Scott Kennedy « Faculty

Associate Professor, EALC
Associate Professor, Political Science

kennedys indiana.edu
Goodbody Hall 205
(812) 856-0105

Professor Kennedy's home page
curriculum vitae

Education

PhD, George Washington University, 2002

Research Interests

Contemporary Chinese politics
Business lobbying and policymaking
Global governance
U.S.-Chinese relations

Courses Recently Taught

EALC E386, U.S.-East Asian Relations
EALC E390, Contemporary Chinese Politics
EALC E393, China's Political Economy
EALC E600, Issues in Chinese Politics
POLS Y657, The Politics of Development

Awards and Distinctions

Henry Luce Foundation, for the Initiative on China and Global Governance (2010-2013)
US Department of State, Fulbright Research Fellow, Peking University (2008-09)
National Committee on US-China Relations, Public Intellectuals Program Fellow (2008-2010)
Indiana University, Summer Faculty Fellowship ($8,000) for book project (2006)
Indiana University, multiple units, funding ($37,000) for conference on capitalism in China (2006)

Publication Highlights

Beyond the Middle Kingdom: Comparative Perspectives on China’s Capitalist Transformation (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2011).
The Business of Lobbying in China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2005).
China Cross Talk: The American Debate over China Policy since Normalization, A Reader (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2003).
(with Deng Guosheng), “Factor Analysis of Industry Association Lobbying and Influence,” Comparative Economic & Social Systems (经济社会体制比较), No. 162 (July 2012), pp. 147-156.
“The Myth of the Beijing Consensus,” Journal of Contemporary China, Vol. 19,No.65 (June 2010), pp. 461-477.
(with Deng Guosheng) “Big Business and Industry Association Lobbying in China: The Paradox of Contrasting Styles,” China Journal, No. 63 (January 2010), pp. 101-125.
“Comparing Formal and Informal Lobbying Practices in China: The Capital’s Ambivalent Embrace of Capitalists,” China Information, Vol. 23, No. 2 (July 2009), pp. 195-222.
“China’s Emerging Credit Rating Industry: The Official Foundations of Private Authority,” The China Quarterly, No. 193 (March 2008), pp. 65-83.
“Transnational Political Alliances: An Exploration with Evidence from China,” Business & Society, Vol. 46, No. 2 (June 2007), pp. 174-200.
“The Political Economy of Standards Coalitions: Explaining China’s Involvement in High-Tech Standards Wars,” Asia Policy, No. 2 (July 2006), pp. 41-62.
“China’s Porous Protectionism: The Changing Political Economy of Trade Policy,” Political Science Quarterly, Vol. 120, No. 3 (Fall 2005), pp. 407-432.

My interest in East Asia comes from two sources; the first is my interest in world affairs in general, and the second is my family’s experience in the region. My grandmother lived in Macau and wrote for the Christian Science Monitor in the early 1970s, and my uncle has lived in Japan for most of the past 40 years. Further prompted by my grandfather, an engineer who had traveled to Asia, I tried a Chinese language course my second year in college. But it was a semester in Beijing in 1988 – meeting average Chinese, riding on trains, and bicycling down Changan Avenue through Tiananmen Square – that sealed my fate as someone who wanted to make China a part of my career.

My work is motivated by a concern for interest groups, an effort to utilize multiple research methods (including cross-country comparisons), and a desire to contribute to the public policy conversation. My first monograph, revised from my dissertation, focused on the rise of business of lobbying and its affect on national public policy in China. This stream of research originally depended primarily on semi-structured interviews, but I am gradually utilizing formal surveys and other methods to better understand corporate political activity in China and elsewhere. My current book project, “Mandarins Playing Capitalist Games,” is on the growing participation of Chinese industry and government in international economic regimes, such as antidumping and technical standards. I want to understand how Chinese learn, utilize and shape the rules of the international system, not just to be good citizens and comply with their commitments, but to further their interests. My other recent project is an edited volume, Beyond the Middle Kingdom, which examines various aspects of China’s political economy in comparative perspective. My concern about public policy has led me in each of these areas to attempt to speak to both academic and public policy audiences in the US, China, and elsewhere. Also, I edited China Cross Talk (2003), a collection of speeches, testimony, essays, op-eds, and cartoons that encapsulate the fascinating debate Americans have had over the past 30 years about China policy.

This complex of interests and concerns is what motivated me to create the Research Center for Chinese Politics & Business (RCCPB) in 2007. With offices now in Beijing and Bloomington, the purpose of the center is to carry out cutting-edge research and engage stakeholders on critical issues that meet at the intersection of Chinese politics and the global world of business.