Discursive Construction of China's "Double First-Class" Policy: A Five-Dimensional Analysis Based on the Wahlström & Sundberg Framework

This study examines the discursive construction of China's "Double First-Class" (DFC) higher education policy. While existing research has predominantly focused on implementation outcomes, scant attention has been paid to how the policy itself is discursively shaped and rendered legitimate. Drawing on discursive institutionalism as a theoretical lens, this study employs Wahlström and Sundberg's five-dimensional analytical framework—encompassing the epistemological, political, ethical, aesthetic, and instrumental/utilitarian dimensions—to conduct a qualitative content analysis of core DFC policy texts. The findings reveal that DFC policy discourse constitutes a multi-layered structure anchored by two overarching logics: state volition and performativity. The political dimension (national strategic imperatives) and the instrumental dimension (performance-driven logic) jointly shape a utilitarian conception of knowledge (epistemology), a narrative of service to the nation as the supreme good (ethics), and a heroic mobilizational rhetoric (aesthetics). These five dimensions operate synergistically to construct a self-reinforcing legitimacy narrative chain from "why build" to "how to build." However, deep-seated internal tensions persist, principally between rigid state discipline and university autonomy, between universalistic world-class standards and particularistic Chinese characteristics, and between the long-term mission of moral cultivation and the short-term pressures of performativity. This study demonstrates that these discursive tensions constitute root causes of practical dilemmas, offering a novel diagnostic perspective for understanding the internal dynamics of Chinese higher education reform.