“Sustainable or Unsustainable” in Higher Education Internationalization Development: Exploring the Post-Doctoral System in the Humanities and Social Sciences

Jian Li and Eryong Xue ()
Additional contact information
Jian Li: China Institute of Education Policy, Faculty of Education, Beijing Normal University, Beijing 100875, China
Eryong Xue: China Institute of Education Policy, Faculty of Education, Beijing Normal University, Beijing 100875, China

Sustainability, 2022, vol. 14, issue 17, 1-12

Abstract: The current reforms in the internationalization of the post-doctoral system in China’s higher education institutions is implemented using both governmental and institutional policies, especially in the humanities and social sciences. These reforms are situated in evolving strategies for the internationalization of China’s post-doctoral system. This study explored various stakeholder perspectives on this internationalization process; we analyzed 34 institutional post-doctoral recruitment documents and the transcripts from 36 interviews we conducted with academics, university senior administrators, and vice presidents. The findings suggest that internationalizing the post-doctoral system in the humanities and social sciences still faces challenges and difficulties: the postdocs’ role ambiguity as “temporary researchers” without the “iron rice bowl”; non-guaranteed funding, which creates a “survival of the fittest” postdoc environment; quality versus quantity of work positioning “paper as the primary productivity”; and governance and management disorder being seen as “shifting from management to service”. The internationalization of the post-doctoral system still embodies ambiguities and dilemmas. Suggestions are offered for future research in the last.

Keywords: post-doctoral researcher; China; post-doctoral system; world-class universities; higher education; internationalization (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/14/17/11024/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/14/17/11024/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:14:y:2022:i:17:p:11024-:d:906084

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().