Suzanne E. Scoggins is assistant professor of political science and director of Asian studies at Clark University. Her research focuses on policing in reform-era China and explores themes of local governance, state legitimacy, and authoritarian control. Her first book, Policing China: Street-Level Cops in the Shadow of Protest (Cornell University Press and Columbia Weatherhead Series, 2021) examines the paradox of China’s self-projection of a strong security state that prioritizes protest control and stability maintenance to the detriment of other areas of policing. The resulting mismatch of security capacity creates problems of enforcement and safety that ultimately compromise regime goals of stability.
Dr. Scoggins’ academic articles have appeared in Comparative Politics, the China Quarterly, Asian Survey, Europe-Asia Studies, China Law and Society Review, and PS: Political Science & Politics. Her new book manuscript, Constructing State Legitimacy in China, examines police society conflict and the state’s increasingly sophisticated efforts to improve police relations with the public through targeted propaganda campaigns in traditional and new media. Her research and commentary on policing and Chinese politics have also appeared in The Economist, The Diplomat, South China Morning Post, Bloomberg Businessweek, The New York Times, Business Insider, and East Asia Forum, among others.
Dr. Scoggins holds a Ph.D. in political science from the University of California, Berkeley, a master of international and public affairs from the University of Hong Kong, and B.A.s in political science and women’s studies from the University of Georgia. Prior to joining the faculty at Clark in 2016, she was a predoctoral fellow at Stanford University’s Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law.