Introduction
The Association of Chinese Political Studies (ACPS) will hold its 33rd annual meeting between September 18 – 20, 2020 in Middlebury, Vermont. Since its founding in 1986, ACPS has provided a platform to bring together Chinese political studies scholars from around the world. ACPS now has nearly 1,000 individual members from more than a dozen countries across four continents. Exemplary conference papers will have the opportunity to be published in ACPS’s flagship journal, the Journal of Chinese Political Science. JCPS was recently accepted into SSCI, Clarivate (formerly Thomson Reuter) Social Sciences Citation Index.
ACPS is pleased to announce that Middlebury College will host the conference. From its proud history spanning more than two centuries (since 1800), Middlebury College has emerged as one of the most highly regarded liberal arts colleges. Middlebury is unique in that it also offers graduate and specialized programs operating around the world. Our natural setting in Vermont’s Champlain Valley, with the Green Mountains to the east and the Adirondacks to the west, is crucial to our identity, but Middlebury’s borders extend far beyond Vermont. The Middlebury Language Schools, Middlebury C.V. Starr Schools Abroad, Middlebury Bread Loaf School of English, Middlebury Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, Middlebury School of the Environment, and the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey provide top-quality specialized education, including graduate education, in selected areas of critical importance to a rapidly changing world community. Currently, Middlebury College enrolls about 2,500 undergraduate students, 750 graduate students at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey, and maintains Schools Abroad in 17 countries and 37 cities.
The ACPS conference will be hosted at the Bread Loaf mountain campus, where the poet Robert Frost helped establish the School of English in 1920.
Conference Theme
China is in a period of dramatic change in its economy, regulatory and government structure, and international role. This conference intends to analyze these changes and their implications for China’s future governance and international prospects. We invite papers that analyze policy innovation and institutional restructuring at the domestic level, as well as papers looking at China’s evolving role as a global actor.
We are particularly interested in papers that employ novel theoretical frameworks and innovative methodological tools. In addition to panels featuring new research, we will also have roundtables featuring newer methods such as machine learning, experimental survey design, events analysis, etc. We also plan to offer a roundtable on teaching Chinese politics, and one featuring publishers to discuss the changing competitive landscape of academic publishing.
Proposal Submission Procedures
The deadline for proposal submission is March 30, 2020. Current ACPS members will receive priority consideration, though we seek high-quality proposals in congruence with the conference theme. The proposal review committee will also consider panel proposals consisting of 4-5 papers sharing a coherent theme (including a methodology). Please indicate if you would be interested in presenting on either/both a topic and a methodology in your proposal.
Paper and panel proposals should be submitted via e-mail to acpsus.org@gmail.com. For paper proposals, please include (1) paper title and abstract; (2) keywords indicating topic and methodology; and (3) each author’s full name, institutional affiliation, and contact information. The e-mail subject line for paper submissions should be “Paper Proposal Submission ACPS_Middlebury 2020.”
For panel submissions, please include (1) panel title; (2) each paper’s title and abstract; (3) each author’s full name, institutional affiliation, and contact information; (4) full name and contact information of the panel chair and discussant. Please use “Panel Proposal Submission ACPS_Middlebury 2020” as the e-mail subject line.
Acceptance of Proposals
The review committee will issue notifications of acceptance, via email, to the primary author listed in the paper or panel proposal. Notifications will be distributed by early May 2020.
Conference Registration Procedures
Those participants whose papers are accepted and plan to attend the conference must register for the conference and pay a non-refundable registration fee via the ACPS website by May 30, 2020.
Volunteering, Elections, and Mentoring
We welcome expressions of interest from conference participants willing to serve as panel chairs and discussants.
Anyone interested in serving as a mentor/mentee should contact Dr. Jing Chen at chenj@hartwick.edu. Mentors and mentees will have a chance over Saturday’s lunch to discuss research and career topics.
We will hold elections for the next ACPS Board, and welcome nominations (including self-nominations) for positions: president-elect, treasurer, research director, membership and mentoring director, publicity director, and newsletter editor.