Introduction to Liberalism in the Chinese Context: Potential and Predicaments

Liu Qing (b. 1963) is professor of political science at East China Normal University and a leading liberal public intellectual in China. Born in Shanghai, Liu spent much of his youth in Xinjiangand returned to Shanghai for university, where he earned degrees in chemical engineering before turning to the social sciences. In the 1990s, he studied Western political thought in the United States, obtaining an MA from Marquette University and a PhD from the University of Minnesota. Before joining the faculty of East China Normal University in 2003, Liu was a research associate in the Institute of Chinese Studies at the Chinese University of Hong Kong as well as coeditor of the well- known Hong Kong magazine Ershiyi Shiji (Twenty- first century).