1．A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF VOCATIONAL AND TECHNICAL EDUCATION

The industrial countries have maturer experiences in vocational and technical education (VTE), because of a long history of over 100 years of its development. It is quite a necessity for us to learn from them when we establish our own system of VTE. However, each country has its own system because of its own national circumstances, so we should not copy their experiences but make them fit our circumstances. The book analyzes in special topics the elements of some countries' systems of VTE. There are 8 chapters, mainly discussing separately in each chapter the development of VTE, its system, administration, curriculum, teacher training, evaluation, vocational guidance and cooperative education. Some laws and regulations concerning VTE of Germany, the United States, the Pre-Soviet Union, and Japan are listed as appendices in the end of the book.

2. AN INTRODUCTION TO COMPARATIVE EDUCATION——EDUCATION AND NATIONAL DEVELOPMENT

Education can promote national development and hinder it ads well. The mission of comparative education is closely bound up with educational development, further with national development. In the 19th century, the great progress and modernization of modern capitalist national states of Europe and America led to the establishment of their national education systems, to which many comparative educators made a contribution. The great reform and advance of education followed the economic prosperity of developed countries and the tide of modernization in developing countries in 1950's and 1960's. The relationship between education and national development has been out of the main themes of comparative education research. Geared to the 21st century, the large, interdependent world family makes internationalization as an important object of educational reform. Education internationalization will be an essential task in comparative education research.

The book has three sections. The first section expounds the development and methodologies of comparative education, discusses the status and trend of comparative education research by analyzing its academic community, institutions, objects, methods and achievements, in order to understand the nature of comparative education. The second section approaches the relationship between education and national development, introduces the theories of modernization, human capital, dependency and world system which are closely connected with comparative education research, and explores the significant role of education played in national development and the modernization of education itself. The third section analyzes the issues and developing trend of education in the contemporary world from perspectives of personnel, finance, structure and information in the education system. Finally, it discusses the internationalization of comparative education and education.

3. COMPARATIVE ADULT EDUCATION

This book mainly introduces the features of adult education and motive power of its development, the development course , functions and structure, learning psychology of the adult, legislation on adult education, education management, fostering of education personnel, and the use of modern educational techniques in adult education. It the first book on comparative study that combine the current theories and practices of adult education.

4. COMPARATIVE EDUCATION

This book is organized by Education Ministry in April,1979. It consists of 10 chapters: introduction; educational system; comparative pre-school education; comparative elementary education; comparative general secondary education; comparative technical secondary education; comparative higher education; comparative teacher education; comparative educational administration; review and prospect.

5. COMPARATIVE EDUCATION

This book is divided into four parts, edited in a comprehensive system. The first part is the significance, method and development of comparative education; The second illustrates a survey of 8 countries; The basic experience of education development and reform is discussed in the third part; The fourth gives us a prospect of the future.

6. COMPULSORY EDUCATION IN ASIAN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES

(comparative education series）

With the goal of Education for All proposed in the Jomtien Conference, 1990, compulsory education becomes a top priority area in nearly every developing country. In the course of universalizing compulsory education, developing countries share many problems and experiences. This study, Compulsory Education in Asian Developing Countries-the final report of a key educational research project of Eighth Five-year Plan (1990-1995) for Educational Sciences of China, chooses five countries as comparative cases, namely, India, Thailand, Malaysia, Pakistan and China. It mainly consists of two parts. The first part, with one chapter for each country, provides a comprehensive description and analysis of the five selected countries' compulsory educational systems. Each chapter first gives a brief account of the country's historical background for the development of compulsory education, then discusses several important aspects of compulsory education, such as legislature and regulations, guiding principles, administration systems, financing, teacher supply, instruction and curriculum. In the description and analysis, both achievements and problems associated with compulsory education are stressed. The chapter on China is based on a UNICEF-supported case study of China's nine-year compulsory education. The second part analyzes the issues presented in the first chapter from a comparative perspective, with a view of finding the common and different features, problems and experiences of compulsory education in the five countries, and the ways that can help achieve the universalization and improve the quality of compulsory education.

