China's Universities in the World Community: Conformity or Transformation?

In this chapter I turn to China's external knowledge relations and the ways in which they have served its reintegration into the world community since 1978. First three distinctive approaches to international relations are delineated: the Maoist view of global order, which continues to inform Chinese foreign policy in the post-Mao era, ¹ the functionalist view of equilibrium theorists which underpins American foreign policy thinking, and finally the view put forward by theorists of the World Order Models Project. ² Central to my analysis are the concepts of this third approach, yet a consideration of the first and second approaches is also important. They reveal the underlying assumptions and expectations of Chinese and Western policy makers who are creating the conditions for China's increasingly rapid integration into the world community.