Yuan Wang

I am Assistant Professor of at the National School of Development, Peking University. Previously I served as Assistant Professor of International Relations for three years at Duke Kunshan University. My teaching and research interests include global China, African politics, and comparative political economy of development.

My book The Railpolitik (Oxford University Press) investigates why Chinese-financed and -constructed develop into starkly different trajectories in different African countries. I used process tracing based on extensive fieldwork in Kenya, Ethiopia, Angola, and China. My work has appeared in leading journals including Comparative Politics, Review of International Political Economy, World Development, China Quarterly, etc.

I completed DPhil in Politics at the University of Oxford. I hold a Master of Science (MSc) in Politics Research from Oxford, a Master of Public Policy (MPP) from Harvard Kennedy School, and a Bachelor of Law in international relations from Shanghai International Studies University. I was the 2021-22 fellow at the Columbia-Harvard China and the World Program and Postdoctoral Research Scholar at the Weatherhead East Asian Institute, Columbia University. Before Oxford, I served in the China office of the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and at the Sino-Africa Centre of Excellence Foundation Nairobi office.