A Strategy Risks report cited by the Daily Caller News Foundation says Missouri State University’s MBA program trained more than 1,500 Chinese state-enterprise and government managers, including personnel tied to China’s defense and surveillance sectors.
By yourNEWS Media Newsroom
Missouri State University’s long-running MBA program involving Chinese state-linked personnel trained more than 1,500 current and future managers for Chinese state-owned enterprises and government bodies, including individuals connected to the country’s defense industry, according to a Daily Caller News Foundation report citing findings from Strategy Risks.
The Strategy Risks report said the publicly funded university’s program had, by 2018, educated Chinese managers who later served in state-owned enterprises, government institutions, strategic supply-chain organizations, surveillance-technology companies and defense-linked entities. Strategy Risks estimated that U.S. taxpayer support for the program reached tens of millions of dollars, though the report also said available materials gave conflicting descriptions of how the program was financed.
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Missouri State University disputed the allegation that taxpayer dollars supported the program.
“We are aware of the report released by Strategy Risks regarding Missouri State University. No taxpayer dollars were directed toward the program, as the report alleges but readily admits it cannot substantiate,” an MSU spokesperson told the Daily Caller News Foundation.
Strategy Risks said its estimate relied on the most detailed available figures, which appeared in a recruiting presentation from Chinese Agricultural University. At the same time, the report said public recruiting materials connected to the MBA program listed differing prices, subsidy structures and parties responsible for payment.
The program’s origins date to 1999, when leaders from China’s State Economic and Trade Commission came to the United States looking for MBA programs that could train Communist Party managers, according to Strategy Risks. Missouri State’s program began in 2001.
The report said the admissions process was controlled by the Chinese Communist Party. Recruiting materials described eligibility requirements that included formal CCP membership and clearance for overseas travel, while CCP institutes organized cohorts, sponsored candidates and prepared participants for the program.
By 2015, 107 finance personnel from entities within the Aviation Industry Corporation of China system had completed Missouri State’s MBA program, according to the report. AVIC was described in the report as China’s primary state-owned aviation and defense conglomerate. The Department of War designated AVIC as a “Communist Chinese military company” in June 2020, and a Trump administration executive order barred Americans from holding securities in companies on that list.
One Missouri State MBA graduate later became Party Secretary, Chairman and Legal Representative for AVIC International Financial Leasing Co., according to Strategy Risks. The report said he was already a senior manager at the company when he completed the MBA program in 2013.
Strategy Risks described AVIC as a major weapons exporter that has operated “at the center of China’s military aviation buildout” over the past two decades and as “a participant in defense-industrial networks linked to major international conflicts and human rights abuses.”
The report said AVIC personnel enrolled at Missouri State appeared to study “a conventional business curriculum,” but said AVIC valued the program more for credentialing than for classroom instruction.
The Missouri State spokesperson told the Daily Caller News Foundation that the report did not identify misconduct by the students.
“As the report further acknowledges, the students studied a ‘conventional business curriculum’ with no evidence of espionage, intellectual property theft, misconduct, false affiliations or complaints of harassment. Students admitted to the program were required to comply with all student visa regulations administered by the U.S. State Department,” the spokesperson said.
Strategy Risks also identified graduates who moved into senior positions in China’s strategic supply chains and surveillance-technology sector.
One 2010 graduate became director and vice president of a major Chinese artificial intelligence and voice-recognition company, according to the report. The U.S. Commerce Department placed that company on the Entity List in 2019 for supplying voiceprint and voice-recognition technology to Xinjiang security bureaus as part of China’s mass surveillance system targeting Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities.
The report also noted the role of Jim Baker, then Missouri State’s vice president, who received China’s “Friendship Award” in 2012. Strategy Risks described the award as a tool used “to cultivate foreign nationals who advance Chinese state interests, and that recipients in such networks ‘unequivocally serve national party goals.’” Baker visited China more than 100 times on behalf of Missouri State, according to the report.
Chinese university websites continued promoting the program as recently as July 2024, Strategy Risks found.
Missouri State’s MBA partnership with Liaoning Normal University in China was established in 2000 with formal approval from China’s Ministry of Education and the Missouri State University Board of Governors. The partnership remains active, and qualifying students enrolled through it may transfer to Missouri State to complete their degrees.
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