This book is a comparative study of how early childhood educational policies and initiatives in three countries—China, India, and the United States—have been utilized as both direct and indirect strategies for responding to fierce global economic competition. Human capital theory and cultural ecology theory serve as the conceptual framework for discussing how this has played out in each of the three countries. In addition, this book presents a discussion and analysis of how the beliefs, parents’ perspectives, and practices with regard to child-rearing and the education of young children have both changed and remained the same in response to forces of globalization.

Guangyu Tan is Associate Professor in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction at the State University of New York at Fredonia, USA. Her research interests are comparative studies in P-16 education. 

Amita Gupta is Professor of Early Childhood Education and former Department Chair in the School of Education at the City College of New York, CUNY, USA. She has been in the field of early childhood education for more than thirty years with extensive cross-cultural experience.

Gay Wilgus is Associate Professor in the Graduate Program in Early Childhood Education at the City College of New York, CUNY, USA. Her recent research is focused on motherhood studies and carework.