Kyle Jaros

Biography & Research

Kyle A. Jaros is associate professor of global affairs in the Keough School of Global Affairs at the University of Notre Dame. He also serves as interim director of the Keough School's Liu Institute for Asia and Asian Studies. 

Jaros’s research explores the politics of urban and regional development, intergovernmental relations and subnational foreign affairs with a focus on China. His scholarship on China’s subnational development and central-local relations has appeared in leading China studies and social science journals such as The China Journal, The China Quarterly, Journal of Contemporary China, Politics & Society, Publius, and Studies in Comparative International Development. His first book, "China’s Urban Champions: The Politics of Spatial Development" (Princeton University Press, 2019) examined the policy logics and political factors driving uneven development in China’s provinces. Jaros is currently completing a second book project and related articles (with Sara A. Newland) that examine subnational U.S.-China relations during a period of rising tensions.

Jaros holds a concurrent appointment in Notre Dame's Department of Political Science and is a faculty fellow of the Keough School's Kellogg Institute for International Studies.

Before coming to Notre Dame, Jaros was associate professor in the political economy of China at the University of Oxford’s School of Global and Area Studies and held a China Public Policy Postdoctoral Fellowship at the Ash Center of the Harvard Kennedy School. He earned a Ph.D. and M.A. in political science from the Department of Government at Harvard University and an A.B. in public and international affairs and a certificate in Chinese language and culture from Princeton University. He also holds a graduate certificate in Chinese studies from the Hopkins-Nanjing Center for Chinese and American Studies. Jaros is a fellow of the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations Public Intellectuals Program, a former visiting senior fellow for U.S.-China Subnational Relations at the Truman Center (2024), and a former Wilson China Fellow (2022-2023). Jaros is also a member of the editorial boards of Urban Affairs Review and Studies in Comparative International Development.

Recent Work

• "Get China Right at City Hall" (Getting China Right at Home, Addressing the Domestic Challenges of Intensifying Competition)

Courses

• The Political Economy of East Asian Development (undergraduate course)
• Cities, States and Global Governance (undergraduate course and elective for master of global affairs)
• East Asia's Global Cities (elective for undergraduate program in Asian studies)
• Connecting Asia (core course for undergraduate program in Asian studies)
• Research Design for Governance and Policy (required course for governance and policy major, master of global affairs)

News & Media

• "Kyle Jaros named interim director for Liu Institute for Asia and Asian Studies"
• "U.S.-China Subnational Diplomacy: A Conversation with Dr. Kyle Jaros and Dr. Sara Newland" (podcast, Center for Strategic & International Studies)
• "As China Seeks Influence, It Has a Cuddly Way Into City Hall: Pandas" (The New York Times)
• What Trump’s Return Means for U.S.-China Relations  (The U.S.-China Perception Monitor - The Carter Center)
• U.S. states shape foreign policy amid national China unease, research shows (Notre Dame News)
• Kyle Jaros on the Role of of Subnational Relations in US-China Relations (The U.S.-China Perception Monitor - The Carter Center)
• Chinese grieve popular ex-premier Li Keqiang in quiet show of dissent (BBC News)
• California governor's trip shows US-China engagement is still possible on a state level (The Washington Post)