America may have legitimate competitive reasons to worry about the number of computer science and engineering graduates from elite Chinese and Indian universities – the figure dwarfs that of U.S. students with similar degrees.

But a new book by Stanford researchers and others says that the concern that these countries will develop their own centers of high-tech production and innovation and draw research, development and scholarship away from American shores is still premature.

The research, a multidisciplinary look at the growth of higher education in the world's four largest developing economies – Brazil, Russia, India and China (known collectively as the BRICs) – analyzes the quality of institutions, the quantity of people getting degrees and equal access to education.

The book, University Expansion in a Changing Global Economy: Triumph of the BRICS?, is published by Stanford University Press.

"In the past 20 years, university systems in these big countries have just exploded," said Martin Carnoy, a Stanford professor of education and one of the authors. Carnoy is also an affilate of the Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies.

"So the questions are why did it happen and what are the implications? And specifically, what are the implications for the U.S. if the market is flooded with new scientists and engineers? Are we going to be overwhelmed? What happens to their societies if all the energy is focused on elite institutions," Carnoy said.

The researchers approached their questions with the belief that societies, and governments, can be judged by the way they invest in and organize their public higher education systems.

For example, how well these countries create a labor force that is competitive in the information age depends on the quality of higher education. Whether people have equal chances to succeed relies on having colleges that are accessible to even the poorest students. And how effectively a country expands its university system may determine how successful it is at growing a robust economy and competing with the United States and Europe, the scholars argue.

"If you have economic growth and provide educational opportunities, you're perceived as a legitimate, successful government," Carnoy said. "So our theory was, if you can pull this off, if you can successfully expand your university systems, you are likely a pretty efficient government."

BRIC undergraduate education increased from about 19 million students in 2000 to more than 40 million students in 2010. The largest increase was in China, which went from less than 3 million to almost 12 million bachelor's degree students during that period, the study says.

Financing elite schools

The study found that BRIC countries are pouring money into their elite colleges in an effort to create world-class institutions and have their graduates compete with the United States and Europe.

Researchers say the elite colleges are much better for the focused investment, and the engineers and computer scientists are graduating with similar competency and training as those from developed countries.

But the mass institutions are receiving fewer resources, the study says, and that's where most of the students go. In 2009, 2.1 million of the 2.5 million total bachelor's graduates in China matriculated from mass institutions, not elite ones. In India, it was 2.2 million of 2.3 million.

This widening funding gap between top schools and mass institutions has broad implications, the scholars argue. The gap has the potential to slow economic growth domestically, deepen income inequality and create less social mobility.

Students who go to the mass institutions aren't getting high quality, competitive educational experiences, the study says, and many of the students also get stuck with big bills as funding assistance is directed toward the elite universities.

"What happens, then, is they are doing a good job of educating students at the elite levels, but they are not doing a good job of educating students at the non-elite levels who are also fundamental for the economy," said Prashant Loyalka, a research fellow at FSI and one of the study's authors.

In absolute terms, the sheer numbers of students graduating from elite institutions in computer science and engineering majors in these countries is also high. In China, for example, the total number of computer science and engineering graduates from elite universities is more than the total number of such graduates from the United States.

But sustaining and building innovation hubs requires more than the elite, the researchers said. The engine of these new economies is the rest of the population – those that attend mass institutions.

"In the United States, we have relied on competent second-tier engineers. They are the guts of our system. We need good students in all fields in these second-tier universities because the top-tier universities just don't produce that many graduates. They simply don't," Carnoy said.

He warned that this redistribution of funds away from second-tier institutions is a concern in the United States as well. "To an extent the BRICs have to do it, because they don't have enough resources to go around. But do we have to do it? The answer is probably no. It certainly should be no," Carnoy said.

The research is one of the first empirical and comparative looks at the higher education systems across these countries, and relied on in-country interviews, surveys, data analysis and classroom observation.

Report card

Overall, the researchers found that significant challenges remain as these countries march toward creating universities that can rank alongside those in the United States and Europe.

China, the scholars said, is doing pretty well, but Russia and Brazil are question marks.

"Russia has provided the vast majority of its people with a high level of education, but it has lagged in terms of putting money into research," Loyalka said. "Brazil has a high-level of graduate education and research at its top-tier public institutions, and these institutions are receiving a lot of support. However, the vast majority of students attend private institutions, which are, on average, of dubious quality."

India, Loyalka noted, was surprising. Despite its very good technical universities, he said, "you have a small proportion of Indians going to those, and the mass institutions are of really poor quality."

"The higher education system in India does not appear to be well organized," Loyalka said.

Among other recommendations, the researchers said India should increase its graduate education and, along with Russia, increase spending on research.

