On April 26, the Ninth Session of the Fourteenth National People's Congress Standing Committee passed the "People's Republic of China Degree Law" (referred to as the "Degree Law" hereafter), which will come into effect on January 1, 2025.
The degree system is a fundamental aspect of China's education system. The "People's Republic of China Degree Regulations" enacted in 1980 established China's degree system as the country's first education law. However, with China entering a new development stage, the "Degree Regulations" could no longer meet practical needs. The formulation of the "Degree Law" based on the "Degree Regulations" marks the first comprehensive revision in over 40 years and signifies a new historical stage in China's degree law governance and quality assurance.
Significance of the Degree Law Enactment
As China's higher education scale continues to expand, effective management and supervision of degree conferment have become pressing issues. The introduction of the "Degree Law" aims to standardize and manage all aspects of degree conferment, protect the legitimate rights of degree applicants, ensure the quality and authority of degrees, and legally solidify the reform achievements of the degree system. This move undoubtedly holds positive significance for promoting the improvement of talent cultivation quality in Chinese universities and achieving high-quality development in higher education.
Following the formal enactment of the "Degree Law," conditions, procedures, and regulatory mechanisms for degree conferment in universities will need corresponding adjustments in accordance with the law. This will help optimize China's degree management system, enhance the value of degrees conferred by Chinese universities, and continuously strengthen the international competitiveness of Chinese higher education.
In recent years, issues and challenges have persisted in the degree conferment process in universities, such as thesis plagiarism and degree evaluation disputes. The original "Degree Regulations" have struggled to adapt to new developments. Various legal disputes and judicial cases arising from degree management have been widely observed, drawing significant attention from society. China urgently requires a new fundamental law on degree management to effectively regulate these issues.
Therefore, the enactment of the "Degree Law" holds immense practical significance, representing the long-awaited outcome of various parties and the diligent efforts of education legislative workers.
Addressing Judicial Practice Disputes
The "Degree Law" introduces new institutional arrangements in various aspects, to some extent addressing the various disputes in judicial practice and aiding in resolving legal controversies in degree management.
The "Degree Law" stipulates the implementation of a three-tier degree management system at the national level. The State Council Degree Committee, provincial-level degree committees, and degree-granting unit degree evaluation committees are the three main bodies responsible for degree management. The State Council Degree Committee and provincial-level degree committees lead degree work at the national and regional levels, respectively. The responsibilities of degree-granting unit degree evaluation committees include reviewing the unit's degree conferment system and standards, deliberating on the establishment and revocation of degree-granting points, making decisions on degree conferment or revocation, handling degree conferment disputes, and accepting complaints or reports.
Although the three-tier management has already formed corresponding institutional arrangements in practice, its confirmation in the form of national legislation is a first, especially with the legal affirmation of the responsibilities of provincial-level degree committees. This reflects the legal confirmation of the empowerment of state degree management to the provincial and university levels. At the provincial level, using regional economic and social development as a guide for new degree authorization work is conducive to further implementing provincial coordination in higher education.
The "Degree Law" specifies types of academic degrees and professional degrees. While the "Degree Regulations" only focused on academic degrees, lacking relevant provisions on the professional degree system, the "Degree Law" emphasizes that academic degrees highlight academic research capabilities, with training focusing on academic research. Professional degrees emphasize practical skills, with training focusing on professional practice. In terms of degree evaluation, academic degree graduate students emphasize thesis defense, while professional degree graduate students need to defend practical or other specified outcomes.
In the future, the positioning and norms of academic and professional degrees will have stronger institutional guarantees, with graduate classification training and evaluation becoming legal principles. Academic and professional degrees differ only in type, with no disparity in value.
The "Degree Law" expands the autonomy of degree-granting units, establishing a system for autonomous review of master's and doctoral degree-granting points on one hand, and granting the State Council Degree Committee the authority to revoke the autonomous review qualifications of relevant units if the quality of graduate training does not meet the required standards or if there are serious issues in degree quality management. This is of significant importance in safeguarding and expanding the autonomy of degree-granting units, further promoting standardized management in universities and stimulating vitality in university operations.
Consequently, degree-granting units with autonomous review rights will inevitably choose to uphold this power through self-restraint, standardized management, and enhanced development efforts while continuously improving the quality of graduate training.
