China has undertaken a massive overhaul of its university system since 2021, ditching around a third of all courses—mostly from the arts, humanities and languages, and replacing them with tech and AI-focused majors. As China moves towards an AI-led future, the stated goal is to give its students the skills needed to find employment in tech-related fields.
Such courses offer practical skills relevant to China’s economic goals, but the removal of humanities courses will inevitably have some impact on the ability of the society to think critically. To bureaucrats in the China system, the humanities may appear redundant compared to various STEM subjects, but there is the also the possibility that they encourage a more questioning approach to everything. But ironically, in the age of AI, critical thinking and asking questions may be the most critical skills that can set humans apart from machines.
As the world moves towards ever greater division, two vastly different views of governance are forming, one more diverse and participatory, and another more top-down and controlled. The reconstruction of tertiary education in China very much works in terms of the second category but ignores the fact that in the age of AI, people with critical thinking skills will presumably have an advantage.