Comparative Politics & Methodology
Dissertation Title: "Collective Action in Autocracies: The Case of Workers and Strikes in China"
Committee: Mary Gallagher (co-chair); Nahomi Ichino (co-chair, Emory University); Christian Davenport, David Miller (Economics), Xiaohong Xu (Sociology)
Summary: Yuequan Guo is a Ph.D. candidate in Political Science at the University of Michigan. His research investigates two questions: 1) how do ordinary people overcome barriers to collective action and mobilize in autocracies, and 2) what reduces repressive activities by authoritarian states. Specifically, he examines how Chinese workers initiate strikes despite limited external support, how strikes spread in the hinterland of China, and how workers in the hinterland resist pressure from employers in new ways. Addressing the two theoretical questions in the context of China also leads him to study the domestic migration of Chinese workers, which disseminates the knowledge and experience of collective action and changes the cost and benefit of repressive activities for government officials. He approaches these questions with a variety of methods, including formal theory, statistical models, network analysis, and ethnography. For more information, please visit https://yuequanguo.com.
