Educational superhighway from Africa to China speeds up mobility

Will Chinese diplomacy in Africa, which in the last two decades has opened a highway for African student mobility to China, become relevant in the global power-political game-plan in the future?

That is the question in the minds of educational researchers who have been studying the emerging scholarship field of African student flow to Chinese universities – and are trying to unmask the forces that are driving the migration.

According to Benjamin Mulvey, a PhD candidate at the Education University of Hong Kong, the main rationale underpinning China’s recruitment of African international students is one of using a soft power strategy in its engagement with African countries, mainly those in Sub-Saharan Africa.

“The Chinese government assumes that having large numbers of students from Africa [studying at] Chinese universities will increase its influence on the continent, and perhaps benefit China politically in the future,” Mulvey told University World News in an interview.

Fastest international student growth rate

Such an assessment is hard to dispute, taking into account that, while in 2003 there were only 1,793 African students enrolled in Chinese universities, the number has risen to 81,562 students in 2018, increasing by 4,549% in a 15-year period, or by 303% annually.

This had been the fastest international student growth rate among all the world regions, according to Esther Benjamin, the chief executive officer of World Education Services and a former chief executive officer of Monash South Africa.

As of two years ago, 16.5% of about half a million international students in China were from Africa. Ghana, Nigeria, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe were the top five African countries with the highest number of students in China. Currently, China is second only to France as the most popular destination for African students seeking higher education outside the continent.

The issue is that, unlike so many other large student destination countries, China’s policy for attracting international students is different as it is not driven by intensive marketisation of higher education. According to Mulvey, African students who are going to China cite affordability of study as the main reason for their decision. “Tuition fees are lower than in medium higher education destinations such as Malaysia and Ukraine, while the scholarships are relatively easy to come by,” said Mulvey.

The rapid rise of inbound African students to Chinese universities has also been aided by a lack of barriers such as the International English Language Testing System (IELTS), the high stakes proficiency examination which is a requirement for African students seeking admission to English taught degree programmes in European universities. China also has no stringent visa rules for African students and does not require proof of funds in order to secure a student visa.

Gaining the upper hand

According to Professor Elaine Lynn-Ee Ho, a senior research fellow at the Asia Research Institute at the National University of Singapore, with the growing number of African students in China, Chinese institutions seem to be steadily gaining the upper hand over Western educational institutions as sites of modern higher education.

In her study on the aspirations of African students in China, Lynn-Ee Ho argues that African international students seek to accumulate cultural capital from the Chinese urban experience. “Together with a Chinese university degree, this would make oneself stand out in the country of origin, or if one were to develop a career in a third country,” said Lynn-Ee Ho.

However, there is an assumption that learning the Chinese language and mastering social-cultural interactions could be advantageous in terms of job prospects for graduates in African countries, working for companies doing business with Chinese partners or in the international diplomatic sector. There had also been cases of African students turning into traders while learning in China.

“Their businesses involve buying goods to send home for resale and assisting traders in Africa with buying and shipping goods from China,” says Heidi Haugen, a professor of sociology at Norway’s University of Oslo, in a study on China’s recruitment of African university students.

Although it is hard to predict a causal link between the expanded student mobility to Chinese universities and China’s current economic penetration in Africa, Mulvey and other researchers said one cannot rule out China’s long-term objectives.

“It is most likely such benefits would accrue after African graduates of Chinese universities move into more senior positions in business or politics in their home countries a decade or two later,” Mulvey told University World News.

Foreign policy tool

In this regard, China would not be the first big power to apply educational exchanges as a foreign policy tool to shape political preferences abroad instead of military means or economic coercion. Indeed, academic and scientific exchanges inspired how the United States, France, Britain and the former Soviet Union gained friends in Africa in the past.

For decades, international students have been seen as young ambassadors with greater sympathy for the economic and political interests of the country where they studied. But whether studying in China would lead students to become sympathetic towards Chinese interests in Africa is another matter.

Henry Tugendhat, a PhD candidate at Johns Hopkins University in the United States, says while there may be no highly coordinated Beijing consensus on the political and economic policies of China in attracting African students, one cannot rule out that the mobility contributes to Sino-African diplomatic engagement.

Apart from university students, each year about 10,000 African officials are trained on short-term courses in China, across a range of themes in agriculture and development.

“Establishing connections with many thousands of African participants from diverse government departments and programmes and different levels of seniority from across the continent builds up to a huge resource to be drawn on in the future,” said Tugendhat in a study titled “Chinese agricultural training courses for African officials: Between power and partnerships”.

Academic quality of African students

But according to Dr Yuan Gao, a senior researcher at the Centre for Higher Education Equity and Diversity Research at La Trobe University in Australia, despite spectacular achievements, uncertainties cloud China’s future ability to maintain its attractiveness to international students.

In a study titled “International student recruitment campaign: Experiences of selected flagship universities in China” that she co-authored with Jin Liu, an assistant professor at Beijing Institute of Technology, Gao says nearly half of all international students in Chinese universities are enrolled in non-degree programmes. On the face of it, what this suggests is that such students are unlikely to become influential politico-elites with the capacity to drive pro-Beijing policies back home.

As China continues to brand itself as a robust emerging market for African students, concerns are rising from home regarding the academic quality of those students in comparison with the Chinese students recruited to join the country’s best universities. “The enormous disparity in the requirements for domestic and international students to enter top universities in China has drawn extensive public attention and engendered heated debate,” says Gao.

Opposition is emerging over the generous financial support international students receive, while their perceived poor academic achievement has caused social concerns in China regarding equity.

While in the past most African students received scholarships, now the majority pay tuition fees and currently only about 12% are receiving Chinese government scholarships. The Chinese government scholarships are appealing as they cover the full tuition fee and provide a student with free on-campus accommodation with a monthly stipend of between US$380 and US$535.

According to UNESCO’s 2020 Global Education Monitoring Report titled Inclusion and Education: All means all, China is one of the top providers of scholarships.

But as China continues to drive its soft power in Africa, what is still in question is whether the flow of African students to Chinese universities has any bearing on future global politics or whether it is just an economic motive to keep Africa as a market and a source of raw materials.