Suspended Policy Goals and the Triple Gap in Grassroots Calligraphy Education Implementation

DOI

10.2991/978-94-6239-825-2_33How to use a DOI?

Keywords

Calligraphy Education; Public Policy Implementation; Policy Implementation Gap; Qualitative Research; Semi-structured Interview

Abstract

As a core carrier of China’s traditional culture, Chinese calligraphy has been systematically incorporated into the national curriculum system and the policy framework for aesthetic education in recent years. However, whether increasingly refined top-level policy design can necessarily achieve its intended objectives remains an open question. Drawing on public policy implementation theory and taking Lvliang City, Shanxi Province, China, as a case study, this article systematically examines the practical gaps that arise in the implementation of calligraphy education policies at the grassroots level. The study combines policy text analysis with semi-structured interviews involving ten grassroots education administrators, calligraphy teachers, parents, and government officials. The findings indicate that, although a relatively systematic national policy framework for calligraphy education has been established, implementation in third-tier cities generally faces three major challenges: the gradual attenuation and selective execution of policy directives during transmission, the insufficient provision of full-time teachers and the marginalization of calligraphy instruction, and the joint compression of the space for aesthetic education by parents’ utilitarian demands and the out-of-school training market. This article reveals the actual transmission mechanism through which calligraphy education policies move from policy texts to classroom practice. It provides grassroots empirical evidence for understanding the implementation difficulties of traditional culture education policies and offers theoretical implications for the optimization of related policies.

Copyright

© 2026 The Author(s)

Open Access

Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

Download article (PDF)

TY  - CONF
AU  - Shutong Di
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/11/10
TI  - Suspended Policy Goals and the Triple Gap in Grassroots Calligraphy Education Implementation
BT  - Proceedings of the 2026 5th International Conference on Public Service, Economic Management and Sustainable Development (PESD 2026)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 332
EP  - 344
SN  - 2352-5428
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-94-6239-825-2_33
DO  - 10.2991/978-94-6239-825-2_33
ID  - Di2026
ER  -