It’s time for western universities to cut their ties to China
Western universities now need to close their Confucius Institutes and end their academic cooperation with China. Following the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre, one of the ways China sought to rebuild its image abroad was by systematically forging partnerships with Western universities. At first, these partnerships mainly focused on research collaboration. Later, they grew to include the Confucius Institutes for language education and the establishment of Western universities’ branch campuses in China.At a time when China was undemocratic but liberalizing, such engagement seemed like a sensible strategy. There have always been uneasy moments in Western universities’ relationships with China, whether prompted by tensions over hosting the Dalai Lama or controversies over university self-censor...