Project managers
PhD, born in 1972, has been an assistant professor of contemporary Chinese studies at the University of Würzburg since October 2008
He is the coordinator of the “Governance in China” research network (2010–2014), which is funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research, and head of the “Social Stratification and Political Culture in Contemporary Urban China” project. He studied modern Chinese studies, political science and economics at the University of Cologne and Nankai University, Tianjin (PRC), graduating in 1999 with an MA in Chinese area studies. From 1999 until 2008 he worked as a research assistant in modern Chinese history/politics, economy and society at the East Asian Institute of the University of Cologne. He has undertaken regular research trips to China.
Thomas Heberer is professor of Politics of East Asia at the Political Science Department and the Institute of East Asian Studies (IN-EAST) at the University Duisburg-Essen since 1998. Since the middle of the 1960s he has been working on China which he visited first in 1975. From 1977 to 1981 he worked as editor and translator at the Foreign Language Press in Beijing. From 1981 he has regularly conducted field research in different parts of China. Over the past years, he engaged among other things in the social and political roles of private entrepreneurs, the role of ideas and intellectuals in political processes, the role of ethnical entrepreneurs for local development and ethnicity, institutional and social change in Chinese cities and the role of local cadres (“strategic groups”) in the rural transformation process. Further information on: www.uni-due.de/oapol/
is a professor of government and the political economy in China at Trier University and has been director of the subproject "Industrial and Technology Policy in the People's Republic of China" at Trier University since March 2010. His current research interests include the political system and economic reforms in the PRC as well as economic policy/regulation.
is a professor of political science with a focus on Chinese and East Asian area studies at Frankfurt University, and an associate senior research fellow at the GIGA German Institute of Global and Area Studies in Hamburg. Her research centers on political legitimation, ideology, and the political economy of contemporary China.
Research Team
born in 1983, has been a member of the “Governance in China” research network’s research staff at the Institute of Asian Studies of the GIGA German Institute of Global and Area Studies in Hamburg since April 2010.
She studied Chinese studies, political science and economics at the University of Hamburg and Lanzhou University (PRC), graduating in 2010 with an MA.
has been a member of the “Governance in China” research network’s research staff at the Institute of Asian Studies of the GIGA German Institute of Global and Area Studies in Hamburg since April 2010.
She studied philosophy, political science and psychology in Bonn and Berlin, as well as Chinese language at Nanjing University (PRC). She is currently finishing her doctoral thesis on China’s rise as a global financial power.
born in 1985, has been a member of the “Governance in China” research network’s research staff in the Department of Chinese Studies at the University of Würzburg since April 2010.
She studied Chinese studies, philosophy and economics at the University of Würzburg, Peking University and the Beijing Language and Culture University (PRC), graduating in 2010 with an MA.
In April 2010 Susanne Löhr joined the Chair of Politics of East Asia at Duisburg-Essen University. During her studies of Political Science, Sinology and Economics at Philipps-University Marburg, she stayed two semesters at Shandong University in Jinan/China. She is researching how the reform for sheng guan xian (“province leading county”) changes local institutional structures and policy processes.
Elena Meyer-Clement is a research assistant at the Asia-Orient Institute (Chair of Greater China Studies) of the University of Tuebingen. She studied Sinology, Political Science and Philosophy at the University of Hamburg and earned her master’s degree in 2003. Currently, she is finalising her Ph.D. thesis on the film and music industries in China, which explores the role of private film and music producers in Beijing in processes of institutional change.
Baris Selcuk, Diplom-Regionalwiss.,
born in 1978, has been a member of the “Governance in China” research network’s research staff in the Department of Chinese Studies at the University of Würzburg since April 2010.
He studied East Asian area studies, with a major in political science and a minor in ethnology, at the University of Cologne and the Beijing Language and Culture University (PRC). He graduated with an MA in Chinese area studies and political science from the University of Cologne in 2009.
has been research associate with the project since March 2010 (dissertation: "China's Economic Government: National Industrial Policy, 1987–2009"). She studied German language and literature at Beijing International Studies University in the PRC (BA) and political science and media studies at Trier University (MA).
Since April 2008 René Trappel works as a research assistant at the chair Politics of East Asia at Duisburg-Essen University. He is part of the DFG- sponsored research project “Politics and Autonomy in the Local State – County and Township Cadres as Strategic Actors in the Chinese Reform Process”. Currently he is also writing a dissertation about agrarian change and the commodification of land in rural China.
Manager of the research network's adminstrative office
born in 1984, has been the manager of the “Governance in China” research network’s administrative office in the Department of Chinese Studies at the University of Würzburg since March 2010.
She studied Chinese studies, economics and human geography at the University of Würzburg and Peking University and graduated in 2008 with an MA.
