Universities are an interesting, but overlooked, transnational actor. Research on universities can yield new knowledge on the interplay of state and nonstate actors, and their respective powers. Drawing on cases from American universities in the Middle East and China with missionary roots, this article illustrates how Nye and Keohane’s (Reference Nye and Keohane1971) analysis of transnational relations is useful in highlighting how universities can be central transnational actors that are two-way conduits for ideas, information, people, and money between nonstate actors across national borders.
American missionary universities are private American-style universities founded by American missionaries with boards of trustees in the United States and deeply rooted in their Eastern host societies. The American missionary universities in the Middle East and China have served as exemplary transnational actors in terms of both the quality and intensity of the transnational relations they have cultivated. Figure 1 illustrates the complicated ways in which these universities have connected with local students and their families and through their alumni far and wide in society. And these American missionary universities have connected local universities, business interests, civil society actors, and government agents in the Middle East or China with counterparts in the United States facilitating the transfer of ideas, information, people, and money across borders. These transnational relations are the basis of these universities’ soft power. The American missionary universities in the Middle East and China are crucial cases (George and Bennett Reference George and Bennett2005) for transnational relations and soft power (Bertelsen Reference Bertelsen2009a; Reference Bertelsen2009b; Reference Bertelsen2012a; Reference Bertelsen2012b; Reference Bertelsen2014; Bertelsen and Møller Reference Bertelsen and Møller2010).
Figure 1. University as Transnational Actor
(Color online)
On the one hand, these universities have expressed soft power in terms of attracting desired behavior, acceptance, and support from students, their families, the host society, and the state. Their soft power is derived from their stellar academic reputation and their track record of improving the life-chances of graduates. On the other hand, these universities generally failed at their original mission of Protestant proselytizing. Also, they did not create any acceptance of US foreign policy (which was not their goal). Instead, these universities have exerted what is called “reverse” soft power, namely helping to shape elite opinion in American society and in the US government thereby attracting substantial academic, political, and financial resources for themselves and their Eastern host societies through dense elite networks within the United States, again based on academic excellence. But, similarly, these universities failed at advancing Middle Eastern or Chinese interests in the United States.
The American universities in the Middle East with missionary roots are Robert College in Istanbul (1863–1971), Syrian Protestant College (1866–)/American University of Beirut (AUB) (1920–), American University in Cairo (AUC) (1919–) and American Junior College for Women (1924–)/Lebanese American University (1994–). Likewise, American missionaries established more than 20 higher education institutions in China, which played central roles in establishing dense Sino-American social networks. These transnational social ties thrived until the Korean War when the US government banned financial transfers to Mainland China in December 1950 and the People’s Republic of China (PRC) nationalized these American universities. (Lutz Reference Lutz1971; Ng et al. Reference Ng, Leung, Xu and Shi2002; West Reference West1976).
The American missionary universities in the Middle East and China have held significant university soft power concerning the milieu goals of introducing their students to American scientific knowledge; attracting them to norms such as academic freedom, religious tolerance, and gender equality; familiarizing them with American educational traditions; and promoting fluency in English, as well as building elite connections to high-ranking members of American society.
SOFT POWER OF AMERICAN MISSIONARY UNIVERSITIES IN THE MIDDLE EAST AND CHINA
Considerable research exists on foreign civilian and military students coming to the United States for its socialization effects (Altbach and Peterson Reference Altbach, Peterson, Watanabe and McConnell2008; Atkinson Reference Atkinson2010; Richmond Reference Richmond2003; Selltiz et al. 1963; Watson and Lippitt Reference Watson and Lippitt1958; Wilson Reference Wilson1951; Reference Wilson1955; Wilson and Bonilla Reference Wilson and Bonilla1955). However, research on the soft power of American universities overseas is limited. This is despite significant policy attention in the United States toward higher education as a soft-power strategy for socialization and public diplomacy (Center for Strategic and International Studies 2009; Nye Reference Nye2004; Nye and Owens 1996; Rice Reference Rice2006).
