In
Attacks on Harvard, Chinese See Yet Another Reason to Write Off the U.S.
Beyond the
shock for students, President Trump’s moves against higher education are being
seen in China as a blow to one of the last admirable American institutions.
Vivian Wang
By Vivian
Wang
Reporting
from Beijing
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/05/23/world/asia/harvard-china-trump.html
May 23,
2025, 3:57 a.m. ET
If the Trump
administration succeeds in blocking Harvard from enrolling international
students, the hardest-hit group would be students from China, who make up the
school’s biggest share of current students from overseas.
The
consequences are likely to extend far beyond those select few who could gain
entry to the prestigious university. The move could reshape the broader
relationship between the two countries by cutting off one of the few remaining
reasons that people in China still admire the United States.
The flow of
students from China to the United States has long been one of the most reliable
ballasts in the two countries’ relationship, despite growing geopolitical
tensions and China’s superpower ambitions. China until recently was by far the
biggest source of international students to the United States, sending hundreds
of thousands of people each year. Even as other symbols of the United States —
Hollywood, for example, or iPhones — lost their cachet for many Chinese,
American universities remained a source of aspiration, even veneration.
Elite
universities like Harvard played a particularly important role in that
admiration. In recent years, even student exchanges have started to suffer from
the two countries’ frosty ties, as many have worried about anti-Chinese
discrimination, difficulty securing visas or crime. But schools like Harvard
were an exception: They remained as attractive as ever to Chinese students, who
were willing to overlook other concerns for the promise of a best-in-the-world
education.
Now, even
that beacon is in question.
“Everyone
comes here with the ideal of changing the world,” said a current Chinese
graduate student at Harvard, who requested anonymity for fear of endangering
her visa. “But when I’m trying to understand the world, the world shuts me
out.” She said she now wants to return to China after graduation.
In a sign of
how tense the relationship between the two superpowers has become, the reaction
among many Chinese on social media — where the Harvard news was a top trending
hashtag on Friday — was mixed. There was concern and outrage. But in some
quarters, there was also grim acceptance or even glee.
Some
commentators said Mr. Trump was accelerating China’s ascent. They celebrated
that American universities would lose both revenue and talent, some of which
might flow to China instead. At least one university in Hong Kong has already
said that it is willing to offer unconditional admission to any transfer
students from Harvard.
Ren Yi, a
high-profile blogger who goes by the pen name Chairman Rabbit and is himself a
Harvard graduate, wrote that the United States government was “castrating” its
own top university.
“This is a
great change unseen in a century,” he wrote, quoting China’s leader, Xi
Jinping, who has used the phrase to describe his confidence in China’s rise.
(Mr. Xi’s own daughter also graduated from Harvard.)
Asked about
the decision on Friday, a spokeswoman for China’s foreign ministry said it
would “only damage the image and international reputation of the United
States.”
Even before
the move against Harvard, Chinese students in the United States had plenty of
reasons to worry. American state and federal lawmakers have proposed
restricting Chinese citizens’ ability to study in the United States, citing
national security concerns. Students have reported being turned away at the
border despite having valid visas, or having their visas abruptly revoked.
China’s
education ministry last month issued a formal warning to Chinese students to
consider the risks of studying in the United States — its first alert to
students going abroad since 2021.
The Trump
administration’s cuts to research funding have also weighed heavily on many
Chinese scholars, some of whom say they worry about being financially able to
do their work. The Harvard student who said she now plans to return to China
said that she had an offer for a research position rescinded because of the
federal funding freeze.
In China’s
flourishing industry of overseas study consultants, many encouraged their
clients to apply to other universities, including outside of the United States,
as backup. On a live broadcast with hundreds of viewers on Friday, one
consultant warned that other schools might soon see similar restrictions.
But for
some, Harvard’s exceptional status — its wealth, its prestige — also gave them
hope that the university, and American society more broadly, would weather the
turmoil.
Yu, a
Harvard master’s student who asked to be identified by only her given name for
fear of retaliation, said that she had been heartened by how people at Harvard
had pushed back against the government’s attacks. In addition to the university
administration, her fellow students, Chinese and otherwise, had banded together
to share international travel plans with each other in case anyone ran into
trouble, and to dissect the language of executive orders.
She had
expected that life as an international student would get harder under Mr.
Trump, she said, and she had not drastically changed her view of the United
States.
“I more look
at the values the country holds and how people are trying to defend those
values,” she said. “It will be difficult, but there will be a fight, and we do
have some hope.”
Siyi Zhao
contributed research.
Vivian Wang
is a China correspondent based in Beijing, where she writes about how the
country’s global rise and ambitions are shaping the daily lives of its people.
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