Section Introduction: How Nation-States Respond to the Impacts of Migration, Immigration and Ethnic Diversity in the Context of Globalization in India, China, Japan, Korea and Singapore

Abstract

The vast population movements within and between Asian nations caused by globalization and industrialization have created new opportunities for and tensions in educational expansion in these rapidly urbanizing nations. In this book, the section “Urban Education in Asia” features seven chapters which identify the challenges to equal access to high-quality education for migrant children in India and China and immigrant children in Japan, Korea, and Singapore. The introduction summarizes the questions explored in these papers: How have migration and immigration diversified the student populations in Asian urban areas over recent decades? How have population changes accelerated changes in educational institutions? How have government officials, policymakers, and educators responded? To what degree and why are these policies and their implementation effective at fulfilling their purposes and intentions?To help readers better understand the similarities and differences of these five Asian countries, the introduction lays out their backgrounds, highlighting their diverse social, political, demographic, and historical contexts and explaining how various internal and external forces have reshaped the balance between quality, equality, and equity in educational access, outputs, and outcomes in them. The introduction also describes two theoretical frameworks (the political economy of education and pluralism/multiculturalism) for policy and institutional analysis. Finally, the editor shares her reading of how each chapter illustrates the impacts of the interactions and intersections among historical contexts (colonial, neocolonial, and postcolonial), cultural issues (philosophies, ideologies, beliefs, values, and traditions), and structure matters (economic system, power, policies and laws, organization and operations) on the development, implementation, and reform of educational policies and institutional changes in the five selected nations.