Dr Hongyi Lai

Hongyi LAI is Associate Professor of the School of Politics and International Relations, University of Nottingham (UoN), United Kingdom. Prior to the University of Nottingham he served as a senior research fellow at East Asian Institute, National University of Singapore. He studied at Beijing University in the 1980s and witnessed the biggest student movement in Chinese politics. He received PhD from UCLA.

His research covers China’s governance, as well as domestic and international political economy. His research on China includes the following topics– domestic-external linkage of political economy, energy and climate policy, soft power, governance and epidemic management, economic reform, central-local relations, and regional development. His scholarly publications include eight books, twenty-five academic journal articles, and twenty-four book chapters. His publications have been assigned as readings at leading universities in the world such as Harvard, Michigan, Southern California, Leeds, Beijing, and National Singapore. His recent books included China’s Governance Model: The Flexibility and Durability of Pragmatic Authoritarianism (a Routledge book regarded by a leading China expert as defining the debate ‘for years to come’), China’s Soft Power and International Relations (Routledge, a widely cited book on China’s cultural and public diplomacy), and The Domestic Sources of China’s Foreign Policy (Routledge, the first monograph on the topic).

He has also published 80 plus news commentaries in English and Chinese outlets. Some of his ideas found echoes in policies, such as China’s SARS management, governance, and diplomacy under President Hu and Premier Wen. His foresighted commentaries on China’s trade policy and Belt and Road Initiative, as well as the US-China trade war appeared in The International Economy: The magazine of international economic policy.