Yongnian Zheng received his BA and his MA from Beijing University and his PhD at Princeton University. He was a recipient of Social Science Research Council-MacArthur Foundation Fellowship and John D and Catherine T MacArthur Foundation Fellowship. He was Professor and founding Research Director of the China Policy Institute, the University of Nottingham, United Kingdom (2005–2008), and Director of East Asian Institute, National University of Singapore. He is Professor of Political Science at the Chinese University of Hong Kong (Shenzhen).