A central element of Deng Xiaoping's political reforms initiated during the 1980s was to reform the ways that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) related to other national institutions (the state and military), sectors of society, and the Party itself.  While there have been significant ups and downs over the past thirty years, many elements of Deng's original vision for Party reform have been carried out and continue to be pursued. As a result, today's Chinese Communist Party is a stronger institution that has survived the collapse of the Soviet Union and other communist party-states worldwide. Yet, it faces new challenges, to which it must adapt. Professor Shambaugh's lecture will assess the CCP's adaptations and reforms over the past three decades.

David Shambaugh has been Professor of Political Science & International Affairs in the Elliott School of International Affairs at The George Washington University since 1996.  He directed the Elliott School's Sigur Center for Asian Studies from 1996-98, and since that time has been the founding Director of the China Policy Program.  He has also been a Nonresident Senior Fellow in the Foreign Policy Studies Program and Center for Northeast Asian Policy Studies at The Brookings Institution since 1998.  In 2008 he was also appointed an Honorary Research Professor at the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences.

Before joining the faculty at George Washington, he previously taught at the University of London's School of Oriental & African Studies (1987-1996), served as Editor of The China Quarterly (1991-1996), and directed the Asia Program of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars (1986-87).  He received his B.A. in East Asian Studies from the Elliott School at George Washington, an M.A. in International Affairs from Johns Hopkins SAIS, and Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Michigan.  Professor Shambaugh has published widely-having authored or edited 25 books, approximately 200 articles and book chapters, and 100 opinion-editorials and book reviews.  He is a frequent commentator on Chinese and Asian affairs in the international media, sits on the editorial boards of a number of scholarly journals, and has served as a consultant to various governments, research institutes, and private corporations. 

This talk is part of the Stanford China Program Winter 2009 China Seminar Series titled "30 Years of Reform in China: How Far from the Cage?"

Three decades of economic reform in China have created expectations of political change to follow. However, neither the Chinese Communist Party nor China's capitalists are following this script. The CCP has strengthened its support for the private sector and integrated capitalists into the existing political system. China's capitalists have shown little interest in promoting democratization. Many are dependent on the state for their success, and have shared interests, personal ties, and common views on a range of policy issues. Rather than being potential agents of change, China's entrepreneurs are proving to be a key source of support for the party's agenda.

Bruce Dickson received his B.A. in political science and English literature, his M.A. in Chinese Studies, and his Ph.D. in political science from the University of Michigan. He joined the faculty of The George Washington University and the Elliott School in 1993. He teaches on China, comparative politics, and democratization. Professor Dickson is currently examining the political consequences of economic reform in China, and in particular the relationship between private entrepreneurs and the Chinese Communist Party.

Dr. Dickson is the author of Wealth into Power: The Communist Party's Embrace of China's Private Sector (2008), Red Capitalists in China: The Party, Private Entrepreuneurs, and Prospects for Political Change (2003), Democratization in China and Taiwan: The Adaptability of Leninist Parties (1997), and is co-editor of four other books. His articles have appeared in Asian Survey, China Quarterly, Comparative Politics, Comparative Political Studies, Journal of Contemporary China, Journal of Democracy, National Interest, and Political Science Quarterly. He is a frequent commentator on political developments in China and Taiwan and on U.S.-China relations, and has appeared on CNN, NPR, BBC, and VOA.

This talk is part of the Stanford China Program Winter 2009 China Seminar Series titled "30 Years of Reform and Opening in China: How Far from the Cage?"

Peter Henry's research on emerging markets provides fundamental insights about the impact of economic reform on the lives of people in developing countries. It uses theory and data to grapple objectively with some of the most important and contentious economic questions of our time: Does debt relief help or hurt poor countries? Should emerging nations permit capital to flow freely in and out of their economies? Is it possible to reduce inflation without undermining economic growth? Peter's answers to these questions appear in the leading academic journals and have led him to testify before the U.S. Congress and various United Nations Ambassadors.

Peter is Konosuke Matsushita Professor of International Economics, the John and Cynthia Fry Gunn Faculty Scholar, and Associate Director of the Center for Global Business and the Economy at the Stanford University Graduate School of Business. He is also a Senior Fellow of the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research, a Research Associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research, a Nonresident Senior Fellow of the Brookings Institution, and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. From 2000-2001 he was a National Fellow at the Hoover Institution. The National Science Foundation's Early CAREER Development Program supported his research and teaching from 2001-2006. In 2004 Peter participated in the Copenhagen Consensus, an international conference on how to make the most efficient use of the world's scarcest resources. The Economist magazine named the published proceedings of the conference one of the best business books of 2004.

