Meet Juan Qian

Welcome! I am an Earl S. Johnson Postdoctoral Instructor in Political Science at the University of Chicago. I recently completed my Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

I study bureaucratic politics, elite dynamics, and policymaking in authoritarian regimes with a regional focus on Asia. My research explores (1) how do autocrats motivate and control subordinate bureaucrats and ensure their compliance with challenging tasks? (2) What causes the geospatial variation in repression and policy implementation within an autocracy? (3) How do political violence and intergroup conflicts impact state capacity and political attitudes in short and long run?

My book manuscript, titled Statebuilding by Campaign: The Making and Shaking of Modern Chinese Bureaucracy, studies the various mechanisms employed by the Chinese regime to motivate and control subordinate bureaucrats during major political and policy campaigns from 1949 to 1976. Additionally, my works on Chinese politics have been published in Comparative Politics, The China Quarterly, Ethnopolitics, and The Routledge Handbook in Anti-Corruption Research. My research has received multiple awards from APSA, MPSA, and UW-Madison.

For more information on my research, please find my CV here.