CHRISTOPHER CAIRNS. Curriculum Vitae

Transcription

1 CHRISTOPHER CAIRNS Curriculum Vitae Cornell University Department of Government Ithaca, NY (970) EDUCATION Ph.D Cornell University (Government), expected 2016 Major Field: Comparative Politics Minor Field: International Relations M.A. Cornell University (Government), 2015 M.Sc London School of Economics and Political Science (Human Rights), 2008 B.S. Georgetown University, School of Foreign Service (International Politics), 2007 DISSERTATION ABSTRACT Title: Authoritarian Adaptation to the Social Media Shock : Selective Censorship of Chinese Microblogs Social media s rise has toppled or shaken regimes in the Arab world and forced autocrats everywhere to respond. While these tools protest-facilitating characteristics are well known, just as pivotal is how young, well-educated netizens in Iran, Russia, China and elsewhere are using social media longer-term to demand better governance and quality of life. Going beyond existing society-centric research, this project considers how ruling elites respond to this challenge. Why have some rulers (North Korea) chosen to crudely throttle social networks, others (Egypt) left them mostly open, while still others (China) adopted sophisticated co-optation strategies? I address the above question through a case study of China. Through elite interviews with Chinese practitioners of social media, and quantitative analysis of original microblog data, I find that the ruling Communist Party is successfully adapting to social media by effecting a strategy of selective censorship. While the Party has clear incentives to maintain tight censorship overall, its motivation for periodically relaxing control is less intuitive: I argue that by selectively allowing discussion, leaders implicitly signal their serious intent to carry out the sort of reforms citizens demand. I additionally find that both elite beliefs/ideologies, and bureaucratic structure are key determinants in Chinese leaders will and ability to censor selectively. 1

2 PUBLICATIONS Real World Islands in a Social Media Sea: Nationalism and Censorship on Weibo during the 2012 Diaoyu/Senkaku Crisis (first author, with Allen Carlson). China Quarterly, forthcoming March Review of Kong, Shuyu. Popular Media, Social Emotion, and Public Discourse in Contemporary China. Asiascape: Digital Asia, 2 (2015), pp GRANTS AND FELLOWSHIPS Doctoral Dissertation Research Improvement Grant, National Science Foundation, Dissertation project title: Authoritarian Accountability 2.0: Has the Internet s Rise Strengthened the Chinese Communist Party? Chinese Government Scholarship, PRC Ministry of Education, Cornell EAP Area Studies Fellowship (Lee Teng-Hui), Cornell East Asia Program, International Research Travel Grant, Cornell Einaudi Center for International Studies, 2014 Houston I. Flournoy Graduate Fellowship, Cornell University, 2013 Cornell Graduate School Conference Travel Grant, 2013 Foreign Language Area Studies (FLAS) Fellowship, U.S. Department of Education, Sage Fellowship, Cornell University (Graduate School funding), WORKING PAPERS Hazy Messaging: Framing Air Pollution Crises on Chinese Social Media (with Elizabeth Plantan). Testing Control 2.0 : Why Chinese Authorities Allow or Suppress New and Old Media Coverage of Labor Disputes (with Manfred Elfstrom). Let a Thousand Dissertations Bloom! : Humor and Sarcasm in Chinese Social Media during the 2012 Sino-Japanese Diaoyudao/Senkaku Dispute (with Prof. Allen Carlson). Revise and Resubmit at Asian Survey. RESEARCH INTERESTS The impact of the Internet and social media on authoritarian regime durability Chinese politics: elite politics; bureaucratic processes; and political participation New media and state-society relations 2

3 Nationalism and public opinion under authoritarianism (focus on China and East Asia) Big data and machine learning approaches to social science PROSPECTIVE COURSE OFFERINGS Contemporary Chinese Politics (Intro Undergraduate, or Upper Undergrad/Grad Seminar) Social Media and Political Change in Comparative Perspective Introduction to Comparative Politics Introduction to International Relations China in World Politics Introduction to Probability and Statistics (Graduate and Undergraduate) Computational Content Analysis for Social Science Nationalism and Foreign Policy TEACHING EXPERIENCE Teaching Assistant, Introduction to International Relations (undergraduate) for Professor Peter Katzenstein, Fall 2015 Teaching Assistant, China and the World (undergraduate) for Professor Allen Carlson, Spring 2014 Teaching Assistant, China Under Revolution and Reform (undergraduate) for Professor Andrew Mertha, Fall 2013 FIELD RESEARCH Seven months in China (five in Beijing, two in Hong Kong/Guangdong), CONFERENCES AND WORKSHOPS Midwest Political Science Association Annual Conference, Chicago, IL, April Paper: Hazy Messaging: Framing Air Pollution Crises on Chinese Social Media (with Elizabeth Plantan) American Political Science Association Annual Meeting, Washington, DC, August Paper #1: Strikes, Social Media and the Press: Why Chinese Authorities Allow or Suppress New and Old Media Coverage of Labor Disputes (with Manfred Elfstrom) Paper #2: Real World Islands in a Social Media Sea: Nationalism and Censorship on Weibo during the 2012 Diaoyu/Senkaku Crisis (with Allen Carlson) Association of Asian Studies (AAS) Annual Meeting, Philadelphia, PA, March

4 Paper: Real World Islands in a Social Media Sea: Nationalism and Censorship on Weibo during the 2012 Diaoyu/Senkaku Crisis (with Allen Carlson) Symposium on the China-Japan Border Dispute over the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands. Center for East Asia & Pacific Studies, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, April Paper: Real World Islands in a Social Media Sea: New Developments in Chinese Discussions of Foreign Policy and the Diaoyu/Senkaku Islands Dispute (with Allen Carlson) UCLA Comparative Politics Association COMPASS Conference, Los Angeles, CA, March Paper: Air Pollution, Social Media, and Responsive Authoritarianism in China SERVICE AND CONSULTING WORK Cornell Institute for Social and Economic Research (CISER) Statistical Software Consultant, August 2015 July 2016 (expected) Guest lecturer on content analysis and statistical methods for social science (sentiment analysis, and time series analysis) at the Center for Social Media Research, School of Journalism and Communications, Peking University, Beijing, China, November Also advised Center s master s and undergraduate students on review of extant research on social media measurement. Cornell East Asia Program Graduate Student Steering Committee (EAP-GSSC), Provided organizing and logistical support for workshop Studying China from the Outside In and Inside Out hosted by Cornell Government Department, Ithaca, NY, May LANGUAGES AND SKILLS English (native) Mandarin Chinese (highly proficient listen, speak, read; proficient write) Spanish (highly proficient) German (proficient) Statistical software (Stata advanced including statistical programming, R proficient, SAS) DISSERTATION COMMITTEE Committee Chair: Andrew Mertha Professor, Department of Government Director, the China and Asia-Pacific Studies (CAPS) Program, Cornell University

5 Allen Carlson Associate Professor, Department of Government, Cornell University Daniela Stockmann Associate Professor, Department of Political Science, Leiden University, The Netherlands +31 (0) Peter Enns Associate Professor, Department of Government, Cornell University Departmental Contact: Tina Slater Graduate Field Assistant, Department of Government, Cornell University PREVIOUS EMPLOYMENT Web Content Producer and Social Media Manager, Institute of International Education (IIE), New York, June 2009 August 2011 Associate Digital Strategist, Blue State Digital, Washington, D.C., January May,