From Burden Reduction to Responsibility Redistribution: A Multi-Stakeholder Qualitative Study of China’s Double Reduction Policy in Guangdong Junior High Schools

Abstract

China’s Double Reduction Policy (DRP) was introduced in 2021 to reduce excessive homework and regulate private supplementary tutoring. Yet reducing visible workload does not necessarily remove the competitive pressures that organize schooling, family decision-making, and students’ progression. This qualitative study examines how the DRP was experienced by teachers, parents, and students and asks whether burden reduction was accompanied by a redistribution of educational responsibility. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 60 participants from five public junior high schools across Guangzhou, Heyuan, Zhanjiang, and Leizhou in Guangdong Province: 20 teachers, 20 parents, and 20 students, including 20 matched parent-student dyads. Reflexive thematic analysis was the primary analytic approach. Meaning-unit coding, TF-IDF-assisted screening, co-occurrence inspection, and standardized differential keyword comparisons were used as supplementary procedures rather than substitutes for qualitative interpretation. Four interrelated findings were identified. First, formal tutoring dependence and some routine workload declined, while examination competition remained. Second, schools and teachers absorbed support functions previously purchased in the tutoring market, expanding demands for classroom efficiency, differentiated instruction, feedback, after-school services, and student wellbeing. Third, parents moved from routine tutoring consumption toward selective resource management, school communication, and home supervision. Fourth, this redistribution was socially unequal: family time, income, educational knowledge, local provision, and students’ self-regulation shaped whether reduced tutoring became relief or a new form of risk. The article develops an educational responsibility redistribution perspective, arguing that policy evaluation should examine not only whether burdens fall, but also where work, anxiety, support, and self-management demands move after reform.