Furthermore, the "Degree Law" grants more autonomy and academic independence to degree-granting units in setting degree conferment conditions. It requires each degree-granting unit to formulate specific conferment standards unique to the unit based on legal provisions and its own academic evaluation criteria, marking a new breakthrough in this area.
The "Degree Law" places significant emphasis on ensuring degree quality. Specifically, it emphasizes the primary responsibility of degree-granting units for quality assurance, requiring them to strengthen their degree quality assurance systems. If the quality of degree conferment does not meet the required standards, the degree-granting authority can be revoked. The law also mandates regular expert evaluations at the national and provincial levels for approved degree-granting units and conferment points. Additionally, training units must provide graduate students with well-behaved, academically proficient, or professionally skilled teachers, researchers, or professionals as supervisors and establish mechanisms for selection, assessment, supervision, and dynamic adjustments. Through these combined efforts, a more comprehensive system for ensuring degree quality is constructed. The Degree Law emphasizes the protection of students' rights. The right to education is one of the fundamental rights of citizens. In recent years, there has been extensive exploration and practice in the field of higher education regarding the protection of students' rights, and the dispute resolution process for degree awards has been continuously improved. In this regard, the Degree Law further clarifies the requirements and regulations for graduate students and their supervisors, detailed provisions for degree award procedures and quality assurance clauses, which help to further demonstrate procedural justice.
For example, the Degree Law stipulates that if a degree applicant disagrees with the academic evaluation conclusion or is dissatisfied with actions such as rejecting the degree application, not awarding the degree, or revoking the degree, they can request a review for resolution. This legal protection enhances the appeal and relief channels for degree disputes, further safeguarding the legitimate rights of degree applicants.
The Inheritance of the Spirit of the Degree Regulations and Degree Law
While responding to industry and societal demands, some legislative directions that the public eagerly anticipates have not been included in this legislation.
For instance, in the widely discussed issue of the form of national degrees and institutional degrees, the Degree Law has not made changes to the basic form of national degrees. Additionally, questions such as the relationship between the university degree evaluation committee, degree evaluation sub-committees, defense committees, the existence of superior review authority over subordinate bodies, the ability to challenge assessment results made by grassroots academic organizations, and the possibilities for administrative review or litigation in cases of degree disputes, which are major concerns in the education and legal sectors, remain to be addressed in future legislative and amendment work.
Furthermore, there are institutional spirits that the Degree Regulations and Degree Law consistently uphold.
Firstly, the relentless pursuit of cultivating high-level talents independently. The Degree Regulations have provided necessary regulations for the independent cultivation of high-level talents over the past 40 years. China has primarily relied on local degree-granting institutions for over 40 years, achieving initial success in supplying high-level talents. The Degree Law will play a greater role in comprehensively enhancing the quality of independently cultivated talents in the new era.
Secondly, upholding the basic principle of protecting the rights of degree applicants. The degree management system, building upon the amendments in the Degree Law, elevates the guarantee of basic rights to a higher position, further optimizing the mechanism for protecting the rights of degree applicants.
Lastly, emphasizing the value orientation of quality. Although the Degree Regulations do not explicitly mention quality, the basic requirements for the quality of professional talent cultivation are implied. The Degree Law specifically regulates degree quality issues in a dedicated chapter, placing the safeguarding of degree quality as the first article in the general principles, emphasizing specialized institutions responsible for degree evaluation, assessment, and quality supervision.
In conclusion, the promulgation of the Degree Law will undoubtedly have a profound impact on China's higher education and related fields. China is seizing the opportunities brought by the new wave of technological revolution, accelerating the construction of an education powerhouse, a technology powerhouse, and a talent powerhouse, comprehensively enhancing the quality of independently cultivated talents, focusing on nurturing top-notch innovative talents, achieving integrated development of education, technology, and talents, which has become a top priority in the education sector.
After the promulgation of the Degree Law, efforts should be made to strengthen legal education among key groups such as national and local education administrative departments, higher education institutions, faculty, and students, vigorously promote law enforcement inspections, ensure the thorough implementation of laws and institutional spirits, provide solid legal protection for innovative talent cultivation in the new era, better achieve comprehensive standardization of degree management work and comprehensive improvement of degree quality, and provide solid support for the construction of an education powerhouse.
(Authors are the Director of the Education Policy Research Center at Tongji University and a Deputy Researcher at the Development Research Institute of Fudan University)
