ABSTRACT
This chapter indicates that governance in Chinese education is a complex issue. The governing model in Chinese education system includes public, private (Sili) and community (Minban). The chapter outlines four different pathways (general education, vocational education, adult education and non-formal and lifelong education) to argue that public schools still dominated in China. Although SOE schools are grouped into a state-owned system of public education, they are not run by the Ministry of Education, but by SOEs. This chapter provides a picture of the governance model in SOE schools under the central planning system and the flow of decision-making and bargaining of railway schools between governments and railway departments at various levels (central, provincial and district) under the Modern Enterprise System. This chapter provides a case of the transformation of ownership in a Railway SOE school at Shenzhen. It shows how top-down policy is implemented from central government to ministry level, to province level, to municipal city level and finally to district level. Networks support negotiation and bargaining at the district level, which influences the education policy of the central government.