Whereas the soft power of the university is independent of the state, it interacts with the American state’s larger soft-power goals. Although not yet sufficiently understood, the nonstate sources of state soft power are receiving increasing attention (Hocking Reference Hocking and Melissen2005; Lord Reference Lord2006; Nye Reference Nye2004; Riordan Reference Riordan and Melissen2005; Zahran and Ramos Reference Zahran, Ramos, Parmar and Cox2010). The existing research on this subject, however, focuses on soft power as state resources such as public diplomacy (Lord Reference Lord2006; Richmond Reference Richmond2003; Rugh Reference Rugh2006) rather than soft power as desired behavior from others.
In other words, while mission universities exert soft power, it is separate from the US state and focuses on cultivating behaviors desired by the universities without coercion or inducement (Nye Reference Nye2004). University-based soft power, in other words, is the ability to attract acceptance and support from students and their families for the mission and work of the university along with local social and governmental financial, moral and political support, and acceptance. Originally created with the soft-power aim of Protestant proselytizing among local populations and training local elites, local students and their families overwhelmingly rejected proselytizing and, instead, were attracted by the educational quality and the improved life chances offered by the American missionary universities. Thus, the attraction has been limited by the proselytizing agenda of the missionary universities and American China and Middle East policy. Chinese students were strongly nationalist. Student activists at AUB around 1970 expressed this clearly: they sought a quality education but denounced American foreign policy in the region (Anderson Reference Anderson2011; Hanna Reference Hanna1979; Lutz Reference Lutz1971; Munro Reference Munro1977; West Reference West1976).
Host states, from China and the Ottoman Empire to modern Lebanon and Egypt, have cautiously welcomed American missionary universities for their ability to bridge elite communities with the United States and for their contributions to education, health care, social development, and state-building. But, the American missionary universities in China did not survive the Korean War when neither the US nor PRC governments would tolerate these bicultural institutions. The US government banned financial transfers to Mainland China and thereby cut the American missionary universities off from their New York boards and funders; consequently, the PRC nationalized the institutions. After the 1956 Suez crisis Egypt seriously considered nationalizing AUC as part of nationalization of foreign education (Anderson Reference Anderson2011; Bashshur Reference Bashshur1964; Bliss, Coon, and Bliss 1989; Dodge Reference Dodge1958; Lutz Reference Lutz1971; Makdisi Reference Makdisi1997; Reference Makdisi2008, Munro Reference Munro1977; Murphy Reference Murphy1987; Ng et al. Reference Ng, Leung, Xu and Shi2002; Penrose Reference Penrose1970; West Reference West1976).
Arnold Wolfers’ (Reference Wolfers1962) distinction between milieu goals and possession goals is useful for understanding the soft power of overseas universities and their interplay with the soft power of states (Nye Reference Nye2004). The American missionary universities in the Middle East and China have held significant university soft power concerning the milieu goals of introducing their students to American scientific knowledge; attracting them to norms such as academic freedom, religious tolerance, and gender equality; familiarizing them with American educational traditions; and promoting fluency in English, as well as building elite connections to high-ranking members of American society. However, it is equally clear that these universities had no success achieving possession goals, namely the original goal of religious conversion, or any acceptance of American China or Middle East policy (not their aim). Then AUB’s president John Waterbury explained this clearly stating that AUB students ‘‘continue to resent US policies and criticize US leadership, but they want to import its institutional successes in governance, legal arrangements, and business organization” (Waterbury Reference Waterbury2003, 67). In short, the soft power of American missionary universities contributes to state soft power, but only in terms of the milieu goals of creating an enabling environment of norms, skills, and connections, and not concerning specific possession goals of accepting the foreign policy of the society of origin, or the host society (Bertelsen Reference Bertelsen2012b; Bertelsen and Møller Reference Bertelsen and Møller2010).
