{"id":1782,"date":"2025-09-14T20:16:08","date_gmt":"2025-09-14T20:16:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.cedritech.com\/?p=1782"},"modified":"2025-09-14T20:16:08","modified_gmt":"2025-09-14T20:16:08","slug":"targeted-abroad-and-shunned-at-home-chinese-overseas-students-caught-in-limbo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.cedritech.com\/?p=1782","title":{"rendered":"Targeted abroad and shunned at home: Chinese overseas students caught in limbo"},"content":{"rendered":"

For Chinese students, a degree from a US university was once considered a \u201cgolden ticket\u201d to coveted jobs back home. But many are now finding that geopolitics is blunting their ambitions.<\/p>\n

The Trump administration\u2019s threat of visa cancellations \u2013 later shelved after a trade-truce phone call between the US president and Chinese leader Xi Jinping in early June \u2013 has compounded already swirling uncertainty for Chinese students in the US.<\/p>\n

And at home, some graduates are finding their experience abroad is raising red flags with employers, who are increasingly casting a suspicious eye over graduates trained at foreign universities worldwide.<\/p>\n

With their parents footing the hefty bill, some Chinese students are asking if studying abroad is now worth it, especially when the domestic jobs market seems to be favoring homegrown talent.<\/p>\n

Lian, a 24-year-old master\u2019s degree graduate from southeastern China who spent three years studying in the US, had dreams of working on Wall Street \u2013 until his student visa was abruptly revoked last July.<\/p>\n

Lian, who studied Economic Statistics at a Chinese university, lost his visa under a legacy ban from President Donald Trump\u2019s first term, which effectively denies US visas for Chinese students and researchers from universities believed to be linked to the Chinese military.<\/p>\n

The move stranded Lian in China during his summer internship, forcing him to dive into the \u201crat race\u201d of the domestic jobs market.<\/p>\n

None of his 70-something applications to state-backed banks and financial firms landed him a role, with most not even passing the initial CV screenings, Lian noted.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are likely political sensitivities at play,\u201d he said, asking CNN not to disclose which Chinese university he studied at because of the sensitivities of the subject.<\/p>\n

Lian thinks his experience in the US hindered his entry into the public sector \u2013 and made applying for a role in a private company unexpectedly challenging.<\/p>\n

\u201cBeing caught up in the dispute between the two countries just left you helpless,\u201d said Lian, whose job-hunting finally paid off in March with an offer from a private firm in Shanghai.<\/p>\n

Spy concerns as a \u2018social norm\u2019<\/h3>\n

China\u2019s job market \u2013 in both the private and public sectors \u2013 isn\u2019t specifically shunning graduates from the US only, but a broader group of foreign degree holders, even though they are increasingly choosing to come back .<\/p>\n

Since Xi took office in 2013, the annual number of overseas returnees has steadily increased from about 350,000 to 580,000 in 2019, before surpassing 1 million in 2021, according to data from the Ministry of Education and the Center for China and Globalization, a Beijing-based think tank.<\/p>\n

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A balloon reading “Congrats Grad” floats above the crowd during Harvard’s commencement ceremony in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on May 29, 2025. – Libby O’Neill\/Getty Images<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

But not all Chinese companies gave them a rousing reception at a time of intense nationalism and national security suspicions under Xi.<\/p>\n

In late April, Dong Mingzhu, chairwoman of China\u2019s home appliances giant Gree Electric told a shareholder meeting that the company \u201cwill never use any returnees because there could be spies among them\u201d \u2013 a comment criticized on social media and\u00a0state media\u00a0for \u201cstigmatizing\u201d and \u201cstereotyping\u201d the returning cohort.<\/p>\n

The \u201cspy suspicion\u201d \u2013 a paranoia usually found in state-backed firms \u2013 is especially jarring coming from a prominent private business leader. And it adds insult to injury for Chinese overseas graduates like Lian, who say they already feel unwelcome in China\u2019s public sector.<\/p>\n

Since 2023, multiple provinces, including arguably the most liberal-minded Guangdong in southeastern China and major cities like Beijing, have barred foreign degree holders from signing up to the \u201cXuandiaosheng\u201d program, a government recruitment initiative that selects elite graduates to groom as future senior cadres for the government and the ruling Communist Party.<\/p>\n

In the same year, nearly half of all Chinese overseas students sought to enter state-backed firms or government organs \u2013 places offering \u201ciron rice bowl\u201d jobs, coveted for their perceived security in a sputtering economy \u2013 according to a\u00a0yearly report\u00a0co-released by Chinese Global Youth Summit and Liepin, a major online recruitment platform in China.<\/p>\n

