Bo Wen

Prof. Bo WEN is currently an Associate Professor in the Department of Government and Public Administration at the University of Macau (UM), with a disciplinary focus on public management and institutional analysis. Prior to his arrival at UM, Prof. Wen held the position of Assistant Professor (tenure-track) in the Department of Public and International Affairs (formerly known as the Department of Public Policy) at the City University of Hong Kong (CityU). Prof. Wen studied at the University of Southern California (USC) where he earned his Ph.D. in public policy and management. He received his master’s degree in public policy from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and his bachelor’s degree in mass communication and journalism from Shenzhen University (SZU).

Prof. Wen’s work appears in renowned SSCI, SCI, and CSSCI journals. His scholarly contributions are in forms of award-winning original articles, commentaries, review papers, and book chapters in the fields of political science, applied economics, human-computer interaction, organizational behavior, regulatory governance, and China studies. In addition to his scholarly accomplishments, Prof. Wen has also achieved great success in securing extramural grants. He is serving as the Principal Investigator (PI) of an NSFC (Natural Science Foundation of China) project and a Co-Investigator (Co-I) for GRF (General Research Funds of Hong Kong) and SIRG (Strategic Interdisciplinary Research) projects. It also merits mentioning that Prof. Wen is the recipient of several prestigious recognitions and accolades, including the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Advocacy Award (CPSG), New Researcher Award (CityU), and Outstanding Reviewer Award (Public Administration by Wiley), among others. Prof. Wen’s commitment to the profession is evident through his active involvement in prominent roles. He has been elected as a board member representing countries and areas other than Mainland China and North America for the American Society for Public Administration (ASPA)–Section on Chinese Public Administration (SCPA). Furthermore, he serves as the section editor for Chinese Public Administration Review (C-PAR), demonstrating his dedication to fostering the dissemination of high-quality research in Chinese public administration.

Specifically, Prof. Wen’s research encompasses micro-, meso-, and macro-levels of analysis. At the micro-level, his primary focus is on human resource management in the public sector, which has gained significant popularity and become a dominant theme in public management research. One of his recent projects, funded by NSFC, aims to establish consensus among scholars regarding the measurement properties and performance-related effects of public service motivation (PSM) in the Chinese context, aligning with the scholarly call for localized PSM theories. At the organizational level, Prof. Wen’s research emphasizes the regulatory governance of environmental, energy, and housing policies. He firmly believes that effective programs resulting from policies require a well-functioning regulatory component that establishes reasonable rules, ensures faithful enforcement, and enables close monitoring to overcome collective action dilemmas. In a qualitative study conducted by Prof. Wen as a sole author, he argues that the weak enforcement of environmental regulations at the local level can be attributed to three longstanding and unaddressed shortcomings: a shortage of budgeted staff, a lack of personal security, and a lack of motivation among officials. Furthermore, the bureaucratic counterstrategies initially designed to address these problems have ironically given rise to new enforcement dilemmas. On a macro-level, Prof. Wen’s academic interests converge on issues related to institutional design and analysis. Given China’s vast size and imbalanced development, the establishment of a robust institutional setup becomes paramount in effectively addressing a multitude of governance challenges. An illustrative example of Prof. Wen’s work is a co-authored publication featured in a prestigious area study journal. In this paper, they summarize a series of policies and measures implemented by China in line with the 18^th Party Congress to pursue fugitives who have fled the country and to recover stolen assets. Notably, the research underscores the significant impact of China’s anti-money laundering (AML) measures in optimizing the efficiency of other strategies, resulting in successful efforts to pursue corrupt officials who have sought refuge abroad.

Looking ahead, Prof. Wen is committed to embracing the challenges of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, acknowledging the widening digital divide among different socioeconomic groups, and addressing emerging governance issues in this dynamic and transformative era. He is thus determined to step outside his comfort zone and collaborate with scholars from diverse disciplines who share a common vision. Notable examples of his ongoing projects include pushing the boundaries of biological public administration and exploring the policy design implications of generative AI. Throughout his published articles and ongoing projects, Prof. Wen maintains an unwavering objective: to identify and examine inherent problems within various political, bureaucratic, technical (algorithmic), and institutional frameworks. His ultimate aspiration is for the team he leads to contribute to a deeper understanding of these challenges and to propose solutions that promote efficiency, equity, participation, and shared prosperity.