He received his doctoral degree in sociology from the Johns Hopkins University in 2013, where he was a student of Giovanni Arrighi. He also worked at both the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and the State University of New York at Binghamton. His publications focus on labor migration, the hukou system, rural development, land issues, food security, urbanization and state-society relations in China. His research also examines the historical roots of China’s contemporary development problems, and the relationship between China’s domestic dynamics and its international strategy.