Peter received his PhD in economics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1997. While in graduate school, he served as a consultant to the Governors of the Bank of Jamaica and the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank (ECCB). His research at the ECCB contributed to the intellectual foundation for establishing the first stock market in the Eastern Caribbean Currency Area.

Prior to attending MIT, Peter was a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University where he received a BA in mathematics and a Full Blue in basketball. He also holds a BA in economics from The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill where he was a Morehead Scholar, a National Merit Scholar, a member of Phi Beta Kappa, a Marshall Scholar-Elect, a reserve wide receiver on the varsity football team, and a finalist in the 1991 campus-wide slam-dunk competition.

Born in Jamaica, Peter became a U.S. citizen in 1986. His wife of 12 years, Lisa J. Nelson, received her BA and MD from Yale University. She is a child psychiatrist and was a Glaxo Welcome Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association from 1995 to 1997. They have four sons: Christian Blair, Langston Alexander, Hayden Montgomery, and Harrison Elbert.

Compared to other Communist parties that were falling apart in the 1980s, the China Communist Party's success since 1978 is extraordinary. Deng did not start opening and reform, but he made it work. How? What kind of person was he? How was he prepared for his job? One important strategy was setting goals but not drawing bluebrints. He tried experiments, learnt from them, and then let new institutions develop organically. His key experiments were in Guangdong and Fujian. What were the politics and the economics of these experiments and what did they learn?

Ezra Vogel is Henry Ford II Research Professor of Social Sciences at Harvard, honorary director of the Program on US-Japan Relations and former director of Harvard's East Asia Research Center. He was also the second chairman of the Council for East Asian Studies, the first director of the Harvard University Asia Center and former director for the Program on US-Japan Relations at the Center for International Affairs. He has been a professor at Harvard since 1967. Vogel holds a bachelor's degree from Ohio Wesleyan, a PhD from Harvard and ten honorary degrees. He received the Japan Foundation Prize in 1996 and lectures frequently in Asia. Professor Vogel is currently writing a biography of Deng Xiaoping.

This talk is part of the Stanford China Program Winter 2009 China Seminar Series titled "30 Years of Reform and Opening in China: How Far from the Cage?"

Barbara Geddes, who earned her Ph.D. from UC, Berkeley, has written about politics and breakdown in authoritarian regimes, bureaucratic reform and corruption, political bargaining over institutional choice and change, and research design. Her publications include Paradigms and Sand Castles: Theory Building and Research Design in Comparative Politic (2003), Politician's Dilemma: Building State Capacity in Latin America (1994), "What Do We Know about Democratization after Twenty Years?" Annual Review of Political Science (1999) and "A Game Theoretic Model of Reform in Latin American Democracies," American Political Science Review (1991). Her current research focuses on politics inside dictatorships. She teaches Latin American politics, authoritarian politics, and research design at UCLA.

Mark Fathi Massoud's research focuses on the development of law in volatile states rife with violent conflict. An attorney of the California Bar, he received his JD and PhD in Jurisprudence and Social Policy from the University of California, Berkeley, School of Law.

Massoud's current research examines tensions between international rule-of-law aid and local perceptions of rights in a divided society.

Massoud's dissertation, which he is revising into a book manuscript at Stanford, builds on the interdisciplinary tradition of law and society to examine the role of law in development. Taking Sudan as a case, it explores how government officials, civil society activists, and the international aid community all use law to construct and maintain their influence over society.

Dr. Gilley earned his B.A. in International Relations at the University of Toronto. He went on to finish his M.Phil. in Economics at the University of Oxford and his Ph.D. in Politics at Princeton University.

Research Focus
Dr. Gilley’s research centers on democracy, legitimacy, and global politics. He is a specialist on the comparative politics of China and Asia.

Community Engagements/Service
Dr. Gilley is a frequent advisor to governments and NGOs on matters of democracy and human rights in Asia. He serves on the editorial board of the Journal of Democracy and as a programme evaluator for Radio Free Asia’s Mandarin Service.