China and Europe on the New Silk Road: Connecting Universities Across Eurasia

How do universities cooperate when academic exchange is shaped by geopolitical ambitions, differing political traditions, and competing ideas about the purpose of higher education? China and Europe on the New Silk Road: Connecting Universities Across Eurasia takes up that question through an interdisciplinary examination of China’s New Silk Road and its implications for research and higher education cooperation.

Edited by Marijk van der Wende, William C. Kirby, Nian Cai Liu, and Simon Marginson, this collection brings together perspectives on the institutions, policies, values, and relationships influencing academic connections across Eurasia and beyond.

Universities in a changing global landscape

The book begins by placing the New Silk Road in its wider international context, then considers the development of Chinese universities and the history and effects of EU–China cooperation. Rather than treating collaboration as a simple exchange of students or ideas, the chapters examine how academic relationships are formed, what shapes their direction, and how their effects might be understood.

From research partnerships to rules and recognition

Contributors investigate patterns of research collaboration, international university consortia, and cooperation in settings including China–Malaysia partnerships. Other chapters address the frameworks that govern cross-border work, including professional qualifications, recognition, data, and privacy. Together, these topics show how academic cooperation depends not only on institutional ambition, but also on practical rules and conditions.

Different traditions, shared questions

The collection compares academic values and educational cultures, including Sinic and Anglo-American perspectives. Its discussions consider university governance and mission, the place of critical scholarship, the humanities in China, and the wider consequences of changing relationships between knowledge and geopolitical influence.

Who may find this book useful?

This volume will be relevant to readers of higher education and international research policy, as well as scholars and students interested in China–Europe relations, university governance, and the global movement of academic knowledge. Its range of disciplinary viewpoints makes it particularly useful for examining the New Silk Road as more than a transport or trade initiative: it is also a setting in which questions about universities, cooperation, and academic values are being tested.

A considered account of the opportunities and tensions involved in connecting universities across Eurasia.