7. COMPARATIVE HIGHER EDUCATION

This book chooses USSR, USA, France, Japan and Germany as the objectives, and generally reflects the basic experience of higher education in the world. It includes eight chapters: The development of higher education; The structure of higher education; Enrollment system; The teaching of undergraduate; Scientific research; Graduate education; Faculty; Management of higher education

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8．COMPARATIVE INSTRUCTION

The main purpose of this book is to look at Instruction cross-culturally, using Dialectical Materialism and Historical Materialism, and modern systemics as a means of Instruction research, and to present some new insight. The whole book is divided into 10 chapters: the object and the methodology of Comparative Instruction; the historical development in foreign countries and in China; the task, process and principles of teaching; curriculum theory and practice world-widely; various teaching methods, the forms of teaching organization; teaching evaluations; the trend of modern instruction research in world-wide context; the perspectives in the field of Comparative Instruction

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9．COMPARATIVE STUDY ON EDUCATIONAL LEGISLATION OF VARIOUS COUNTRIES

A group of experts on comparative educational research were organized by the department of Policy and Regulation of State Education Commission to produce a series of research reports on educational laws of foreign countries, such as US, UK, France, Japan, Russia, India, South Korea, Thailand. This book, a collection of these reports, tells us a lot about the advantages and disadvantages of educational legislations of the countries, especially those successful and unsuccessful ideas and practice in the field.

10. COMPARATIVE TEACHERS EDUCATION

This book is compiled for liberal arts teaching material, organized by State Education Commission. It consists of two parts, one is the study of teacher education on such countries as US, UK, France, Germany, Japan, Soviet Union and China; The other is monographic study on the teacher education system, pre-service fostering of teachers, in-service training, teacher’s status and treatment.

11.11 IDEAL AND CHOICE: INTERNATIONAL COMPARATIVE STUDY ON STUDENT FINANCIAL SUPPORT POLICIES

Besides the introduction, the book is composed of four subthemes: A historical observation to the main conceptions; The direct support approaches and operational techniques; Three basic policy models in the world after World War Two, i.e. fee free plus grant, student loans and combination models. The case of the PRC forms the last subtheme of the book.

12. INQUIRY INTO CONTEMPORARY METHODOLOGY OF COMPARATIVE EDUCATION——COMPARATIVE EDUCATION AS FORUMS OF INTERNATIONAL COMMUNICATION OF EDUCATION

There are fourteen chapters in the book, which are grouped into four parts. In the first part (Chapter 1 to 3), in order to break out of the circularity of methodological debate, the book gives a detailed examination of the five constituents of comparative education, i.e., subject, object, purpose, method and medium, and their relations. The author analyzes subject-object relationships in the light of different epistemological traditions, taking account of the impact of new information technology, the development of modern physics and non-linear system theories.

In the second part (Chapter 4 and 5), the book deals with models and reference systems in comparative education. The author borrows some models from mass communication (or science of communication), and applies them to the description and analysis of different kinds of comparative education activities, in the hope of exploring their implicit assumptions, heuristic potentials and intrinsic problems. In the wake of the semeiological school of communication studies, the author establishes the Cultural Patterns Model as the basis of classifying comparative education activities, positions or paradigms. In terms of the different reference systems as people perceive cultural otherness, four perception patterns are identified. They are ethnocentrism, scientism, relativism and internationalism. The book gives a detailed analysis of the characteristics of the four patterns, including their basic assumptions, theoretical potentials, and roles in the forums of international communication of education. The author advocates the "internationalistic pattern", which can unify or synthesize the other three patterns.

The third part of the book is critical review of methodologies of contemporary comparative educationists (from Chapter 6 to 13). According to some criteria, fourteen scholars are chosen to review. They are George Bereday, Arnold Anderson, Harold Noah, Max Eckstein, Brian Holmes, Edmund King, Martin Carnoy, Robert Arnove, Le Thanh khoi,Jugen Schriewer, and four Chinese scholars, i.e., Teng Dachun, Wang Chengxu, Zhu Bo, and Gu Mingyuan. Under the guidance of the analytical framework developed in the previous parts, the author scrutinizes their methodologies, points out their strengths and weaknesses, theoretical potentials, usefulness, and potential or intrinsic problems, and appreciates them in terms of their importance in the forums of international communication of education.

