The Trap of Exceptionalism: How Elite Higher Education in China Produces Class and Gender Inequality

Abstract

The scholarship on elite education has focused on the processes through which elite education consecrates students as “the best and the brightest” and justifies elites’ privilege (Bourdieu 1979, 1996; Cookson 1985; Gaztambide-Fernandez 2009; Henriot-van Zanten 2015; Howard 2008; Khan 2011). This dissertation problematizes an understudied educational structure found in elite higher education in China: the valorization of exceptionalism (i.e., exceptional competence / intelligence) and the elevated status bestowed on top students. While elite institutions’ merit-legitimizing effect applies to anyone who has been associated with them, my use of the concept of exceptionalism specifies an elite higher education system where the construction of “exceptional competence / intelligence” distinguishes a select few students from the rest of the high-achieving student body and confers on them disproportionate rewards and recognition. This dissertation argues that such valorization of exceptionalism in elite higher education produces class and gender inequality. Drawing on 133 in-depth interviews, conducted in Beijing in 2021 and 2022, with junior and senior students at the two most prestigious elite universities in China—Peking University (PKU) and Tsinghua University (THU), this study shows that, combined with peer-to-peer status competition during university, the construction of exceptionalism influences students’ self-assessment of competence and in turn influences their expected class position after graduation. Such an educational structure produces class inequality, as privileged students enjoy an advantage in crafting a narrative of excellence. It also produces gender inequality by activating the male-brilliance stereotype (Bian, Leslie, and Cimpian 2017; Leslie et al. 2015)—the idea that men possess innate intelligence while women are more hard working than innately talented in high-level work, leading women (especially the less privileged) to have lower self-assessment of competence. This research contributes to the scholarship of comparative higher education, elite education, and comparative research on inequality by clarifying how merit is valorized in different educational systems and how educational institutions work in tandem with social categories such as class and gender to form social stratification in different societies (comparing the Chinese case with more well-documented Western elite education in the literature). I detail the rules of the game in China’s elite higher education and contribute to understanding the relationship between higher education and a society’s class cultures and gender relations (Stevens et al. 2008). This dissertation also contributes to unpacking the complicated gender dynamics in education. Women have been gaining an advantage over men in educational attainment and academic performance in middle-income and high-income countries (DiPrete and Buchmann 2013), but I show that elite higher education can disadvantage women when it promotes exceptionalism. Leveraging a very privileged slice of the college student population in China, this dissertation contributes to updating our understanding about higher education, class, and gender in China. Moving beyond popular discussions on test-oriented education, it shows how valorization of exceptionalism is important for understanding Chinese education. Taken as a whole, this dissertation challenges the construction of “exceptional competence” in education and deepens the ongoing conversations about the purpose of elite higher education.