Global aspirations and strategising for world-class status: New form of politics in higher education governance in Hong Kong

In the era of globalization, competition has become global as well. In higher education, countries worldwide are attaching increasing importance to international ranking exercises and subscribing to the “world-class universities” paradigm, complemented by various strategies to benchmark with leading universities in order to enhance the global competitiveness of their universities. This is particularly so in Asia as it emerges as the centre of fast-growing economies of the world. With strong determination to perform better in international ranking exercises, a number of Asian universities have attempted to restructure their university systems and searched for new governance and promotion strategies to secure higher global ranking. Similar to their European counterparts, Asian universities are increasingly subject to new external standards of measurement while their own internal governance processes have become more managerial in orientation. Against this wider global policy backdrop, this paper reviews major policies introduced and strategies employed by the government and universities/higher education institutions of Hong Kong in the quest for world–class status. More specifically, this paper critically examines the “politics of competition” among institutions for both state and non-state resources, in recruiting and retaining global talents and in internationalizing their curricula in order to achieve their global aspirations. It also explores the intra-institutional “politics” within institutions involving tensions between teaching and research, and among different discipline areas.