<p>Asian universities are the first to suffer from the primacy of English in global academia, so that doesn’t help their rankings.</p>
<p>Other Asian universities (and by “Asian” I mean “Chinese”) are hobbled by living under a dictatorship that stifles free inquiry</p>
<p>The rest suffer from funding that pales in comparison to the best American systems. Private enterprise has created a system of what shall henceforth be called “pwnage” in which the American universities are fabulously wealthy thanks to larger financial contributions from alumni, students, and private firms. The rest of the world is basically state schools…</p>
<p>Of course, the most widespread (and controversial) problem plaguing Asian universities is the different culture that produces a very different academic environment.</p>
<p>(please direct all personal attacks of ‘racism’ etc to Ambassador [and Asian] Kishore Mahbubani of Singapore who wrote the book “Can Asians Think?” There was also an excellent op-ed on western education in the WSJ a few days ago)</p>
<p>The acceptance rates of Asian schools may be frightfully low, but this is proof that low acceptance rates alone do not a world-class university make.</p>