The project began in 2007 as an interdisciplinary venture supported by FSI, and incorporated scholars in economics and international comparative education at Stanford Graduate School of Education, FSI and universities in Moscow and Beijing.

Several articles focusing on different aspects of the review also have been published over the past year. The most recent, which appears in the July/August issue of the journal Change, highlights the research on quality and quantity of graduates in engineering and computer science from the four countries.

Besides Carnoy and Loyalka, the scholars involved in the project include Maria Dobryakova, a research associate and the director for portals at the Center for Monitoring Quality Education at the Higher School of Economics in Moscow; Rafiq Dossani, a senior economist at RAND Corp. and former senior research scholar at Stanford's Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center at the Freeman Spogli Institute; Isak Froumin, a mathematician and director of the Institute for Educational Studies at the National Research University Higher School of Economics in Moscow; Katherine Kuhns, who received her PhD in the International and Comparative Education Program at Stanford Graduate School of Education; Jandhyala B. G. Tilak, a professor at the National University of Educational Planning and Administration in New Delhi, India; and Rong Wang, director and professor of the China Institute for Educational Finance Research at Peking University.

Brooke Donald is the social sciences writer at the Stanford News Service.

The counterinsurgency plan in Afghanistan hinged on the assumption that the U.S. military could protect the population, that foreign aid could make the Afghan government more accountable, and that the Karzai administration shared U.S. goals. In an article published by Foreign Affairs, Karl Eikenberry – the William J. Perry Fellow in International Security at CISAC – explains why all three assumptions were "spectacularly incorrect."

CISAC's Sig Hecker talks to one of India's most respected newspapers, The Hindu, about why he admires India's nuclear energy program. India's world-class nuclear researchers can still learn many lessons from the Fukushima nuclear crisis, particularly in fostering a culture of safety. The world's largest democracy must demonstrate to its citizens that nuclear power is safe and sustainable in order to pursue its ambitious energy program.

In May, the general elections in Pakistan returned two-time former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and his party - the Pakistan Muslim League - to office. Sharif faced off against Imran Khan, a former Cricket star turned politician whose promises of reform resonated amongst younger voters.

Despite a heightened state of election-related violence and insecurity, voter turnout stood at an historic high of 55 percent.

While Pakistan’s elections and smooth democratic transition have been deemed a success, reports by some observers cited irregularities, vote rigging and intimidation.

Kamal Siddiqi, a 2012 Draper Hills Summer Fellow alumni, covered the elections as editor of The Express Tribune, a national English language daily newspaper published from Peshawar, Karachi, Lahore and Islamabad.

In the interview that follows, Siddiqi comments on this historic election and what it means for Pakistan's democratic future.

Were you surprised by the outcome of the Pakistani elections?

No, I was not surprised with the fact that Nawaz Sharif's party won a thumping majority. This had been predicted by most of us given that the three other major parties - the Pakistan People's Party, the Awami National Party and the Muttahida Qaumi Movement - were not campaigning because of terrorist attacks on their rallies.

I was surprised, however, at the fact that Imran Khan's party - Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) - did so well in Karachi and in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, the northwestern province of Pakistan.

Why do you think Nawaz Sharif was re-elected to a third term as prime minister as opposed to Imran Khan or Ameen Faheem? 

There was a genuine desire for change, especially in Pakistan's most populous province - Punjab. People were fed up with power outages, rising crime and stories of government corruption. Since Punjab is Sharif's home province and it has 50 percent of the seats of parliament, that change was inevitable.

Imran Khan seemed to be a darling of the international media, was it the same for the Pakistani media?

Image

Kamal Siddiqi during the 2012 Draper Hills Summer Fellows Program at Stanford University. Photo Credit: Rod Searcey

He may have been a darling for the Western media but for the local media Imran Khan and his supporters were a headache. They are new to the electoral process and yet they are the least tolerant. In our experience, Imran Khan gave a statement - which we published - and the next thing we knew, we were being accused of yellow journalism. They have a lot to learn.

What was it like to cover the election for The Express Tribune?

This time around, the elections were very violent and I told my reporters - especially those in Peshawar - not to take any risks. At the same time we enjoyed reporting on the election, especially by using social media. We got a lot of feedback and stories from public sources who sent us clips from their phones and tweeted about their experiences. A lot of the information was instant and in areas where there were problems, like the late opening of polling stations, we were inundated with people calling and texting. It was clearly much more transparent than previous polls.

What contributed to the high voter turnout?

One of the achievements of Imran Khan's party was that it motivated the youth. Also, this was the second general election without any interruption. This also helped people to get involved in the process.

What issues were most important for the average Pakistani voter when they went to the polls?

The law and order situation and crime were issues that many leaders talked about as was good governance and the fight against corruption. Power outages and the state of the economy also featured in the debates. Finally, the drone strikes by the U.S. helped some parties garner votes especially in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.

