Meritocracy and Its Discontents: Anxiety and the National College Entrance Exam in China

282 Pages·2021·4.097 MB·English

by  Zachary M. Howlett

MERITOCRACY AND ITS
DISCONTENTS

MERITOCRACY
AND ITS
DISCONTENTS
Anxiety and the National College
Entrance Exam in China
Zachary M. Howlett
CORNELL UNIVERSITY PRESS ITHACA AND LONDON
Copyright © 2021 by Zachary M. Howlett
All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in a review, this book, or parts
thereof, must not be reproduced in any form without permission in writing
from the publisher. For information, address Cornell University Press, Sage
House, 512 East State Street, Ithaca, New York 14850. Visit our website at
cornellpress.cornell.edu.
First published 2021 by Cornell University Press
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Howlett, Zachary M., 1976– author.
Title: Meritocracy and its discontents : anxiety and the national college entrance
exam in China / Zachary M. Howlett.
Description: Ithaca [New York] : Cornell University Press, 2021. | Includes
bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2020025194 (print) | LCCN 2020025195 (ebook) |
ISBN 9781501754432 (hardcover) | ISBN 9781501754463 (paperback) |
ISBN 9781501754456 (ebook) | ISBN 9781501754449 (pdf)
Subjects: LCSH: Gaokao (Educational test)—Social aspects. | Universities and
colleges—China—Entrance examinations. | Achievement tests—China.
Classification: LCC LB2353.8.C6 H68 2021 (print) | LCC LB2353.8.C6 (ebook) |
DDC 378.51—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020025194
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020025195
Cover photo: Parents pray at a temple to Wenchang, the God of Examinations,
for their children’s success on the College Entrance Exam, Fujian Province, 2013.
Photograph by the author.
Contents
Acknowledgments vii
Note on Translation and Orthography xi
Selected Twentieth-Century Timeline xii
Prologue: The Final Battle xiii
1. A Fateful Rite of Passage: The Gaokao and the Myth
of Meritocracy 1
2. Mobility, Time, and Value: The High Stakes of Examination
and the Ideology of Developmentalism 41
3. Counterfeit Fairness: State Secrets and the False
Confidence of Test Takers 77
4. Diligence versus Quality: Merit, Inequality, and
Urban Hegemony 116
5. Courage under Fire: The Paradoxical Role of Head Teachers
and the Individualizing Moment of Examination 146
6. Magic and Meritocracy: Popular-Religious Responses
to Examination Anxiety 182
Epilogue: Lost and Confused 226
Notes 235
References 241
Index 259

