UCLA

China's post-1978 educational reform was born by and into an era of transformation. Given a historical background where modernization leads the principle of all kinds of reform, the Chinese educational system is found to be problematic in the country's struggle of a balance between economic growth and social equality. Upon using basic a historical methodology of Change over Time, the thesis examines the dilemma "between a socialist egalitarian model and a liberal competitive model" from a perspective that takes chronological and spatial transition into consideration. By placing the ongoing educational reform into two theoretical frameworks, namely isomorphism and modernization, the research tries to demonstrate the inevitability of a series of institutional changes that provide both opportunities and threats to the limited social mobility of the world's largest migrating population. The thesis concludes by assuming that although it undergoes many controversies and disputes, the educational reform is exploring a way to satisfy migrants in a particular Chinese manner.