Citing a shortage of funds, the Ministry of Education is halving the budget for the Teaching Excellence program for this year to NT$2.5 billion (US$78 million), while retaining the full budget for a controversial NT$50 billion five-year program to create top universities. A policy that favors certain sectors over others, and rich over poor, is a slap in the face of the teachers and students at the several dozen schools that have worked hard to achieve the Teaching Excellence award.
Higher education in this country has long been a matter of stealing from the poor and giving to the rich, working against private schools while promoting public schools and constantly replicating and reinforcing class structures. Disadvantaged schools and students have no chance to improve their lot since government policies continue to favor the strong.
The ministry favors a few top schools mainly because it wants to raise Taiwan’s international competitiveness. The purpose of the NT$50 billion program is to place a few Taiwanese schools on the list of the world’s top 100 schools. In this year’s Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU) recently released by Shanghai Jiao Tong University’s Center for World-Class Universities, National Taiwan University (NTU) had “improved” its ranking from 150 last year to 127. This caused a lot of smug people to say that not only is NTU the best of all universities in Taiwan, China and Hong Kong, it also managed, for the first time, to surpass the National University of Singapore, which ranked 145, thus making NTU the best among “Chinese” universities.
The fact is that in the ARWU ranking, universities ranked 101 to 150 are grouped and listed alphabetically, so there is no difference between 127 and 145. Not much to rejoice about, in other words.
Even if they had managed to make it to the top 100, what is the difference between 99 and 101? Who remembers any of the schools ranked below the first dozen or so on the list? How many people have heard of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich, which ranks 23rd?
Furthermore, top Taiwanese universities like the National Tsing Hua University or National Chiao Tung University always rank in the 300 to 350 group, belying the idea that the NT$50 billion five-year budget is having any kind of effect.
An education policy focused on placing a university on the list of the world’s top 100 universities merely highlights the use of political rhetoric in developing countries. Even a place on the World Universities’ Ranking on the Web, which aims to promote Web publication and electronic access to scientific publications, is on the wish list of domestic universities, with schools ranking in the 500s and 600s making a big deal out of it. This obsession with ranking has reached unimaginable proportions.
National competitiveness depends on raising the skills of the whole nation, not on favoring a small elite. We cannot rely on cultivating a few top universities and ignore the rights and potential of the majority of university students, nor can we continue to create privileged and disadvantaged groups in complete disregard of social justice and fairness.
There have been reports that the ministry was considering cutting the budget for the “top university program,” but a few “powerful individuals” intervened and the budget for the Teaching Excellence program will instead be halved, creating a difficult situation for 30 to 40 universities that already receive little support each year.
The main concern for Taiwan’s higher education is how to resist the two main forces that have developed in response to educational formalism. In a pluralistic democracy, universities should have the power to strive for equality and pursue difference. Not every Taiwanese university wants to become a top university or be a factory for academic production, but they still have the right to demand, on a foundation of equality, that they be allowed to use their specialties to train the next generation.
Even more importantly, the state must not use national assets to favor a small elite, nor must it sacrifice the rights of the disadvantaged in order to secure the future of the privileged. The only right left to the disadvantaged would then be the right to take to streets.
Chiou Tian-juh is a professor at Shih Hsin University’s Department of Social Psychology.
Translated by Perry Svensson
Recently, China launched another diplomatic offensive against Taiwan, improperly linking its “one China principle” with UN General Assembly Resolution 2758 to constrain Taiwan’s diplomatic space. After Taiwan’s presidential election on Jan. 13, China persuaded Nauru to sever diplomatic ties with Taiwan. Nauru cited Resolution 2758 in its declaration of the diplomatic break. Subsequently, during the WHO Executive Board meeting that month, Beijing rallied countries including Venezuela, Zimbabwe, Belarus, Egypt, Nicaragua, Sri Lanka, Laos, Russia, Syria and Pakistan to reiterate the “one China principle” in their statements, and assert that “Resolution 2758 has settled the status of Taiwan” to hinder Taiwan’s
Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong’s (李顯龍) decision to step down after 19 years and hand power to his deputy, Lawrence Wong (黃循財), on May 15 was expected — though, perhaps, not so soon. Most political analysts had been eyeing an end-of-year handover, to ensure more time for Wong to study and shadow the role, ahead of general elections that must be called by November next year. Wong — who is currently both deputy prime minister and minister of finance — would need a combination of fresh ideas, wisdom and experience as he writes the nation’s next chapter. The world that
Can US dialogue and cooperation with the communist dictatorship in Beijing help avert a Taiwan Strait crisis? Or is US President Joe Biden playing into Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) hands? With America preoccupied with the wars in Europe and the Middle East, Biden is seeking better relations with Xi’s regime. The goal is to responsibly manage US-China competition and prevent unintended conflict, thereby hoping to create greater space for the two countries to work together in areas where their interests align. The existing wars have already stretched US military resources thin, and the last thing Biden wants is yet another war.
Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, people have been asking if Taiwan is the next Ukraine. At a G7 meeting of national leaders in January, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida warned that Taiwan “could be the next Ukraine” if Chinese aggression is not checked. NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg has said that if Russia is not defeated, then “today, it’s Ukraine, tomorrow it can be Taiwan.” China does not like this rhetoric. Its diplomats ask people to stop saying “Ukraine today, Taiwan tomorrow.” However, the rhetoric and stated ambition of Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) on Taiwan shows strong parallels with