President-to-President Dialogue - HKUST x ICRC

Dr Simon Shen is the Founding Chairman of the international relations start-up company GLOs (Glocal Learning Offices) comprising of a series of companies in the field of education, research, creative and intellectual travel, and the President of Yew Wah Global Institute of Lifestyle and Management. A graduate of the University of Oxford and Yale University, Dr. Simon SHEN is one of the few international relations scholars originating from Hong Kong who has earned both international and local recognition. He has published over 70 academic articles, including in the prestigious China Quarterly, China Review, and Journal of Contemporary China. In the domestic society, he is regarded as one of the most representative scholars in the younger generation due to his active participation in public affairs as a public intellectual and a think tanker. His social media channel, intended to make international relations more accessible, is highly popular among netizens. Currently Dr. SHEN is an adjunct associate professor of the University of Hong Kong and Chinese University of Hong Kong, where he served as the Founding Director of its Global Studies Programme and Master of Global Political Economy Programme, and is holding adjunct research positions at Tsinghua University and Nanyang Technological University of Singapore, among others. He has served as senior visiting fellow or visiting fellow of National University of Singapore, Brookings Institution, Warwick University, Ryukyu University, among others. Dr. SHEN is also a lead writer (Global) of Hong Kong Economic Journal, International Relations Consultant of Bloomberg Business Magazine and Consultant of New York Times in Education.  

Prof Kellee S. Tsai is Dean of Humanities and Social Science and Chair Professor of Social Science at HKUST.  Prior to joining the University, Prof Tsai served as Vice Dean for Humanities and Social Science and Professor of Political Science at Johns Hopkins University.  A scholar of contemporary Chinese politics and economic development, Tsai’s research addresses broader debates in comparative politics, the political economy of development, and the study of informal institutions and endogenous institutional change. She has published five books, including Back-Alley Banking: Private Entrepreneurs in China (Cornell University Press, 2002), Rural Industrialization and Non-Governmental Finance in Wenzhou (co-authored in Chinese, 山西经济出版社 2004), Japan and China in the World Political Economy (co-edited with Saadia Pekannen, Routledge, 2005), Capitalism without Democracy: The Private Sector in Contemporary China (Cornell University Press, 2007), and State Capitalism, Institutional Adaptation, and the Chinese Miracle (co-edited with Barry Naughton, Cambridge University Press 2015).  Her articles have appeared in journals such as China Journal, China Quarterly, Comparative Political Studies, Perspectives on Politics, World Development, and World Politics. Her current research concerns the local developmental implications of return migration, remittances and ethnic foreign direct investment in China and India.