In the final part of this book, the author tries to systemize the viewpoints presented in the previous chapters. The book legitimates divergent comparative activities and the four perception patterns by outlining their roles in the theory building and theory testing forum, educational ideas and educational values communication forum, and educational decision and educational practice forum. Finally, an analytical framework for the reconstruction of the history of comparative education is presented in terms of the formation, institutionalization and internationalization of the forums of international communication of education.

13. NATIONAL CULTURAL TRADITION AND ITS EDUCATIONAL MODERNIZATION

The book is one of the achievements of the research project "national cultural tradition and its educational modernization", which is a key question for study in the "eighth-five year plan" of national philosophy and social sciences.

In the process of comparative study of national educational systems, it has been found that those nations who have the same political and economic system are different in their educational thoughts and systems; in reverse, those who are different in their political systems have similar educational thoughts and systems. Why so? The reason, according to the book, is that the culture has its conditioning role to education. If cultural settings are different, those nations will have different educational thoughts and systems, even though they have same political systems; in reverse, if those nations belong to the same cultural circle, they will be quite similar in their educational thoughts and systems, even though their political systems are different. Therefore, it is difficult to understand the essence of its educational thoughts and system if we do not study a nation's cultural backgrounds. In its process of educational modernization, each nation takes a different way because of its unique cultural background, and this affects the course of its development. So study of the relation between national cultural tradition and its educational modernization can make clear the essential characteristics of a nation's educational modernization and this can help accelerate educational modernization of China, especially its modernization of educational thoughts.

The book has 11 chapters. Chapter One is an introduction of the book, it mainly discusses national cultural tradition and its characteristics of evolving; the forming of educational tradition and its features; characteristics of modern education and the relation between national cultural tradition and educational modernization. The following chapters (from Chapter Two to Chapter Seven) discuss separately the relationship between cultural tradition and educational modernization of 6 nations-China, Japan, America, England, German and Russia. Chapter Eight to Eleven are comparative studies of educational values, views of persons with ability, views on relationship between teachers and students and views of knowledge from the points of view of national cultural tradition.

The conclusions are as follows:

Educational development and reform are closely related to cultural tradition.

(2) Education is influenced by cultural tradition, but in reverse, it is a main way to inherit, choose, transfer and create culture.

(3) National cultural tradition sometimes has conflicting and opposing effects on a nation's modernization.

(4) Transformation of education from tradition to modernity is a hard process. Educational tradition is affected by age, national politics, economy and culture. It is forming and developing in the process of transforming.

(5) The transformation of educational thoughts is the key point of transformation of education from tradition to modernity.

(6) The most scientific approach to study educational theory is the historical and dialectical materialism of Marxism.

14. SHORT HISTORY OF COMPARATIVE STUDIES OF CHINESE AND FOREIGN EDUCATION

"Short History of Comparative Studies of Chinese and Foreign Education" is a pioneer study of educational research. It requires a comparative study of history of Chinese and foreign education in a grand cultural context of world history. It is a unprecedented educational research with broad content concerning comparative education, history of Chinese and foreign education and history of exchange of culture and technology.

The guiding principle of the book is "to take a broad view of the world, but to base ourselves upon China". That is, to serve the modernization of socialist education with Chinese character, we must study comparatively the rules and historical experiences of world educational development concerning Chinese circumstances and demands.

The framework of the book is to write out a short history of comparative study of Chinese and foreign education in the order of ages. The content is mainly a comparative study of educational systems and thoughts, and also of their characteristics and historical reasons of forming. The model is generalized as "taking history as warp and taking problems as weft". The methodology of the emphasizes comparability and comparable value, and takes them as standards of choosing problems. It requires combining longitudinal (different ages) and horizontal (the same age) studies in the research and using them flexibly. However, horizontal compares are generally thought as more comparable and valuable because there are more common factors in them and we can find more specific consulting points. Therefore, the methodology is generalized as "comparing longitudinally and horizontally, but giving priority to horizontal compare".