Education modernization in rural China: exploring temporality in education policy

Abstract

ABSTRACT Temporality is a relatively new conception in the field of education policy. Drawing upon historical sociology, this article aims to contribute to the field by deconstructing China’s policy discourse – education modernization. It traces the history of the discourse (1904–2012) to analyze how Chinese rurality is interwoven into the nation’s pursuit of modern country status. Two temporal threads are identified: the rural as a problem and the rural as a modernization plan. The article reveals how the threads forms a paradoxical position of the rural in China’s current modernization agenda: the problematized rural as a potential empowering force. The findings illuminate how the policy constructs a history narrative thereby constructing a unified destiny of the nation for the future, which entrusts education policy with moral significances. China’s case demonstrates how education policy inherits and utilizes historical and cultural assumptions as a governing technique, while being shaped and constrained by them.