How do you think the violence surrounding the elections has affected Pakistan's political climate, if at all?

The violence gave an edge to the right of center parties like Nawaz Sharif's Pakistan Muslim League party and Imran Khan's Tehreek-e-Insafparty whose rallies were not attacked. The three main left of center parties - the ruling Pakistan People's Party and its coalition allies - were affected by the consistent attacks and bomb blasts at their rallies and their election offices. This became one factor in their poor showing at the polls.

How does this election impact the future of democracy in Pakistan, if at all?

The manner in which an independent election commission conducted the elections, how the polls were held, how power was transferred and how all parties accepted the results have been very encouraging. People by and large have accepted democracy as the best way to move ahead and by turning up in large numbers they rejected the call by extremists like the Taliban to reject this form of government.

On August 16 the Karachi office of Siddiqi's "The Express Tribune" was attacked by gunmen who fired shots injuring two staff members. You can read more here to learn about the incident and how the media are often trapped in the line of fire.  

Ten years after President Bush attempted to reduce U.S. involvement in statebuilding, America and its allies are more heavily involved in it than ever before.  There simply are no viable alternatives to stabilizing fragile states. And yet the tremendous sacrifices we make to rebuild states too often produce regimes where corruption and other abuses of power prevail. In turn these undermine the legitimacy of the regimes and render stability ever more elusive.

The international community may share responsibility for creating this accountability gap. In Afghanistan, the rush to build up the power of the government and to respect its sovereignty have weakened constraints that would subject that power to the will of the Afghan people.

Amid struggles over flawed elections and corruption these past two years, practitioners on the ground have experimented with new approaches to close the accountability gap in Afghanistan. NATO military approaches to governance-led operations have been matched by parallel civilian efforts to work from the bottom-up in engaging Afghan communities and helping them seek solutions through the nascent institutions of the Afghan government. 

These efforts face an uphill challenge, but represent the best hope for closing an accountability gap that threatens all statebuilding efforts. This symposium at Stanford University will bring together practitioners and experts to share experiences and explore options to improve the contemporary practice of statebuilding.

One often forgets the battlefields that CISAC military fellows leave behind.

They come to Stanford to spend an academic year doing research and mentoring students. They throw off their uniforms and put on their jeans to engage with scholars across the campus. One rarely gets a bird’s-eye view of what life is like for them out in the field, much less in actual combat with a hostile, thinking enemy.

But one Afghanistan War documentary gives viewers a rare look at what one CISAC military fellow, U.S.  Army Col. J.B. Vowell, does in his real job: fight Taliban and al-Qaida insurgents while trying to keep his soldiers alive.

A rough cut of the “"The Hornet's Nest"” was recently screened on campus for Stanford faculty and staff, war veterans and military fellows from CISAC and the Hoover Institution. Former Secretary of Defense William J. Perry, a CISAC faculty member, introduced the film and called the battle footage “remarkable.”

“The Hornet’s Nest” is about the soldiers – the survivors, their commanders, and those who lost their lives – in Operation Strong Eagle III, a battalion air assault in 2011 to seize insurgent-controlled strongholds along the Pakistan border. Their mission was to open up opportunities for local governance to reach Afghans under Taliban control.

The film is also about a father-and-son broadcast team who would document the assault, as well as the respect and shared risk between the soldiers and the embedded journalists.

Vowell is seen preparing his troops for what would become one of the deadliest confrontations with the Taliban in Afghanistan’s Kunar Province. The region is dubbed the “heart of darkness” as it’s considered the world’s most dangerous terrain for U.S. forces. Its steep mountainsides are dotted with caves used by insurgents for easy ambush.

“They don’t know what’s about to hit them,” Vowell says of the Taliban as he preps his No Slack Battalion of the 101^st Airborne. “That will teach them to shoot at my soldiers.”

It is March 29, 2011, and Vowell is conducting the final rehearsal for Operation Strong Eagle III. The mission is to clear the area of insurgents and lay the groundwork for an incoming platoon that would attempt to assassinate Taliban leader Qari Zia Rahman.

“This is his home. This is his sanctuary,” Vowell tells his men. “No one has ever dared to go in there. You think this is going to cause a ruckus? I think so.”

What follows is the largest battle the battalion has seen since Vietnam. Over nine days, Vowell’s battalion tried to fight their way into these villages – and viewers are taken along for a harrowing, 90-minute ride. The men are pinned down on rugged mountaintops and in abandoned mud-and-brick compounds, exhausted but inching forward to rescue their fallen and keep on fighting.

The footage was taken with hand-held cameras by veteran broadcast correspondent Mike Boettcher and his rookie son, Carlos. Viewers witness the first father-son team embedded with the U.S. military rekindle a relationship that had become strained.

