China’s leaders say that science, technology, and innovation will make China strong, and they have devoted jaw-dropping sums to recruit scientists and build new research facilities. At the same time, the West receives growing numbers of reports about China’s rising scientific and technological power, and even about what might be done to halt its rise. But how much is really known about the changes and scale of scientific research in China?
There are many statistics to alarm people weary of China’s scientific rise. Huawei joined the Fortune 500 in 2010 and achieved outright dominance in many markets soon after. Visitors to elite universities encounter vast construction projects, from new buildings at Beijing’s Tsinghua University to a new STEM-focused university in Hangzhou. In 2019, 1.5 million students graduated from science or engineering undergraduate programs at Chinese universities. Nearly 37,000 students graduated from science or engineering doctoral programs in China,
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