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Can Hong Kong Keep Its Lead in the Brain Race?
Philip G. Altbach and Gerard Postiglione
Philip G. Altbach is Monan professor of higher education and director of the Center for International Higher Education at Boston College. Gerard Postiglione is professor in the Faculty of Education at the University of Hong Kong. Address: Faculty of Education, University of Hong Kong, Pokfulam Rd., Hong Kong, China.
Hong Kong's future depends on its human resources—the skills of its people in such fields as financial management, law, science and technology, tourism, the management of trade and business, and related fields. In a recent poll of 11,000 business leaders, almost 20 percent highlighted an inadequately educated work force, as the most problematic factor for doing business in Hong Kong. In the World Economic Forum's Global Competitiveness Report of 2005/06, Hong Kong dropped 7 places to 28 out of 117. To build and maintain human capital, Hong Kong needs world-class innovative and competitive universities. Singapore, similar to Hong Kong in its dependence on brains and innovation, has been rapidly internationalizing its higher education system, actively recruiting scholars and students globally and from mainland China as well. Singapore (like South Korea and Taiwan) got a big jump on Hong Kong by heavy investment in science and technology R&D in the 1980s and 1990s. Hong Kong has paid for that mistake and still lags behind with a GDP expenditure on R&D of 0.7 percent compared to 1.9 percent on average in the EU in 2004, 2.26 for OECD countries, 2.59 percent in the United States, 3.15 in Japan and 2.25 in Singapore. Even renowned astrophysicist Stephen Hawking, on a visit last week with Hong Kong chief executive, called for the funding of more research and teaching posts at Hong Kong's universities.
Hong Kong's quick-profit business community chose to rely more on the approaching reunion with China for keeping the economy charging ahead, rather than following the path of the other three Asian Tigers. It seems to be repeating that scenario with respect to investment in higher education. A special challenge now is keeping abreast of the rapidly developing and improving universities in other parts of China. If Hong Kong does not pay special attention to its universities, it will inevitably lose its position as a primary place for innovation and commerce internationally and in the region. However, another widely held perspective is that Hong Kong benefits greatly from robust university growth on the mainland and that the proximity to and unique relationship with mainland universities will become instrumental to enhancing Hong Kong's global competitiveness. This may be wishful thinking. The mainland is in fact building universities that rival Hong Kong's best institutions now.
Mainland Developments
The challenge from the Chinese mainland in higher education is immense. At the present time, China is making a headlong effort to create a dozen or more "world-class" universities. Academic leaders and the government are not thinking about Hong Kong but rather Oxford, Berkeley, Harvard, and other world-class universities whose leaders have been spending a good deal of time visiting China lately. Peking and Tsinghua Universities have long been identified as leading institutions, and much money has been spent to build new facilities and instill a culture of academic quality and competition. Three additional examples can illustrate the scope of China's efforts. Zhejiang University and Shanghai Jiao Tong University are both considered in China's "top 10." Each has upwards of 30,000 students and, in many fields, graduate programs. Both institutions are part of the 985 Initiative of the central government, which is providing significant resources to a select group of universities. Both also benefit greatly from additional local funding—from Zhejiang province and the Shanghai municipal government, respectively—each of which is among China's richest local authorities. Shanghai Jiao Tong's new suburban campus rivals, in size and facilities, the best of America's state universities. Indeed, it is as if Jiao Tong built the equivalent of an American "land grant" campus in five years rather than the century it took to build up the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign or a similar institution. China Ocean University in Qingdao—a more specialized institution in Shandong province, but also under the umbrella of the Ministry of Education—is also building its second new campus on the outskirts of the city. It will focus more specifically on marine technology, its traditional strength. However, all three of these institutions are seeking to build strength across the disciplines and to shed the overspecialization of many Chinese universities.
Building top research universities requires more than impressive buildings and advanced laboratories. An advanced academic culture focused on research, collaborative work, meritocratic advancement, and top-quality teaching and advisement is also required. It may be in these "soft" areas that mainland universities need further development.
