Professor Zhao will draw on his new book, The Dragon Roars Back: Transformational Leaders and Dynamics of Chinese Foreign Policy, to trace the dramatic shifts in China’s foreign policy since its founding in 1949 and the key roles played by Mao Zedong, Deng Xiaoping and Xi Jinping. Each of these transformational leaders reshaped foreign policy to better fit their aims for China. His presentation will focus on Xi Jinping’s power concentration and its implications for Chinese foreign policy.

Suisheng Zhao is a Professor and Director of the Center for China-US Cooperation at Josef Korbel School of International Studies, University of Denver. He is the founder and editor of the Journal of Contemporary China and the author and editor of more than two dozen of books. His most recent book is The Dragon Roars Back: Transformational Leaders and Dynamics of Chinese Foreign Policy (Stanford University Press, 2023). A Post-Doctoral Campbell National Fellow at Hoover Institution of Stanford University, he received his PhD degree in political science from the University of California-San Diego, an MA degree in Sociology from the University of Missouri, and BA and MA degrees in economics from Peking University.