Kevin Zhengcheng LIU
Mr. Kevin Zhengcheng LIU
Economics
Research Postgraduate Student
Programme

3-year PhD

Field of Study

Economics

Research Interests
  • Development Economics
  • Political Economy
  • Public Economics
  • Economic History
Education
  • MPhil in Social Science, The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology
  • BA, Peking University
Recent Publications
The Making of Bad Gentry: The Abolition of Keju, Local Governance, and Anti-Elite Protests, 1902–1911

This paper investigates the impact of the abolition of the civil service exam on local governance in early twentieth-century China. Before the abolition, local elites collected surtaxes that financed local public goods, but they were supervised by the state and could lose candidacy for higher status if they engaged in corrupt behavior. This prospect of upward mobility (POUM) gave them incentives to behave well, which the abolition of the exam removed. Using anti-elite protests as a proxy for the deterioration of local governance, we find that prefectures with a higher POUM experienced more incidents of anti-elite protests after the abolition.