“I was just a face in a box,” Boettcher says, referring to his more than three decades of combat work overseas, typically missing his son’s milestones as he grew up. “In the bottom of my heart I knew that Carlos was adrift and I felt that I had let Carlos down.”

When Carlos asks his father if he can join him in Afghanistan, Boettcher figures he can teach him how to work a camera under fire. You see Carlos go from a baby-faced young man to an earnest reporter practicing his on-air dispatches during his yearlong embed. He trudges up one hill as bullets whiz by and then you hear him go down and see the camera go still.

“The one thing I could not let happen was to let my son die,” Boettcher says. “I thought I had lost my son; that I had lost my chance to be a father.”

But, he adds: “We had landed in the hornet’s nest; this was command and control for the Taliban right there in that valley. And they were going to make us pay.”

Carlos survives, eventually goes back to ABC News headquarters in New York and becomes a producer for the broadcast network. The two would winner an Emmy for their coverage.

Viewers also get to know the soldiers of Strong Eagle III, making it particularly hard when you learn six of them have been killed. You see one soldier with a beautiful smile joking with his buddies before he is killed; the soldier who had tried to save him laments he should have run faster down the hill toward the fallen man.

The film ends with sorrowful coverage of the memorial devoted to the six that was conducted in Afghanistan days after the battle.  Soldiers kiss the helmets of the fallen; officers kneel, bow their heads and cry.

CISAC military fellow and U.S. Army Col. J.B. Vowell in Kunar Province, Afghanistan, 2011. Photo Credit: Justin Roberts

“Everything has a cost in combat and it’s hard to know that the orders you gave cost some men their lives,” Vowell says when asked by an audience member at the Stanford screening how he deals with the death of his own men.

Regardless of one’s political beliefs about the second-longest war in American history, after Vietnam, the footage reminds viewers that this largely forgotten war has been fought – and covered – with tremendous bravery.

Nearly 3,000 American and allied troops have been killed in the war, launched to avenge the deaths of nearly 3,000 civilians in the 9/11 terrorist attacks. As many as 17,500 Afghan civilians have lost their lives; two dozen journalists have been killed covering the conflict.

“We felt like we needed to leave behind some kind of historical document … and great commanders like JB embraced having the cameras there,” Boettcher says, sitting on Stanford’s Cemex Auditorium stage with Vowell and co-director David Salzberg. “They wanted the stories of their men and women told. Americans must know that there is a cost to be paid; it’s being paid every day.”

An audience member asks Vowell if his men resented having to protect the journalists.

He says his troops took no more precautions to protect the father-son team than they did one another. It took time for the soldiers to embrace the Boettchers, but once they realized they had not just parachuted in for one or two stories, they became part of the battalion.

“Folks like me in uniform just have a visceral reaction against the media, as it’s usually a bad story when they show up,” he says. “The journalists who are better are the ones who share the risk with soldiers. It’s not a camaraderie thing; it’s a respect thing. And if they’re willing to be in there, not just be there for a day or two, but to really be there – that gains respect of soldiers and they trusted Mike to tell their story.”

Vowell spent the academic year making recommendations for the strategy, mission and force structure in Afghanistan after combat troops are withdrawn next year. His project was submitted to the U. S. Army War College and Perry served as his faculty adviser.

CISAC’s other military fellows this academic year were U.S. Air Force Lt. Col. Mark Pye and U.S. Army Col. Daniel S. Hurlbut.

“It has been a tremendous opportunity for me to spend a year with CISAC and focus on strategic and policy issues relevant to U.S. national security”, says Vowell.  “I had the opportunity to tell the Army’s story of the last 12 years in Afghanistan as well as research the best policy recommendation for our way ahead in the region. Only CISAC could afford me that opportunity to combine my experiences with the best cross-disciplined faculty in the nation to further my research. I know I will be better able to serve my command in the future with the 101^st Airborne Division as a result.”

Vowell assumes command of the 3^rd Brigade Combat Team, 101^st Airborne Division on Aug. 1 and is likely to do another tour in Afghanistan next year.

Co-director Salzberg spends much of his time traveling the country organizing private screenings for Gold Star families – those who have lost service members on the battlefield – and preparing the documentary for a nationwide release on Veteran’s Day.

“I’ve been in this business for a long time and have worked on a lot of different films,” says Salzberg, a veteran documentary and feature film director and producer of such films as “The Perfect Game” and “La Source.”

“Sometimes you have an opportunity to do something that is more important than a film,” Salzberg said. “If you talk to these young men and women who serve, they really just want the public to know what they’re going through. They don’t want a parade or a medal. We wanted to show that – and we are honored that these guys let us into their lives.”