The Politics of Piracy:
Intellectual Property in Contemporary China
9:00 a.m., Friday, Sept. 21, 2007
Webster Hall Auditorium
Admission: free

One of the principal assumptions about Sino-U.S. trade negotiations is that once the U.S. and China come to an agreement, the degree to which implementation will be successful is a function of Beijing’s will. Professor Mertha argues that this assumption is fundamentally flawed, that policy implementation is shaped by the actual contours of particular bureaucracies, quite independent of Beijing’s preferences. He uses the case of intellectual property to illustrate these claims.

Dr. Andrew Mertha is an assistant professor of political science at Washington University in St. Louis. He has a B.A. and a Ph.D. from the University of Michigan and is the author of two books: Water Warriors: Political Pluralization in China’s Hydropower Policy (estimated publication date, March 2008) and The Politics of Piracy: Intellectual Property in Contemporary China. He has been a visiting scholar at Beijing University’s Research Center for Contemporary China and at Stanford’s Asia/Pacific Research Center.