The study draws inspiration from the World Education Reform Database (WERD) and utilizes the same research questions, notably the investigation reform activity and reform content, over a longer period of time. In addition, it draws on Chinese scholarship that specified reform waves or phases, respectively in the Chinese context. What is more, the presentation presents a typology of the different types of legislative documents at the level of the State Council as well at the level of line ministries, notably the Ministry of Education. A corpus of over 10,000 policy documents were identified, of which the study narrowed the number by focusing on laws, regulations, and normative directives both at the level of the State Council and the Ministry of Education. The findings suggest that there was no School-Autonomy-with-Accountability reform wave in China. Instead, the data compiled suggests that China had its own trajectory of reform phases, informed by themes that were crucial at this stage of China educational development: expansion of compulsory education, national language issues, and private sector involvement in the education; just to name a few topics that emerged over the period 1978-2023. In conclusion, the presentation emphasizes the importance to make a differentiation between policy place and policy space. Different from OECD countries or countries dependent on the Washington Consensus and other donors, China’s reform trajectory reflects economic, political, and social developments in the country itself rather than international developments.

Broomley, et al. 2021. World Education Reform Database (WERD)