Research
Revisiting Our Understanding of Major Power Diplomacy: The Causes and Consequences of High‑Level Diplomatic Visits with China, 1960‑2020. (Forthcoming in International Studies Quarterly)
Coauthored with Hankyeul Yang.
We introduce a new dataset on high-level diplomatic visits from and to China between 1960 and 2020 with data on visits conducted by leaders and foreign ministers.
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We argue that as China’s global influence grew over time since 2000, Chinese leaders have been less likely to grant an audience to a visiting foreign minister from another country while visiting Chinese foreign ministers have been more likely to be granted an audience with the leader of the host country.
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Life-Cycle and Generational Influences on Chinese Political Behavior and Attitudes: Age Matters, and so does Context. (Forthcoming in Social Science Quarterly)
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Coauthored with Robert Harmel, Zhaoqing Li, and Yao-Yuan Yeh.
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Objective. To revisit the relative importance of age vs. generation in explaining differences of political behavior and attitudes across age cohorts in China, assess impact of contextual changes affecting multiple age groups, and identify special characteristics of attitudes and behavior of Generation Z.
Method. Analysis of differences among age cohorts using survey data for 2019, and differences for each cohort between 2008 and 2019 using two nationwide surveys.
Results. Findings suggest (1) roles for both age and generation in explaining differences among cohorts, (2) special features of Gen Z as compared to older generations, and (3) roles of contextual factors (period effects) in affecting change across multiple generations.
Conclusion. Not only does age influence political behavior and attitudes in authoritarian China, but so does context, both later in life and particularly during formative years. When taking age, generation, and period effects into account, there is no single explanation that applies to all types of attitude and behavior.
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Coauthored with Robert Harmel and Yao-Yuan Yeh.
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Objective. The purpose of this research is to explore whether location of a citizen’s residence is an important source of explanation for nationalistic attitudes in China.
Methods. Using data from a nationwide representative survey of Chinese adults and a multidimensional approach to nationalism, analyses include bivariate correlation and multiple regression.
Results. Significant support is found for twelve of sixteen hypotheses linking “location variables” to specific types of nationalistic attitudes, even when modeling with a substantial set of controls. The hypothesis-supporting evidence touches all four dimensions of nationalism.
Conclusion. When it comes to development of nationalistic attitudes in China, location matters!
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Coauthored with Robert Harmel, Zhaoqing Li and Yao-Yuan Yeh.
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Objective. This article explores whether authoritarian China has a monolithic political culture, or rather a set of somewhat different political cultures across a number of regions.
Method. On the basis of several criteria we deem particularly important for identifying regions within which development, communication, and socialization of political attitudes are likely to be internally common but distinguishable from those of other regions, we divide China into six such regions. We then employ a combination of eight attitudinal measures from The China Survey of 2008 which are directly relevant to discerning political culture.
Results. We find that there are indeed substantively different cultures across regions, some of which are more consistent with elite preferences than others.
Conclusion. From our initial foray into possible explanation, we conclude that politico-historical legacy—sometimes in interaction with certain aspects of geographic, demographic, and economic characteristics—may go furthest in explaining the cross-region cultural differences.
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Alternative agents of “Good Citizenship” socialization in China
(Revise & Resubmit)
Coauthored with Robert Harmel and Yao-Yuan Yeh.
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While previous research has addressed the role of education in the development of “good citizenship” norms in China, this paper addresses other agents of political opinion formation, including party membership, state-workplace education, and religion.