Researching Higher Education in “Asia’s Global Education Hub”: Major Themes in Singapore

Abstract

Higher education studies as a field of academic research have become more developed and important in Singapore since the 1980s when the city-state placed more emphasis on reforming and restructuring its higher education sector to achieve the status of “Asia’s global education hub”. The past few decades witnessed a more significant growth of the research work and literature on higher education in Singapore, which have covered several trends of development and major issues arising from changes facing the higher education system in Singapore. With reference to the research of higher education studies in Singapore over the past three decades, this chapter probes into major characteristics, trends and issues closely related to higher education development in Singapore, which are most appropriately represented by such themes as “centralized decentralization”, entrepreneurialization, globalization, internationalization, marketization and massification. It also examines the factors affecting the development of higher education in Singapore. It is believed that important lessons can be drawn from Singapore’s experience of higher education development for other countries, no matter they are small or large, developing or developed, to develop their higher education systems in order to strive for survival in a highly competitive global market.