About the Student Seminar Series

Our Student Seminar Series offers emerging China scholars an opportunity to engage directly with interdisciplinary faculty and peers from across campus to discuss and receive feedback on their research. Each seminar features one or several PhD students presenting their latest empirical findings on issues related to China’s economy. Past topics have included college major selection as an obstacle to socioeconomic mobility, the effect of a cooling-off period on marriage outcomes, and factors contributing to government corruption. Faculty and senior scholars provide comments and feedback for improvement. This event series helps to build and strengthen Stanford’s community of young researchers working on China.

Student Seminars are held on select Fridays from 12 - 1 pm. Lunch will be provided! 

Visit the Student Seminar Series webpage for more information on the content and format of the series and to learn how to sign up to present. 

About the Student Seminar Series

Our Student Seminar Series offers emerging China scholars an opportunity to engage directly with interdisciplinary faculty and peers from across campus to discuss and receive feedback on their research. Each seminar features one or several PhD students presenting their latest empirical findings on issues related to China’s economy. Past topics have included college major selection as an obstacle to socioeconomic mobility, the effect of a cooling-off period on marriage outcomes, and factors contributing to government corruption. Faculty and senior scholars provide comments and feedback for improvement. This event series helps to build and strengthen Stanford’s community of young researchers working on China.

Student Seminars are held on select Fridays from 12 - 1 pm. Lunch will be provided! 

Visit the Student Seminar Series webpage for more information on the content and format of the series and to learn how to sign up to present. 

About the Student Seminar Series

Our Student Seminar Series offers emerging China scholars an opportunity to engage directly with interdisciplinary faculty and peers from across campus to discuss and receive feedback on their research. Each seminar features one or several PhD students presenting their latest empirical findings on issues related to China’s economy. Past topics have included college major selection as an obstacle to socioeconomic mobility, the effect of a cooling-off period on marriage outcomes, and factors contributing to government corruption. Faculty and senior scholars provide comments and feedback for improvement. This event series helps to build and strengthen Stanford’s community of young researchers working on China.

Student Seminars are held on select Fridays from 12 - 1 pm. Lunch will be provided! 

Visit the Student Seminar Series webpage for more information on the content and format of the series and to learn how to sign up to present. 

Topic: TBD 

Speaker: TBD

Abstract TBD 

About the Student Seminar Series

Our Student Seminar Series offers emerging China scholars an opportunity to engage directly with interdisciplinary faculty and peers from across campus to discuss and receive feedback on their research. Each seminar features one or several PhD students presenting their latest empirical findings on issues related to China’s economy. Past topics have included college major selection as an obstacle to socioeconomic mobility, the effect of a cooling-off period on marriage outcomes, and factors contributing to government corruption. Faculty and senior scholars provide comments and feedback for improvement. This event series helps to build and strengthen Stanford’s community of young researchers working on China.

Student Seminars are held on select Fridays from 12 - 1 pm. Lunch will be provided! 

Visit the Student Seminar Series webpage for more information on the content and format of the series and to learn how to sign up to present. 

About the event: Why do adversaries sometimes cooperate to restrain their military competition? Why do they design arms control agreements with intrusive verification in some cases but rely on minimal transparency in others? Amidst ongoing international competition, arms control remains rare despite potential mutual benefits, and agreements vary dramatically in their approaches to monitoring. This book reveals how uncertainty from domestic political changes - such as leadership transitions or social unrest - can enable arms control. It identifies two paths to agreement: during periods of uncertainty, states that previously relied on informal understandings hedge by establishing lightly-monitored agreements, while those that anticipated deception take calculated risks through agreements with intensive verification. Through comprehensive data analysis and rich case studies, Jane Vaynman challenges conventional wisdom about uncertainty in international relations while offering insights for policymakers. As states confront challenges from nuclear competition to emerging technologies, understanding when arms control becomes viable is more vital than ever.

About the speaker: Dr. Jane Vaynman is an Assistant Professor of Strategic Studies at the School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) at Johns Hopkins University. Dr. Vaynman’s work focuses on security cooperation between adversarial states, the design of arms control agreements, and the effects of technology on patterns of international cooperation and competition. From 2022-2024, she served as a senior advisor in the Bureau of Arms Control, Deterrence, and Stability at the U.S. Department of State. Her prior academic appointments include the Department of Political Science at Temple University and the Elliott School of International Affairs, George Washington University. She was also previously a Lightning Scholar at Perry World House at the University of Pennsylvania, a Stanton Nuclear Security Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, and a Fulbright Fellow at the Carnegie Moscow Center. Dr. Vaynman received her Ph.D. in political science from Harvard University and B.A. in international relations from Stanford University.

 All CISAC events are scheduled using the Pacific Time Zone.

No filming or recording without express permission from speaker.

About the event: This talk will discuss recent advancements in AI for biology, and relevant security and oversight considerations. It will also discuss how policy can be used to incentivize and shape technology development for defensive purposes, clarifying how the colloquial "defensive acceleration" or d/acc concept in AI circles relates to formal offense-defense balance concepts.

About the speaker: Dr. Pannu is an Assistant Professor at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and Senior Scholar at the Center for Health Security. She is currently Director of Frontier Safety at the Chan Zuckerberg Biohub, a philanthropic research organization focused on AI for biology. Dr. Pannu’s primary areas of research include biosecurity, pandemic preparedness, and emerging technology security and governance. Dr. Pannu previously worked on AI-enabled diagnostics at Google and has served as a subject-matter expert for the National Academies of Sciences, the EU AI Office, and the Bipartisan Commission on Biodefense, among others. She serves on the board of Blueprint Biosecurity, a nonprofit dedicated to achieving breakthroughs in humanity's ability to prevent pandemics. Dr. Pannu regularly briefs government officials and policymakers on emerging technologies with security implications, including artificial intelligence and synthetic biology.

 All CISAC events are scheduled using the Pacific Time Zone.

No filming or recording without express permission from speaker.

SCCEI Seminar Series (Spring 2027)

Friday, April 2, 2027 | 12:00 pm -1:20 pm Pacific Time
Goldman Room E409, Encina Hall, 616 Jane Stanford Way

About the Speaker 
 

Daniel Mattingly is Associate Professor of Political Science at Yale University. He studies the domestic and international politics of authoritarian regimes, with a focus on China. He is the author of The Art of Political Control in China (Cambridge University Press, 2020), which examines how the Chinese state controls protests and implements ambitious social policies. It was named one of the best books of 2020 by Foreign Affairs and received the best book award from the Democracy and Autocracy Section of the American Political Science Association. His current book project examines the role of the military in China’s domestic and international politics. He received a Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley, and a B.A. from Yale University.

Questions? Contact Xinmin Zhao at xinminzhao@stanford.edu