Book Review: Handbook of education in China

Reviewed Work

Handbook of Education in China, edited by W. John Morgan, Qing Gu and Fengliang Li, Cheltenham, UK, Edward Edgar, 2017, 558 pp., £85 (hardback), ISBN 978-1-78347-065-5

Introduction

This edited volume is a highly comprehensive handbook that contains everything a beginning scholar in Chinese education might need to know. Over 23 chapters it deals with historical and fundamental aspects of education (origins, ideologies, governance, finance); the stages of education (early childhood, primary, secondary, technical and vocational, higher, teacher and distance and lifelong education); key problems and policies (citizenship, inequality, special and inclusive and minority education, private tutoring, education and the labour market, education for migrant workers and their children, Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths (STEM) education, environmental and international education); and, finally, education in the Special Administrative Regions of Macao and Hong Kong. Setting itself against the backdrop of rapid economic growth, massive expansion of education and a growing interest in recent developments in China within ‘Western’ societies, this handbook offers a blend of historical, theoretical and empirical research insights, at times highly critical. It brings together viewpoints from both Chinese and non-Chinese scholars to showcase the variety of research in a new and interesting way that makes education in the People’s Republic of China accessible to scholarly, English-speaking audiences.