The rise and rise of research in China: what does it mean for China and the world?

Global research entails both ever-expanding open networks and self-regulated national systems. Global research also constitutes an unequal playing field, dominated by Euro-American knowledge, people, universities and rules. Different national systems engage with global research to various degrees, some more actively than others.

Global science in China, which was minor in scale only thirty years ago, is now massive and in some respects disruptive, overturning old assumptions. It has developed outside the Euro-American bloc, while connecting to it. It leads in total papers in the science and engineering disciplines and in mathematics it leads the production of high citation papers, and also relatively strong in computer science, chemistry and engineering. However, China is not as strong in life sciences and biomedicine, and in humanities and social science research it is largely invisible in world terms, though much is produced in Chinese. The uneven nature of China’s presence in research indicates not only differences in the globality of disciplines but also tensions between global, national and local cultures.

What drives rising China in global science? What challenges the internationalisation of its humanities and social sciences? What are the commonalities and differences across Chinese science, humanities, and social sciences research? Where is China’s research heading? How is it similar or different to other rising countries in research? What does the development of China’s research mean to the world? Why is it important to talk about China?

The two speakers will draw on their current research and scholarship to discuss these issues, while locating China’s research in both the changing geo-political context and the hitherto Euro-American dominated academic world. The key question they will address is: What are the global implications of the development of Chinese research?

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