Dr Ye Liu is a Reader in the Department of International Development. Before joining King's, she was a Senior Lecturer in International Education at Bath Spa University (2013–2016) and a Lecturer in Contemporary Chinese Studies at University College Cork, Ireland, where she also served as Director of the BA programme in Chinese Studies (2012–2013).

A recipient of early-career awards—including the 2014 Junior Sociologist Prize from the Research Committee on Women in Society of the International Sociological Association and the 2014 SRHE Newer Researcher Award—Ye holds a PhD in Comparative Sociology from the Institute of Education, University of London.

Her research has been published in leading academic journals, including Sociology, Work, Employment & Society, International Affairs, The British Journal of Sociology of Education, Comparative Education Review, Higher Education, and International Journal of Educational Development.

Beyond academia, Ye has written for The Conversation, Foreign Affairs, and The Diplomat. Her research has been featured in The Financial Times, The Guardian, BBC News, The New York Times, and Times Higher Education. She has also appeared on BBC Radio 4 Woman’s Hour, BBC The Why Factor, the National Committee on US-China Relations Podcast, and the China Changing Festival at the Southbank Centre.

Research

• Gender relations
• Work-family conflicts
• Demographic policies
• Education
• Social and political trust

Ye’s research focuses on the long-term consequences of China’s unprecedented demographic experiment—the one-child policy—on gender relations, social attitudes (including social and political trust), and demographic challenges. Her first book ‘Higher Education, Meritocracy and Inequality in China’ (Springer, 2016) explores how educational policies and the notion of meritocracy intersect to reproduce socioeconomic, gender and geographical inequalities through China’s highly selective gaokao examination system.

She is currently working on a book manuscript that examines an often-overlooked demographic in China: women without siblings—particularly those without brothers. By tracing the life-course transitions of siblingless women from China’s first one-child generation, the book explores the unintended consequences of state policies, the resilience and adaptability of women within patriarchal systems, and the enduring struggle to reconcile talent and virtue in contemporary womanhood.

Teaching

Undergraduate

• 4YYD0004 Social and Political Analysis of Emerging Economies
• 5YYD0007 China and Development

Postgraduate

• 7YYDN035 Topics in the Analysis of Emerging Economies

PhD supervision

Ye welcomes prospective research students interested in topics such as gender relations in East Asian societies, fertility issues and demographic policies in East Asia, social and political trust in China, and the intersections of gender, post-industrialisation, and skills formation.

Her current PhD students include:

• Jettawat Pravat
• Yiqing Liu
• Dwinanda Swasono
• Xiaodong Bao
• Bowen Xia

Expertise and public engagement activities

• Gender relations in China
• Fertility and demographic challenges in China
• Social and political trust in China
• Education policy and inequality in China

Further details

See Ye's research profile