Changing landscapes of Asian higher education

Changing landscapes of Asian higher education

Before the mid-1990s, Asian higher education tended to be small-sized, teaching-intensive, domestic-focused, and elite-oriented. The existence of such an education system, though highly regarded within the country, is not so extensively related to the broader society with respect to student participation and talent cultivation, knowledge production, industrial development, and national identity. We have seen a dramatic improvement in higher education systems in this region, not only in East Asia but also in Southeast Asia (Chan, 2016). Diverse indicators have been confirmed this achievement such as increasing participation rates, mounting investment in research and development, growing numbers of inbound international students, and rising placement in major world university rankings. This special issue aims to decipher these changing landscapes within Asian higher education. Our contributors target relatively different issues such as university participation, nation building, science policy discourse, internationalization, and doctoral education. They analyzed various countries as case studies for in-depth understanding including Taiwan, Malaysia, Thailand, China, and Korea. This combination provides a balanced perspective on the latest developments of Asian higher education.