The Impact of Interrupted Education on Subsequent Educational Attainment: A Cost of the Chinese Cultural Revolution

Abstract

One of the largest interruptions to the usual educational process occurred during the Chinese Cultural Revolution, when most schools in urban China ceased regular operation for 6 years. Universities stopped normal student recruitment for an even longer period of time. The 11 years of the Cultural Revolution, 1966-77, affected the formal education of a whole generation of young people. This article examines the extent to which individuals were able to overcome this interruption and proceed to acquire a university degree. It also explores the points at which interruption matters most in the educational process and examines the characteristics of those individuals who were most successful in overcoming the educational upheaval. The article is structured as follows: Section II provides the background. Section III presents the model specifications and describes the data. Section IV analyzes the empirical results. Conclusions are given in Section V.