Thousands of Chinese students riot over bleak job prospects

The biggest demonstration erupted on June 15. Some 10,000 students in central China’s Zhengzhou city ransacked classrooms and administrative offices and clashed with hundreds of police in one of the most intense student protests since the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre.

The riot broke out at the private Shengda Economic, Trade and Management College, which is affiliated with the prestigious Zhengzhou University and has 13,000 students. After paying expensive tuition fees and undertaking years of study, students were angered by the college’s decision to award graduates diplomas in its own name, rather than “Zhengzhou University”, as promised in its advertisements. The title “Zhengzhou University Shengda Economic, Trade and Management College” will immediately reveal the second-class character of their qualifications to employers.

Amid intensive competition in China’s labour market, even a degree from a well-known university no longer guarantees a job. According to recent government estimates, despite an annual economic growth of more than 9 percent, some 60 percent of China’s four million college graduates this year are unlikely to obtain work

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