‘Anti-Western’ recruitment ‘could turn Chinese off foreign study’

“Anti-Western” influences in Chinese employment policies could reduce locals’ appetite for overseas study, an Australian forum has heard.

Linda Jakobson, deputy chair of the China Matters thinktank, said China’s state-owned enterprises were no longer employing people with foreign degrees.

“It’s a very sought-after job to be in the state enterprises,” she told a symposium hosted by the Australia-China Relations Institute (ACRI) at the University of Technology Sydney. “Parents are thinking twice about cutting off the possibility of state-owned enterprise jobs for their kids.”

Many Chinese graduates now aspire to work for government-owned organisations instead of private corporations, which are considered less secure employers at a time of economic turmoil.

However, leader Xi Jinping has intensified Beijing’s control over these organisations – including their employment practices – through mechanisms such as the National Supervision Commission, an anti-corruption body established in 2018.

Ms Jakobson, a senior adviser at the China Office of Finnish Industries in Helsinki, said employment policies were now assuming an “anti-foreign” slant, which in effect meant anti-Western.

“You can get your degree in Africa or Latin America and that’s not so bad. But [there is an] anti-Canada, anti-Australia, anti-America, anti-Europe tendency at the moment. Xi Jinping has really taken the country in a bit of an anti-foreign, anti-Western direction.”

ACRI director James Laurenceson offered a different perspective. “The slowdown of the Chinese economy…on net terms is probably going to act as a bit of a push factor,” he told the forum. “That’s going to encourage more Chinese households to send their children overseas because the domestic environment in China is…so difficult.”

Professor Laurenceson said Chinese applications for Australian student visas now exceeded pre-pandemic levels. He said the now-easing tensions between Beijing and Canberra had never been destined to affect student flows in the way that they had choked trade in agricultural goods.

While Chinese authorities had used safety warnings to discourage study in Australia, the effect had been minimal. “There’s a massive Chinese diaspora in Australia,” Professor Laurenceson explained. “The average Chinese certainly doesn’t wake up and read the People’s Daily to understand Australia. They’ll speak to friends and relatives that are already here.”

However, China Matters fellow Yun Jiang said, although Chinese media commentary about Australian prime minister Anthony Albanese’s recent visit to Beijing and Shanghai had been “quite positive”, resentment lingered over the 2018 banning of Chinese telecommunications company Huawei from the rollout of Australia’s fifth generation mobile network and Canberra’s 2020 call for an independent inquiry into the origins of Covid-19.

Ms Jiang said Beijing’s “injured pride” had fuelled the Chinese retaliation through trade sanctions. “One of the things they often say is it’s the person who ties the bell that has to untie the bell.”

Nevertheless, Ms Jiang said Australia remained particularly attractive to female Chinese students. “In Australia, we have perhaps a more equal attitude to gender and the roles of women in society. They perhaps don’t have to confine themselves to a specific role. That’s really positive.”

Ms Jakobson said European attitudes to China had been “completely changed” by Mr Xi’s support for Russia over its invasion of Ukraine. “Public opinion across Europe has been massively turned against China. [This is] extremely challenging for…countries that would otherwise wish to balance as evenly as they possibly can between the US and the People’s Republic of China.”

john.ross@timeshighereducation.com