8 1 Introduction to the Development of Basic Education in China
across regions or other categories e.g. girls and boys, urban, rural), and vertical
equity (e.g. participation within different groups by level of household income)
remain very important and may be the biggest challenge facing nine year compul-
sory education.
1.1.2 Policy Development for Nine Year Compulsory
Education
The major reform strategies for compulsory education include statutory require-
ments, increased financing, changed forms of decentralised management, and a
series of other innovations. Though education was prioritised for investment after
1949, universal access to basic education was not achieved by the 1960s. After
fairly steady progress the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution (GPCR) in the
late 1960s marked a period of confusion about both participation and purpose
in the school system. This ended after the fall of the Gang of Four in 1976. The
“Four Modernisations”—agriculture, industry, defence, and science and technol-
ogy—were revitalized by Deng Xiaopeng in 1978, returning to the agenda set by
Zhou En-Lai in 1963 to accelerate industrial development. By the mid 1980s after
a period of reconstruction and retrieval of the disruptions of the GPCR, and the
beginning of the “open door” that sharpened comparisons with other countries, the
focus shifted towards upgrading China’s human resources by firstly universalising
the basic school system, and secondly rationalising and developing the higher edu-
cation system.
Universal compulsory education was first mentioned in the ‘Decision on
Universalizing Primary Education in Whole Country’ in 1980 (1980 Decision),
and it was clarified by article 19 of The Constitution of the PRC (1982
Constitution), ‘the State establishes and runs schools, and universalizes primary
and secondary education’. In 1985 the ‘Decision on the Reform of Educational
System’ (1985 Decision) was issued. This elaborated on the detailed measures
needed to universalize nine-year compulsory education. This Decision delegated
the responsibilities for compulsory education to local governments with clear tar-
gets and timescales for implementation in different areas under the Difang
Banxue, Fenji Guanli, or DBFG System.^2
The Compulsory Education Law of the People’s Republic of China was enacted
in April 1986 (Lewin et al. 2004; Lewin 1989). This consolidated all the previ-
ous initiatives and was the first law for compulsory education in China. Though
this was long after such legislation in many European countries, it predated the
Education for All commitments of the international community in 1990 at Jomtien
(^2) We are grateful for Dr Niu ZhiKui for the essence of this overview of recent policy initiatives
presented at the INRULED conference in 2009 in Beijing.