Introduction

Beginning in the late 1970s, China's leaders made a strategic decision to send Chinese scholars overseas for academic and scientific training. The goal was to make up for the years lost through the Cultural Revolution and through these exchanges to catapult China into the top ranks of the global scientific community. While it was not difficult to find Chinese scholars who were interested in going abroad, the critical component of that strategy was to get people to return. In the earlier years of the "open policy in education," the return rate was high. By sending primarily advanced or mature scholars, with established careers and families in China, universities and research labs gained extraordinary benefits from these educational exchanges. However, as the 1980s wore on, fewer and fewer Chinese academics returned. Then came June 4, 1989, and the events in Beijing and in Tiananmen Square, which significantly transformed the "brain drain" into a veritable flood. Many Western governments, responding to demands expressed by the Chinese students and scholars in their communities and to the howls of protest by Chinese communities within their societies, decided to allow Chinese students and scholars to stay for an extended period within their midst and over time have introduced a variety of mechanisms that have allowed those Chinese to stay. As a result, almost 50,000 Chinese students and scholars will stay in the United States. ¹ More than 10,000 have secured working rights in Canada. In Australia, more than 20,000 Chinese students were accorded an opportunity to stay, although the Australian government has appeared at times to be reconsidering its offer of residency.