Acknowledgments
My experience writing this book demonstrates one of its central premises. We
often credit people’s accomplishments to their individual merit; however, the
foundations of merit are social. My name appears on the cover of this book, but
countless people contributed to its formation. First thanks go to all the people in
the Chinese high schools where I conducted my fieldwork. My students in these
schools were my tireless teachers, and many of the teaching staff and adminis-
trators became close friends. Although I cannot name them in public, this book
owes its existence to them.
My advisers Steve Sangren, Magnus Fiskesjö, and TJ Hinrichs nurtured me
throughout my time at Cornell University. I owe each of them a great intellectual
debt. Many other teachers at Cornell also inspired me: Dominic Boyer, Sherman
Cochran, Petrus Liu, Robin McNeal, Hiro Miyazaki, Viranjini Munasinghe, Ter-
ence Turner, Sofia Villenas, and Andrew Willford, to name a few. I also thank
classmates, friends, and staff at Cornell who helped and supported me, includ-
ing Kevin Carrico, Jack Chia, Donna Duncan, Lim Wah Guan, Pauline Limbu,
Laura Menchaca, Margaret Rolfe, James Sharrock, Nguyet Tong, Erick White,
and Taomo Zhou.
Funding for my research came from many sources. The US Department of
Education financed my graduate training with a four-year Jacob K. Javits Fellow-
ship. My fieldwork was supported by the Mellon Foundation, which stepped in
to fund projects selected for the Fulbright-Hays Doctoral Dissertation Research
Abroad (DDRA) Fellowship when Congress suspended the program in 2011.
The funding was administered by the Institute of International Education (IIE),
and I owe special thanks to the IIE program manager in Beijing, Janet Upton,
who kindly shared her wisdom about fieldwork as a fellow China anthropolo-
gist. In addition to external funding, I received generous support from Cornell
University. Two summers of preliminary fieldwork were funded by a Mario Ein-
audi Center Travel Grant and an East Asia Program Lam Family Award for South
China Research. The Cornell East Asia Program also supported the writing phase
of my research with a Hu Shih Fellowship in Chinese Studies.
In China, a variety of institutions and individuals provided crucial support.
In the Department of Anthropology of Xiamen University, I was hosted by Zeng
Shaocong, now at the Chinese Academy for Social Sciences. Professor Zeng wel-
comed me into his community of friends and students and helped me secure
vii
viii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
the tricky permissions necessary for a foreigner to conduct fieldwork in a rural
school. In the Department of Social Work, Yi Lin served as a vital sounding board
for ideas and made many helpful introductions. At the Institute of Education
of Xiamen University, Liu Haifeng and Zheng Ruoling shared their profound
knowledge of the College Entrance Examination and inspired me with their dis-
tinctive style of scholarship, which investigates the contemporary exam in tan-
dem with China’s imperial era civil exams.
I received invaluable mentorship as a postdoctoral fellow at the Harvard Acad-
emy of International and Area Studies. Elizabeth Perry generously agreed to read
my whole manuscript and chair a book workshop on it. Susan Blum, Andrew
Kipnis, Karrie Koesel, and Ajantha Subramanian took part, giving me count-
less incisive critiques. I am deeply grateful to them for their insights, which run
through every chapter. Cristina Florea and Malgorzata Kurjanska brightened my
days with their friendship. Many other colleagues and friends helped make my
time in Cambridge convivial, productive, and intellectually inspiring, including
Brinton Ahlin, Rabiat Akande, Sophia Balakian, Yael Berda, Chantal Berman,
Lina Britto, Melani Cammet, Steve Caton, Rishad Choudury, Arunabh Ghosh,
Julian Gewirtz, Chris Gratien, Jason Kelly, Egor Lazarev, Adam Leeds, Noora
Lori, Casey Lurtz, Eduardo Montero, David Szakonyi, Arne Westad, and Amy
Zhang, among others. The academy administrators Bruce Jackan and Kathleen
Hoover gave tremendous logistical support, which was always infused with their
spirit-lifting humor and kindness.
I have received suggestions on various parts of this book in many different
forums. I am deeply grateful to Michael Szonyi and Tarun Khanna for inviting
me to attend workshops on meritocracy in China and India organized by the
Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies and the Lakshmi Mittal South Asia Institute
of Harvard University. They and the other attendees—including James Lee, Cam-
eron Campbell, and Liang Chen—gave me invaluable critiques. I thank Kaori
Urayama for giving me the opportunity to present my work at the Asia Fellows
Seminar of the Harvard Kennedy School. In panel presentations, I benefited from
the insightful suggestions of Fida Adely, Kathryn M. Anderson-Levitt, Elena Ayda-
rova, Sara Friedman, Gerry Groot, DJ Hatfield, Jill Koyama, Huwy-min Lucia
Liu, Ellen Oxfeld, Robert Weller, Wu Jingting, and Roberta Zavoretti, among oth-
ers. Sections of chapters 3 and 4 expand on ideas first developed in a chapter that
I wrote for an edited volume: “China’s Examination Fever and the Fabrication of
Fairness: ‘My Generation Was Raised on Poisoned Milk,’” in E mptiness and Full-
ness: Ethnographies of Lack and Desire in Contemporary China , edited by Susanne
Bregnbæk and Mikkel Bunkenborg (New York: Berghahn Books, 2017).
At Yale-NUS College and the National University of Singapore, I have been
blessed with many extraordinarily kind and supportive senior colleagues,
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ix
including Joanne Roberts, Jeannette Ickovics, Jane Jacobs, Anju Mary Paul, Nomi
Lazar, Naoko Shimazu, Terry Narden, John Driffill, and Christina Tarnopolksy.
Many other colleagues and friends contribute to making teaching in Singapore an
immensely collegial and fulfilling experience: Emily Chua, Jessica Hanser, Annu Jal-
ais, Rohan Mukherjee, Ben Schupmann, Risa Toha, Christine Walker, Chitra Ven-
kataramani, Huong Tam, Jolene Tan, Ashlyn Thia, Daniel Yeo, and Robin Zheng,
among many others. Steve Oliver created the map charts in this book. My Anthro-
pology colleagues at Yale-NUS—Cecilia Van Hollen, Gabriele Koch, Stuart Strange,
and Neena Mahadev—have given me a steady source of camaraderie and intellectual
fellowship. I owe special thanks to Cecilia Van Hollen for her constant support and
sage advice as well as for being such an inspiring model of kindhearted equanimity.
I am likewise extremely grateful to Marcia Inhorn who, while visiting from Yale, gra-
ciously and unstintingly supported me and other junior faculty in countless ways.
Erik Harms also provided invaluable mentorship and encouragement while on leave
from Yale. My undergraduate students at Yale-NUS inspire me constantly with their
curiosity, passion, and diligence. An undergraduate student assistant, Liu Chengpei,
read my manuscript in its entirety and provided helpful feedback. Publication of
this book was made possible, in part, by a Yale-NUS College subvention grant.
At Cornell University Press, I am profoundly grateful to my editor, Jim Lance,
for his enthusiasm and support, which saw me through the final stages of this
project. He is a paragon of kindness and professionalism. I thank him from the
bottom of my heart for believing in me and this book. I also wish to thank Clare
Jones for her skilled editorial assistance. Two anonymous readers for Cornell gave
generously of their time to provide many important and insightful suggestions.
My production editor, Karen Laun, and copyeditor, Monica Achen, improved the
final product substantially.
The love and support of my friends and family has made all my life journeys
possible. At every stage of my research, the stalwart friendship of Wang Yuan-
chong has given me a wellspring of strength. My friends Kyle Rand and Josh
Morsell traveled halfway around the world to visit me in the field. Lee Calkins
spent his vacation time reading my manuscript. Merry Li supplied crucial help at
every turn. My parents have been pillars of care since the beginning. Throughout
my life, my mother and stepfather, Judith and Brooks Mencher, have nurtured
my curiosity. When I was a child, they dedicated themselves tirelessly to creat-
ing opportunities for me. Brooks was my first writing teacher and continues to
guide me. He read every word of this manuscript at least three times. Although
my father, Joe Howlett, did not live to see the completion of my graduate studies,
I know that he would be very proud. My sister, Malinda Wagner, is a constant
ally, and I thank her husband, Roger, and my niece and nephew, Emily and Eli,
for being so understanding of my absences through the years. My redoubtable
x ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
cousin Margaret Ronald showed me that getting a PhD was possible. My parents-
in-law, Ong Mei Tuan and Lau Liak Koi, have embraced me into their family, giv-
ing me a warm and welcoming home in Southeast Asia. I am likewise grateful to
my brother- and sister-in-law, Kai Yang and Yie Hui, for accepting me so warmly
into their family. Finally, I owe a special debt of gratitude to my partner and col-
laborator Lau Ting Hui, who is my biggest support. She inspires me constantly
with her insight and strength.