Between Post-Soviet Integration and China’s “One Belt, One Road”: Is A New Eurasian Higher Education Region Emerging in Central Asia?

Both the Russian-led Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) and China’s "One Belt One Road" (OBOR) initiative are intended to transform Central Asia through the creation of a Eurasian higher education region. Both EAEU and OBOR are primarily economic projects intended to develop Eurasian infrastructure and the economic and political aspects of these projects are well researched. However, analysis of their cultural dimension is lacking despite the importance assigned to education in both initiatives and in light of global diffusion of the importance of higher education to the knowledge economy. Russia’s Eurasian project is built on a history of (post-)Soviet educational cooperation and shared cultural ties, whereas OBOR focuses on loose arrangements based on scholarships and developing university alliances. These differences lead us to expect to find competing and possibly even conflicting approaches to the construction of a Eurasian higher education region in Central Asia. As such, the paper examines the extent to which Russian and Chinese led visions for Eurasian higher education regionalism are competitive or compatible in Central Asia. The paper also sheds light on the perspectives of Central Asian states by investigating how these countries are responding to these efforts to construct a Eurasian higher education region. Drawing on policy and other official documents to compare approaches taken by Russia, China and the responses of the Central Asian states, we contend that a new third term of ‘points of correspondence’ is the most accurate way to conceptualize this emerging higher education regionalism in Eurasia, and to move beyond the current crossroads of competition.