State-mediated Brokerage System in China's Self-funded Study Abroad Market

Abstract

The thriving of China's self-funded study abroad market is marked by the tremendous increase of students who use the services of educational intermediaries to facilitate their transnational journeys. This is largely due to the marketization of China's higher educational system and the liberalization of state policy towards commercialized brokerage services. Based on multi-sited fieldwork in China and Italy, this paper examines the intersections between the regulatory, the commercial, and the social dimensions of the educational migration infrastructure in China. It identifies a tension between the neoliberal ideas of individual autonomy and freedom, which are promoted by the state and private intermediaries, and the self-perpetuating nature of the educational migration infrastructure, which facilitates and constrains different groups of parents' and students' desire for international education.