Hong Kong's Advantages—Some Lessons for the Mainland
Hong Kong has many important advantages in its academic culture that go beyond its impressive facilities. The University of Hong Kong (UHK) is undergoing a major expansion and renovation to its campus in anticipation of its 100th anniversary. But it is in the "software"—the academic culture and traditions—where Hong Kong's top universities have a competitive advantage over their mainland competitors. These include English as the main medium of instruction—while the UHK is the only exclusively English-medium institution, the other two major research institutions, the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology and the Chinese University of Hong Kong, are predominantly using English. Nevertheless, as several Chinese mainland universities are also increasing the English-medium component of their institutions, it will be more important for Hong Kong to excel in this area while keeping a high standard of Chinese. Academic freedom is sufficiently well entrenched to have withstood several major challenges since 1997. The international faculty with both Chinese and other foreign heritages have not been sidelined in the day-to-day operation of the universities and complement the cosmopolitanism of the institutions. Transparency in administration and a significant degree of faculty governance have meant that the academic staff have been involved in all major development planning and key decisions. Working conditions are favorable by international standards, as are academic salaries—despite quickly sliding downward toward the international norms with several cuts in recent years, a delinking from the civil service salary scale, and introduction of a performance-based salary system. However, Hong Kong's competitiveness in terms of salaries may gradually decline as salaries and conditions on the mainland improve and academic salaries in other places like the United States continue to rise.
While permanent tenured academic appointments are highly competitive and difficult to obtain in Hong Kong, there is a recognized academic career path and reasonable security of employment. Mainland institutions are still struggling to establish regularized personnel policies, with appropriate expectations and evaluations.
Perhaps most important is the fact that both Hong Kong's universities and its society function according to accepted international standards and have a general commitment to excellence, meritocracy, and an openness to ideas and innovations.
What Hong Kong Needs
The main requirement for Hong Kong to maintain its competitive academic system is for society at all levels—including the universities themselves as well as the government and the public—to support the universities and recognize them as a central element of Hong Kong's competitive future. This means both adequate funding as well as attention to maintaining and strengthening Hong Kong's distinctive academic culture. An environment in which the most creative professors can pursue their work is essential. Steven Hawking also pointed out on his visit to China that scientists' deference to authority can be a hindrance to scientific breakthroughs. Many mainland Chinese academics are still at the crossroads, stuck between the old traditional bureaucratic control and the new forces of global corporate university culture. But, it won't be that way forever as social change continues in China. Given Hong Kong's heavily commercial and business culture and the lack of a strong intellectual tradition, its leadership could easily slip back into the past when Hong Kong maintained a university as a symbol rather than as a center for intellectual innovation. Within the strong pull of Chinese history, Hong Kong has not been recognized as a cultural Mecca or center of intellectual dynamism, and the powerful business sector has often remained skeptical of the usefulness of Hong Kong's universities with their high price tags.
Hong Kong needs to commit fully to the idea that the knowledge economy is one of its keys to the future. That means that Hong Kong's key universities need to be supported in their efforts to compete globally. Specific policy initiatives should include internationalization (recruiting international staff and students), the continued use of English as the central language of higher education, an emphasis on academic and professional fields especially relevant to Hong Kong's competitive future, dedication to intellectual freedom and independence that have been a hallmark of higher education in Hong Kong, the ability to attract Hong Kong overseas scientists to return home, continued reform of the school system, an undergraduate curriculum that builds problem-solving skills and commitment to community building, and a research culture that is supported with bold initiatives to sustain a new intellectual environment of discovery and application. Without these emphases, Hong Kong will be unable to keep abreast of the emerging academic sector in mainland China and will fall behind in global higher education competition. Of central importance is sustained financial support for higher education.
[Online] Available:
http://www.bc.edu/cihe/newsletter/Number45/p24_Altbach_Postiglione.htm
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