Abstract
In recent years, academic–vocational tracking has become a central institutional arrangement in China’s upper secondary education system. While policy discourse frames tracking as a means to optimize educational structure and promote vocational education, it has also generated persistent concerns regarding educational inequality and social stratification. Existing studies largely focus on the functional rationale or outcome-based inequalities of tracking, paying limited attention to the governance logic embedded in policy design itself. Drawing on a qualitative policy text analysis, this study examines national and subnational policy documents on academic–vocational tracking issued since 2018. Through systematic thematic coding, the analysis focuses on policy goals, governance instruments, responsibility allocation, and equity-related discourses. The findings show that current tracking policies are governed by a logic centered on structural regulation and technocratic management, characterized by proportional control, indicator-based evaluation, and downward delegation of implementation responsibility. Meanwhile, inequality risks are not addressed through explicit exclusion but are institutionally embedded via principle-based equity rhetoric, functional differentiation between educational pathways, and the marginalization of family background and socioeconomic disparities. By foregrounding governance logic rather than policy outcomes alone, this study contributes to a deeper understanding of how educational inequality is produced and legitimized through policy design, and highlights the need to critically reassess tracking reforms from a governance perspective.