The Chinese Ministry of Education (MOE) recently announced the 2013 development plan of the key humanities and social sciences research bases. Between 2012 and 2015, MOE plans on building 100 key research bases and 20 social science laboratories on themes like economics, society, politics, diplomatic relations, law and national defense.
To implement the “Action Plan for Education in the 21st Century”, MOE initiated a project to build key research bases of humanities and social sciences at universities in 1999, with a aim to building internationally prestigious national key research centres to serve as “think-tanks”, “information bases”, and “talent tanks”.
Once approved by MOE, these institutes will be jointly funded by MOE and by the universities where they are based. Since the initiation of the project, MOE has already approved the establishment of 151 such bases since 1999.
The overall goal of the 2013 plan is to comprehensively improve the quality of higher education, and to promote the reform and development of higher education based on the actual needs. The main tasks include: Further deepen reform on higher education systems, building academic demonstration centres and stimulating research activities, to establish new scientific research mechanism adapted with current university system with Chinese characteristics.
The plan also will strive to further expand long-term cooperation academic exchanges with institutions at home and abroad.