TITLE:
From Enrollment to Employment: Motivations, Decadal Trends, and Career Outcomes of Tajik Students in China (2014-2024)
AUTHORS:
Salimov Fathiddin Rajabovich, Agoma Abengiba Simon, Guanglu Zhang
KEYWORDS:
International Student Mobility, Graduate Employability, Belt and Road Initiative, Capital Accumulation, Tajikistan
JOURNAL NAME:
Open Journal of Business and Management,
Vol.14 No.6,
October
19,
2026
ABSTRACT: Against the rapid expansion of South-South international student mobility and the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), China has become the world’s third-largest destination for international students, hosting more than 500,000 students by 2024. Central Asian students, particularly those from Tajikistan, remain an under-investigated group: more than 5000 Tajik students are currently enrolled in Chinese universities, and the Confucius Institute at Tajik National University has trained over 42,000 Mandarin learners since 2008, yet empirical evidence on their motivations, capital accumulation, and career trajectories is limited. This qualitative case study examines evolving motivations, decadal trends, and post-graduation career outcomes among Tajik students in China between 2014 and 2024, drawing on 18 semi-structured interviews with alumni who had completed their degree programs, stratified into three cohorts: 2014-2018 (early BRI expansion), 2019-2021 (COVID-19 disruption), and 2022-2024 (post-pandemic recovery). Reflexive thematic analysis was guided by an integrated framework combining Bourdieu’s capital theory and Tomlinson’s graduate capital model. Findings show a clear progression in motivations, from scholarship access (80%, Cohort 1) to Mandarin as symbolic capital (83%, Cohort 2) to strategic, BRI-linked career planning (100%, Cohort 3). Participants accumulated substantial linguistic (100%), social (89%), cultural (83%), and psychological (78%) capital, yet structural barriers, chiefly a two-year work-experience visa requirement, limited long-term employment in China to 16.7% of participants (n = 3). Four mutually exclusive post-graduation career-outcome categories emerged: return migration to Tajikistan (66.7%), long-term employment in China (16.7%), transnational employment in third countries (11.1%), and cross-border entrepreneurship (5.6%). The study addresses geographical, temporal, and theoretical gaps in South-South mobility research by centering Tajik students, extending graduate capital theory to a non-Western context, and proposing China as a capital incubation hub rather than a settlement destination. Findings offer policymakers and higher education institutions actionable evidence for strengthening BRI-related educational cooperation, reforming post-study visa policy, and improving international graduate employability and mobility outcomes.