regulation of research projects, a new form of academic political steering. Drawing primarily on the author's over 10 years of full-time work at two research universities in China, this article contributes to existing studies on danwei, higher education and intellectuals. (China/GIGA)

This article begins with a clarification of the chronology of the 'Great Leap Forward' in Chinese higher education following the 1999 decision to expand. It then provides an in-depth examination of the leapfrogging story by focusing on why universities commonly adopted a development strategy that stressed it was better 'to become larger and more comprehensive'. The author argues that this strategy and its associated 'abnormal' university behavior, particularly in cases where local universities ignored the Ministry of Education directives to slow down enrollment expansion in 2000-2005, were driven by two incentives: (1) to attain a higher bureaucratic rank or status; and (2) to obtain more government funds and more tuition. These two incentives were shaped by the bureaucratic control and management system, and the government funds allocation system respectively. The article concludes with a discussion of the larger implications of this study. (J Contemp China/GIGA)

Based on newly available memoirs and previously unexplored policy speeches by insiders, this article conducts a political analysis of the Chinese Communist Party's decision to radically expand college enrollment in June 1999. I argue that the decision exemplifies a "guerrilla-style approach" to policy-making. From late March to early June of 1999 when the radical expansion policy was formulated and legitimated, the top leadership ignored opposition from the Ministry of Education (MOE), overturned established policies and assumed de facto control over MOE bureaucratic power. This abrupt, forceful, disruptive and non-professional policy intervention, which aimed to ensure regime survival in the wake of the Asian financial crisis, was antithetical to regularized educational policy-making in post-Mao China. (China J/GIGA)

Party control over higher education in reform-era China has been a relatively neglected topic in the extant literature. Seeking to remedy this neglect, this article focuses on an aspect of the topic that has remained unstudied in Western scholarship: namely, the post-1989 regime's efforts to strengthen and professionalize political education (PE) in universities by intensifying the 'disciplinary construction' of PE. The article finds that these efforts have been partially successful in meeting the regime's objectives. The training of PE teachers has been considerably professionalized; PE courses have become more attractive and effective; and more students tend to accept the Party-sponsored views and policies taught in PE courses, and to support Party leadership. (J Contemp China/GIGA)

Since the early 1990s, studies on the transformation of the post-Mao state have increasingly approached the issue from local perspectives and attacked national-level state studies. A counterbalance to this trend, this article draws on the broader social sciences literature about the state and contends that national-level state studies will remain a valuable part of the China field, despite acknowledging local state studies' critique of national-level studies for their failure to disaggregate the "state" concept. This article proposes an analytical template that regards the Chinese Communist Party's state transformation efforts as proceeding along the two dimensions of "structure" and "modes of governance," each of which are explored from several aspects. The article is intended to provide a broad-brush portrayal of state transformation in reform-era China, including the achievements, limitations, and implications of this transformation. It also assesses the current state of China studies. (Asian Perspect/GIGA)

AbstractBy reviewing the ideas of Yu Keping, one of the most prominent Chinese theorists on Chinese-style democracy and a key contributor to Chinese intellectual discourse on good governance, this article has two objectives: to fill a research gap in China studies by examining influential discourse during the past decade; and to shed light on Yu's controversial conception of Chinese-style democracy, which is intertwined with his views on good governance. We find that the discourse revolves around the call to "move China towards good governance." First, the ultimate objective of China's political reform is to move towards good governance, and not towards what Western social scientists call "democracy." Second, "good government" and civil society are two keys for achieving good governance, which demonstrates that Yu's basic orientation is liberal. Third, governance reform, constituting a major component of China's political reform, has achieved much progress.

By reviewing the ideas of Yu Keping, one of the most prominent Chinese theorists on Chinese-style democracy and a key contributor to Chinese intellectual discourse on good governance, this article has two objectives: to fill a research gap in China studies by examining influential discourse during the past decade; and to shed light on Yu's controversial conception of Chinese-style democracy, which is intertwined with his views on good governance. We find that the discourse revolves around the call to "move China towards good governance." First, the ultimate objective of China's political reform is to move towards good governance, and not towards what Western social scientists call "democracy." Second, "good government" and civil society are two keys for achieving good governance, which demonstrates that Yu's basic orientation is liberal. Third, governance reform, constituting a major component of China's political reform, has achieved much progress. (China Q/GIGA)

Through field investigations in two populous Chinese provinces, this study proposes a grounded theory of digital compensation afforded by smartphone usage in the emotion socialisation of left-behind children. Our interviews found that these children suffer from emotional deficiencies or deficits caused by the absence of parents' emotional companionship, a lack of emotional education within the family and a decline in playmates in their rural communities. Our study also revealed the dialectical tension between the possibilities and ramifications of digital compensation. In a miniature media ecology constructed by smartphones, migrant parents provide virtual companionship and peers help build social capital, while stay-at-home grandparents perform a scaffolding or gatekeeping role, providing a symbolic sense of emotional compensation. Instead of addressing the root causes of the children's emotional distress, the compensatory affordances of smartphone use have had concerning consequences of intense feelings of deprivation and social reversal that exacerbate their loneliness and isolation.