Facing inequalities in academia: understanding Chinese early-career academics’ identity formation

Influenced by an increasingly stratified academic system and China’s tenure-track reform, early-career academics (ECAs) in China are experiencing encroachment upon resources and opportunities, while also facing heightened pressure from performance evaluations and career advancement. Drawing on identity theory and field theory, this study employed 26 in-depth interviews to examine how ECAs in China form varied academic identities in response to institutional environments characterized by structural and contextual inequalities. It revealed how ECAs strategically negotiate external demands and internal expectations through their overall justice judgments and possession of resources, leading to four identity types: strategic coordinator, diligent researcher, institutional innovator, and passive conformist. The study not only provides a nuanced understanding of the complex and diverse types of ECAs, but also reveals how academics utilize their agency to strategically respond to external and internal expectations. The study calls for an ‘interaction-centered’ approach to investigating academic identity, and a fair and inclusive system for resource allocation and career advancement to incentivize ECAs’ attention to quality teaching, research and service, while fostering their capacity for critical engagement and resource negotiation within institutional constraints.