HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_020512.jpg

53

researchers to intensify efforts to protect their proprietary intellectual property
from loss.

Promote Reciprocity

The academic community nationwide should work toward a common set of principles
and practices for protecting academic freedom and promote greater reciprocity.
To prevent influencers from using divide-and-conquer strategies (by rewarding
some institutions while punishing others), it is important for the national academic
community as a whole to come together to formulate and implement these principles.
US universities should not only work together but they should also work with other
universities around the world to develop a “Code of Conduct” for acceptable and
unacceptable practices in academic exchanges with Chinese institutions and funders.
(The section on think tanks in this section recommends similar measures.) The
academic community and government should also monitor instances where Chinese
entities may acquire financially challenged American colleges outright, ensuring that
their academic integrity is not compromised.⁴³

Universities can and must continue to play a positive role in the US-China relationship.
Indeed, by introducing international students to American life and values, and
connecting them to new personal and professional relationships, universities are
arguably the important means by which the United States exercises its soft power.
Generally—but not always—individuals undergoing such an experience take a more
positive view of the country. Unfortunately, as Chinese students contribute much, not
least monetarily, to American universities, universities have been too slow to help them
integrate themselves more organically into campus life. As a result, Chinese students
report unacceptably high levels of depression and isolation or simply clubbing up with
each other.⁴⁴ While acting to mitigate the risks of improper interference, universities
must not forget their obligations to these students nor lose sight of the far greater
opportunity to advance cooperation and understanding.

NOTES

1 This process is well documented in Li, Cheng (ed.). Bridging Minds Across the Pacific: US-China Educational
Exchanges, 1978–2003. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books. 2005.

2 “Places of Origin.” Institute of International Education. 2017. https://www.iie.org/Research-and-Insights
/Open-Doors/Data/International-Students/Places-of-Origin.

3 “For China’s Elite, Studying Abroad Is de Rigueur.” Economist. May 17, 2018. https://www.economist.com
/special-report/2018/05/17/for-chinas-elite-studying-abroad-is-de-rigueur.

4 Ibid.

5 Ibid.

Section 4

HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_020512