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People attend a job fair for university graduates at a gymnasium in Hefei, Anhui province, China, on September 4, 2023. – China Daily\/Reuters<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cThe public sector is becoming less welcoming to overseas graduates,\u201d said Alfred Wu, an associate professor at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore. He pointed to widespread national security concerns as a key driver.<\/p>\n

Wu explained that a climate of paranoia surrounding espionage has become a \u201csocial norm\u201d in China, largely thanks to a social media campaign by the Ministry of State Security (MSS), China\u2019s powerful civilian spy agency, which regularly tells citizens that foreign spies are everywhere.<\/p>\n

Overseas graduates, in particular, have long been seen by the MSS as \u201ceasy targets\u201d to be recruited by foreign spy agencies, state media said.<\/p>\n

A recent series of propaganda videos published by the authority\u2019s social media account includes\u00a0one<\/a>\u00a0that details how a Chinese man was lured by a foreign spy during his doctoral study abroad and ended up helping them gather classified national secrets.<\/p>\n

An \u2018inward-looking\u2019 China<\/h3>\n

For some Chinese employers, hiring domestic graduates not only means fewer security worries \u2013 they\u2019re also cheaper and a better fit for the local culture and market.<\/p>\n

Yuan Xin, a career development consultant in Shanghai, said some Chinese companies prefer more \u201ccost-effective\u201d domestic students perceived to have a stronger work ethic and a better grasp of the local market.<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom what we\u2019ve seen, most students who return after a one-year master\u2019s program indeed don\u2019t have strong study skills and their work skills are just like that,\u201d said Yuan, arguing the \u201cscreening mechanism\u201d for domestic postgraduate programs is more rigorous than those used abroad.<\/p>\n

In China, students must pass a highly competitive national postgraduate entrance exam and then study for at least two years before landing a master\u2019s degree.<\/p>\n

Master\u2019s degree holders have long dominated the returnee landscape, accounting for nearly 80% of all returnees last year, according to an annual survey by Zhilian Zhaopin, a leading recruitment platform in China.<\/p>\n

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Chinese students wait outside the US Embassy for their visa application interviews in Beijing, on May 2, 2012. – Alexander F. Yuan\/AP<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Yuan said graduates from Western countries, where work-life balance is highly valued, \u201cmay not quite fit\u201d the domestic workplace culture, where \u201c996\u201d schedules \u2013 from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m., six days a week \u2013 are common.<\/p>\n

The widespread belief that overseas graduates aren\u2019t as committed or capable as local ones strikes Ezio Duan as a \u201cstereotype,\u201d which he said had a \u201creal impact\u201d on his job search last October.<\/p>\n

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Candidates line up to enter an exam site to take the 2025 National Postgraduate Entrance Examination in Changzhou, China, on December 21, 2024. – VCG\/Getty Images<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Duan studied communication in the US for both his bachelor\u2019s and master\u2019s degrees, and said he only landed three offers from around 400 formal job applications. Similar complaints about the overgeneralization are widely shared by other returned postgrads online.<\/p>\n

Duan, who studied in the US for five years and is focused on private firms in China, views the \u201cwidespread pressure of long working hours\u201d at home as \u201ca real problem.\u201d However, Lian, who was open to working in state-backed corporations after a three-year stint in the US, said he \u201cwon\u2019t be very resistant\u201d to workplace culture back home.<\/p>\n

But even the hardest-working Chinese overseas graduates may find it difficult to overcome the shift in attitudes among domestic employers.<\/p>\n

Wu, a scholar of Chinese public policy, says employers have become more reluctant to hire overseas graduates like Duan and Lian under Xi\u2019s \u201cinward-looking\u201d policies.<\/p>\n

\u201c(Xi) aims to build a relatively closed system as there\u2019s a major narrative that he sees as a harsh reality \u2013 China-US rivalry,\u201d Wu said.<\/p>\n

Wu said the \u201cinward-looking\u201d tendency has become clearer to the public since 2018, when Xi scrapped presidential term caps, and since he has beefed up domestic \u201cself-reliance and security\u201d amid a China-US trade war.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe emphasis on internal stability and control has, in many ways, taken precedence over previous commitments to reform and openness,\u201d said Wu, noting that overseas students are a key embodiment of China\u2019s \u201copening door\u201d policy.<\/p>\n

\u201cThose advantages we thought we had six years ago have completely eroded over the past few years,\u201d said communications graduate Duan.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s something I really didn\u2019t expect.\u201d<\/p>\n

This article has been updated.<\/em><\/p>\n

Yuri Liu contributed to this report.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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