REVERSE SOFT POWER OF AMERICAN MISSIONARY UNIVERSITIES BACK IN THE UNITED STATES
Throughout their history, these universities have been able to attract substantial academic, political, and financial support from private and public sources in the United States. In other words, US missionary universities have exerted a sort of reverse soft power; that is, they serve as transnational actors founded with a soft-power aim in a foreign host society but actually exercise soft power in their societies of origin (Bertelsen Reference Bertelsen2012b; Reference Bertelsen2014; Bertelsen and Møller Reference Bertelsen and Møller2010). Another aspect of reverse soft power is how American missionary university presidents and faculty have tried to advocate in the United States on behalf of China (on concessions during early 1900s), Palestine (in the late 1940s), Egypt (on canal nationalization in 1956), and Lebanon (in the 2006 war) to US political leaders and the US media (Dodge Reference Dodge1958; Lutz Reference Lutz1971; Munro Reference Munro1977; Murphy Reference Murphy1987; Waterbury Reference Waterbury2006a; Reference Waterbury2006b; West Reference West1976).
In circulating ideas, information, and talent, missionary universities have connected their host societies with elite American academic circles, recruiting senior American academics and administrators, while placing their graduate students in the United States. The universities have raised funds extensively in the United States, initially from missionary societies and individuals, and later, when the universities had become secular, from foundations and wealthy benefactors. American missionary universities have had boards of trustees, usually based in New York, that brought together American and Eastern elites from the academy, business, and government. The prominence of these boards of trustees illustrates the high-level transnational connections fostered by these universities.
Rather than exercise power over another, the policy implications of this research suggest that universities can contribute significantly to the transnational relations of a country and its ability to address problems in concert with other nations.
Missionary universities have also been connected with the US government. The US government temporarily supported the AUB financially during World War II, and it has continuously financially supported AUB, the AUC, and Lebanese American University for decades for soft power and development policy reasons. Presidents of American missionary universities have been appointed US ambassadors. Yenching University president John Leighton Stuart served as the last US ambassador to Mainland China, and AUC president John Badeau served as ambassador to Egypt in the early 1960s (Munro Reference Munro1977; Murphy Reference Murphy1987; West Reference West1976).
Graduates of the American missionary universities in China were much in demand for business with the West (Lutz Reference Lutz1971; West Reference West1976). American and British oil companies have been generous sponsors of the American missionary universities in the Middle East. Graduates from the classical American universities in the Middle East remain sought after by Western business because of their American education, Arabic and English skills, and understanding of local cultures (Khalaf Reference Khalaf1977; Munro Reference Munro1977; Murphy Reference Murphy1987).
RESEARCH AND POLICY CONCLUSIONS
American missionary universities, as transnational actors that contribute to shared milieu goals, effectively illustrate the distinction between power with somebody (usually to solve a chaotic transnational problem such as climate change, pandemics, terrorism, or poverty) versus power over somebody (to force them to adopt a certain course of action through hard military or economic power) (Nye Reference Nye2004; Nye Reference Nye2011). Transnational universities and the transnational nature of academia increase the ability to address chaotic transnational problems through epistemic communities, knowledge creation, transnational networks, and the spread of norms that facilitate cooperation. Transnational universities, such as the American missionary universities, contribute to power with others, with respect to both the society of origin and the host society. However, the distribution of this power between the Western society of origin and the Eastern host society is still unclear and must be further researched.
Research on classical American missionary universities in the Middle East and China suggests that universities constitute an interesting category of transnational actors for studying transnational flows of information, ideas, people, money, and power. Universities can have soft power by attracting desired behaviors separate from, but interacting with, state power. Universities can engender power with others to address important transnational problems.
Rather than exercise power over another, the policy implications of this research suggest that universities can contribute significantly to the transnational relations of a country and its ability to address problems in concert with other nations. Therefore, it is important that academic, government, business, and philanthropic actors in the Global North work with institutions in the Global South to create strong transnational relations.
