The third mission stalled? Universities in China’s technological progress

Abstract

This paper outlines China’s progress in developing endogenous capacity for knowledge diffusion and commercialization in the higher education sector. Despite a promising start in the 1980s and early 1990s, academic technology transfer has not kept pace with rapid growth of the country’s overall technological endeavors. But there is evidence of institutional evolution in that university-industry linkages are moving from more hierarchical and rigid forms established under the centrally planned economy into more flexible and market-based arrangements. After probing what underscores the stalling of universities’ new found mission, the paper offers layered policy suggestions on what can be done to overcome the conundrum.