Educational access, quality, and inequality in China: Recent policies, priorities, and progress

Marco M. Laghi, Wensong Shen and Emily Hannum

Chapter 6 in Handbook on Inequality in China, 2025, pp 108-144 from Edward Elgar Publishing

Abstract: This chapter offers a review of longstanding and emerging issues in educational access, quality, and inequality in China. The chapter first provides a brief background on core lines of stratification in China that have been a focus of long-standing and emerging educational policy attention, with particular attention to economic disparities and how they relate to rural-urban inequality, migration, gender, ethnicity, and disability status. We discuss the development of the educational system and current policy priorities and review critical recent developments in expansion and inequality at different educational stages. The chapter then discusses three recent policy challenges in education in China, with attention to their stratifying implications: COVID-19 and response, shadow education and tutoring, and depopulation. We close by discussing progress in addressing inequalities, enduring issues, and emerging issues to keep an eye on in the future.

Keywords: Educational policy; Educational systems; Educational development; Social stratification; China (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
ISBN: 9781035317790
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