Mutual Benefit at the Planning Table: A Case Study of China’s Scholarship Programs for the Global South

Abstract Mutual benefit is central to how China describes its international aid principles. In the past decades, China has strived to promote technical cooperation and knowledge sharing with Global South countries. Providing university scholarships to study in China has been China’s primary means of achieving these goals. However, the extent to which mutual benefit is perceived in the meso-level relations between Chinese and Global South participants in these scholarship programs is under-researched. This study adopts a multisite case study design. Situated within an adult higher education context, we use Cervero and Wilson’s “working the planning table” theory to study the negotiation of the program objectives in China’s scholarship programs. The study finds that Cervero and Wilson’s consultation form of negotiations for a mutually beneficial synergy prevails among Chinese program planners and Global South student participants in the scholarship programs.