Governance reform of local university under the “Double World-Class” policy: are there unintended but not unanticipated consequences?

Adoption of the “Double World-Class” policy in China has led to substantial changes in the country’s higher education governance system. Thus, to examine whether any undesired effects have occurred, in this study, we conducted document analysis along with purposive interviews to gather pertinent data on one local university that has been selected for inclusion in the national “Double World-Class” initiative as well as the Guangdong Province’s “High-Level Construction Universities” project. This investigation is guided by de Zwart’s (Theory and Society 44:283–297, 2015) concept of the “unintended but not unanticipated consequences” and a clear distinct perspective on how these consequences arise. Application of this analytical framework on unanticipated consequences of purposive social action allowed us to identify selective neglect, utility maximization, and the pursuit of the “world-class university” label to perpetuate the myth of superior educational quality as the main drawbacks of the recent policy change. The impact of these factors on the quality of higher education in China is discussed, along with the strategy that can be adopted to mitigate the noted drawbacks in future.