New York, September 24, 2026. The Forum for World Education (FWE) convened Education as Diplomacy: Universities in the Age of Authoritarianism at The Penn Club of New York. FWE President Dr. Cheng Davis delivered opening remarks. Professor William C. Kirby of Harvard University and Professor Bin Yang, Vice Chancellor of the University Council at Tsinghua University, served as keynote speakers. Jing Qian, Vice President of Asia Society and Co-Founder and Managing Director of the Center for China Analysis, joined Professor Yang in conversation. Fred Teng, President of the America China Public Affairs Institute, moderated the discussion and Q&A for both morning sessions, and FWE Board Member Tony Gao and Steering Committee Member Randy E. Bennett co-moderated the afternoon roundtable.
Learning from the past
In his keynote address, “Universities in Ages of Authoritarianism: Learning from the Past for the 21st Century,” Professor Kirby, T. M. Chang Professor of China Studies at Harvard University and Spangler Family Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School, drew on his book Empires of Ideas, whose mainland Chinese edition is scheduled for release this fall.
He traced the modern research university to the University of Berlin, founded in 1810 on the principle that a university should create knowledge, not merely transmit it, uniting teaching and research under the freedom to teach and the freedom to learn. That model shaped research universities worldwide. Yet Berlin’s century of preeminence also showed that institutional excellence is never permanent: when academic autonomy is lost, even the world’s leading universities can decline.
Professor Kirby then turned to the long history of educational exchange between China and the United States, from the first Chinese students at Yale and Harvard’s first Chinese language instructor in 1879, to Yenching University and the founding of Tsinghua as a preparatory school for students bound for America. He praised Tsinghua’s growth into one of the world’s great comprehensive universities, including Schwarzman College, which he described as a Rhodes Scholarship for the twenty first century. His central message was clear: isolation is fatal to universities of the highest quality. He encouraged Chinese students to test themselves internationally and called for more international students to study in China.
Tsinghua’s global strategy
In the Conversation and Discussion session, Professor Yang reflected on nearly three decades of partnership between Tsinghua and Harvard Business School. Beginning in 1996, a joint program brought more than 300 Chinese business faculty to HBS to learn case method teaching. From 2000, the two schools launched executive education programs for Chinese business leaders from both state-owned and private enterprises. These partnerships strengthened business education in China and deepened Tsinghua’s ties with industry.
He outlined Tsinghua’s Global Strategy, first launched in 2016 and now guided by its 2030 vision, which expands international students, faculty, and overseas presence, including the Global Innovation Exchange in Seattle. The strategy focuses on four shared global challenges: public health, AI governance, online teaching and learning, and climate change and sustainability, areas that no single country can address alone.
Echoing the forum’s theme, Professor Yang stressed that how we educate future leaders shapes who they become. He urged students to step outside their comfort zones, engage with people who hold different views, and treat learning as a lifelong pursuit, and described his own commitment to “keeping the water warm” in international academic partnerships.
Roundtable discussion
In the afternoon, Tony Gao and Randy E. Bennett co-moderated a roundtable on Education as Diplomacy: Sustaining Academic and People-to-People Exchange Across Borders. Participants shared examples of exchange that continue to grow, from Schwarzman College, where American and Chinese students study together as peers, to a partnership between Boston Public Schools and Beijing’s Jingshan School spanning four decades, as well as newly approved joint degree programs, faculty collaborations, and student delegations visiting China. Several speakers stressed that campuses remain the most important ground for people-to-people ties.
Participants also discussed the challenges ahead, including declining international enrollment at many U.S. institutions, the need for longer term study abroad rather than only short visits, and the value of reliable, firsthand information for students on both sides. Fred Teng pointed to the importance of rebuilding public confidence in higher education and preparing graduates with the skills employers need. A student participant proposed a platform for young people to share their experiences of learning about China and the United States, while others highlighted sports diplomacy and the simple power of continuing to show up and stay in conversation.
The forum reaffirmed FWE’s commitment to advancing international cooperation through education.