[url]http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704196404575375012885040110.html?mod=googlenews_wsj[url]
Perils of Degree-Worship in China
By LI YUAN

In many cultures, where people go to college and what degrees they hold is a serious matter affecting job prospects and social standing. But in China, academic credentials have long been one of the most important factors in determining the fate of many people.

For more than 1,000 years, the Chinese bureaucracy was mostly made up of people who succeeded in imperial examinations.

In recent times, colleges, especially the top ones, remain the breeding ground for the ruling class. Three of the nine-member Politburo of the Communist Party's Standing Committee, China's ruling body, graduated from Tsinghua University, and one from Peking University.

This is the context for recent public debate over unproven allegations a former president of Microsoft China and best-selling author distorted his academic credentials.

Since early July, Jun Tang has been mired in the so-called "diploma gate" scandal after Fang Shimin, a science writer known for his criticism of academic fraud, accused Mr. Tang of having falsely claimed to have earned a doctorate from the California Institute of Technology.

Mr. Fang said he had tried to check the claim, which, he said, was made in one edition of Mr. Tang's popular book "My Success Can Be Copied," by calling the university, but he couldn't find records of Mr. Tang having graduated.

View Full Image

Corbis
College degrees, especially ones from prestigious institutions, can open doors to better careers.

Read More

Chinese Debate Allegations of Fraudulent Credentials
Mr. Tang has denied making the claim about Caltech, telling Chinese media that he graduated from another university. "I only said I had done some research [at Caltech,]" he told the state-run China Daily newspaper on July 6. "Instead, I got my doctor's degree at the California-based Pacific Western University," the paper quoted him as saying. A representative for Caltech told The Wall Street Journal last Thursday that Mr. Tang didn't graduate from the school.

A July 8 statement by the book's publishers, Citic Publishing House and Blue Lion Financial Planning Center, said Mr. Tang's co-author was responsible for the error and that Mr. Tang personally requested that the reference to the school be removed. The correction was made, but not until after the first edition was published in December 2008 because of "a lag in communication during the proofreading process," according to Mr. Tang's publishers. The co-author couldn't be reached for comment.

On July 6, Mr. Tang wrote to his roughly 700,000 followers on his sina.com microblog: "First, from now on I'm going to add Ph.D. to my name on my business card; second, laws will make those who fabricate facts and make false charges against other people pay a price; third, I'm still me. Nothing has changed.…" He hasn't written anything since, and emails and calls to his company for comments went unanswered.

Meanwhile debate continued in China, in part because Pacific Western University was labeled a "diploma mill" by the U.S. Government Accountability Office in a report published in 2004, which listed the school as an unaccredited institution that awarded degrees for a fee and required no classroom instruction. Pacific Western University later changed its name to California Miramar University. California Miramar's student services office says it is under new management and considers itself a separate entity from Pacific Western.

While the Chinese media seem to be perpetuating Mr. Fang's claim about Mr. Tang despite the fact that the publisher already has explained the error, the issue of fake qualifications clearly touches a nerve here.

Until 15 to 20 years ago most jobs in China were assigned by the state and lasted for life. A diploma was about the only criterion the state could use to decide what kind of job everybody should get. Even today, government agencies and state-owned enterprises still have different pay scales for people with bachelor's, master's and doctoral degrees, and some positions are reserved for those with advance degrees.

"It's a matter of supply and demand," says Zhiwu Chen, professor of finance at Yale University's School of Management.

When a society values certain credentials so much, there will be people who will take risks to meet that demand, he says. "It's unfortunate that some people choose to make the shortcut because the perceived benefits surpass the risks," he says.

For those who aren't well connected, it's quite easy to get fake diplomas on the black market. In 2004, a central government investigation into 670,000 midlevel cadres around the country found problems with the educational qualifications of one in 40, from fake diplomas to falsified degree standing, according to a report by a newspaper owned by Xinhua news agency.

Diplomas from universities in the West have similar, if not higher, value. A decade or two ago, when very few Chinese had opportunities to study abroad, a degree from a Western university could open many doors.

To be sure, fake or unearned education credentials aren't unique to China. The 2004 Government Accountability Office report found that 28 senior-level U.S. federal employees have degrees from diploma mills and other unaccredited schools, and it said the actual number could be higher.

It's also true that degrees from world-renowned universities help open doors in many countries. Eight of 44 U.S. presidents studied at Harvard University. Prior to 2004, Harvard alone was the most common school attended by S&P 500 CEOs, according to a survey by executive recruiter Spencer Stuart. In 2008, there was a tie between Harvard and the University of Wisconsin, the survey says.

—Li Yuan is managing editor of Chinese WSJ.com, the Chinese edition of The Wall Street Journal Online.
Write to Li Yuan at li.yuan@wsj.com