David Shambaugh



David Shambaugh is an internationally recognized authority and author on contemporary China and the international relations of Asia. He has visited or lived in China every year since 1979 and has traveled extensively throughout Asia, Europe, and Latin America.

David is presently Professor of Political Science & International Affairs and the founding Director of the China Policy Program in the Elliott School of International Affairs at George Washington University. From 1996-2016 he was also a Nonresident Senior Fellow in the Foreign Policy Studies Program at The Brookings Institution. Prior to his Washington appointments, David was Reader in Chinese Politics at the University of London’s School of Oriental & African Studies (SOAS), where he also served as Editor of The China Quarterly.

He has served on the Board of Directors of the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations, and is a life member of the Council on Foreign Relations, U.S. Asia-Pacific Council, and other public policy and scholarly organizations. David has been selected for numerous awards and grants, including as a Fellow at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, a Senior Scholar by the Phi Beta Kappa Society, a Senior Fulbright Scholar (Chinese Academy of Social Sciences), and a Distinguished Research Professor at the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences. He has received research grants from the Ford Foundation, Rockefeller Foundation, Smith Richardson Foundation, German Marshall Fund, British Academy, U.S. National Academy of Sciences, and has been a visiting scholar or professor at universities in Australia, China, Hong Kong, Italy, Japan, Singapore, and Russia. An active public intellectual, David is an active public speaker and frequent commentator in the international media. He serves on numerous editorial boards, and has been a consultant to governments, research institutions, foundations, universities, corporations, banks, and investment funds.

As an author, David has published more than 30 books, including most recently China’s Future and The China Reader: Rising Power (both 2016). His China Goes Global: The Partial Power (2013) was selected by The Economist, Foreign Affairs, and Bloomberg News as one of the "Best Books of the Year" and Fareed Zakaria’s CNN program GPS as Best Book of the Week. Other books include Tangled Titans: The United States and China (2012, selected by CHOICE as a "Best Academic Book of the Year"); Charting China’s Future: Domestic & International Challenges (2011); China’s Communist Party: Atrophy & Adaptation (2008); and International Relations of Asia (2008, 2014); Power Shift: China & Asia’s New Dynamics (2005). He has also authored more than 20 reports, 200 scholarly articles and chapters, more than 150 newspaper op-eds, and more than 50 book reviews.

David received his B.A. in East Asian Studies from the Elliott School of International Affairs at George Washington University, M.A. in International Affairs from Johns Hopkins University Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), and Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Michigan. He is a fluent speaker of Chinese, with some German and French.

Links for David Shambaugh
US-China Relations and the Dynamics of East Asia
2016 Fall Symposium.


This page last modified January 15, 2017 jdb