The Chinese Government launched in August 2014 its first official policy paper on learning cities titled "The Decision on Promoting Building Learning Cities". The paper was jointly issued by the Ministry of Education and six other government ministeries. The paper indicates overall goals, tasks to be addressed, and policy measures for building learning cities in China and will serve as guidelines for building learning cities in China.

The policy paper continues the leadership that China has provided in learning city development, including co-hosting with UNESCO the first international conference on learning cities held in Beijing in October 2013. Major Chinese cities such as Beijing and Shanghai are active learning cities. Both Beijing and Shanghai participated in the PASCAL International Exchanges (PIE) program and overview stimulus papers on developments in these cities may be read on the PIE web site (http://pie.pascalobservatory.org)