On April 20-21, 2024, the International Conference on Comparative Public Policy, jointly organized by the School of Public Policy and Management of Tsinghua University(Tsinghua SPPM) and the Journal of Comparative Policy Analysis (JCPA), was successfully held at Tsinghua University. Vice President Peng Gang, Tsinghua University, and Iris Geva-May, Founding Editor of JCPA and Distinguished Visiting Professor of Tsinghua SPPM, attended the opening ceremony and delivered welcome remarks. The opening ceremony was moderated by Liu Zhilin, professor of Tsinghua SPPM and co-editor of JCPA.

Peng Gang delivering welcome remark

Peng Gang congratulated on the convening of the International Conference on Comparative Public Policy on the occasion of the 113th anniversary of Tsinghua University and welcomed experts and scholars attending the conference from China and abroad. Peng also congratulated Tsinghua SPPM as the new host institution of the JCPA journal. Peng recognized that the theme of this conference carried strong practical significance and forward-looking insights, and was of great importance in promoting international academic exchanges and cooperation at Tsinghua University. It would contribute Tsinghua's wisdom and strength to building a more open, inclusive, and collaborative international academic community.

Iris Geva-May delivering welcome remark

Iris Geva-May welcomed all conference participants on behalf of JCPA, and stated that JCPA being hosted at Tsinghua reflected JCPA editorial board’s recognition of Tsinghua University for its academic research and global influence. She looked forward to the further development of JCPA in collaboration with Tsinghua University in the future.

Dean Zhu Xufeng of Tsinghua SPPM and Iris Geva-May exchanged the hosting agreement.

Group photo at the opening ceremony

This conference was held to celebrate the 25th anniversary of JCPA as an opportunity. Themed "Comparative Public Policy at the Age of Advanced Technologies", the conference was the first major academic event held by Tsinghua SPPM since it became the host institution of the JCPA journal. More than 150 scholars from 21 countries participated in the conference.

Jiang Xiaojuan(left) and Guy Peters(right) delivering keynote speeches

The opening ceremony was followed by two keynote speeches moderated by Zhu Junming, Associate Professor and Associate Dean at Tsinghua SPPM. Jiang Xiaojuan, President of the China Society of Industrial Economics, Professor of the University of Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, and former Deputy Secretary-General of the State Council, presented a keynote speech on the topic of “Opportunities and challenges facing public governance in the digital era: Experience from China”. Guy Peters, Maurice Falk Professor of Government at the University of Pittsburgh and founding President of the International Public Policy Association, gave a keynote speech titled “Two and one-half cheers for technological change in policy”.

Tom Christensen(left) and Guillaume Fontaine(right) delivering keynote speeches

The second keynote speech session was moderated by Dai Yixin, Associate Professor of Tsinghua SPPM and Associate Editor of JCPA. Tom Christensen, Professor Emeritus at Department of Political Science at University of Oslo and Distinguished Visiting Professor of Tsinghua SPPM, delivered a keynote speech titled “Current and future trends of public administration research”. Guillaume Fontaine, Post-Graduate Professor at the Latin American Faculty for Social Sciences in Quito, Ecuador, presented a keynote speech on “Current trends in methods of comparative policy analysis”.

The roundtable session was moderated by Chen Jidong, Associate Professor at Tsinghua SPPM and Associate Editor of JCPA. Experts and scholars discussed around the theme of "Comparative Public Policy in the Age of AI."

Over two days of the conference, participants shared their most recent research on a wide range of topics including AI and comparative policies, climate policy implementation towards carbon neutrality, equity and social policy, government capacity and reform, environmental policy, and public policy and governance in a total of 33 parallel sessions divided into five rounds . Prior to the official opening of the conference, a JCPA journal editorial board meeting and three career development workshops were also held.

Shawn Drake, JCPA Coordinator, moerated the closing ceremony. Zhu Xufeng, Dean of Tsinghua-SPPM delivered the closing remark . Iris Geva-May and Ana Cecilia De Alba-González, Chair of the Award Selection Committee, jointly announced the list of award-winning papers. Osmany Porto De Oliveira, a professor at the Universidade Federal de São Paulo, and Zhang Youlang, an associate professor at Renmin University of China, represented their research teams to receive the JCPA 2023 Best Paper Award and the Best Conference Paper Award, respectively.

Award Ceremony for the Best Paper of the Year 2023 in the JCPA Journal

Award Ceremony for the Best Conference Paper at the International Conference on Comparative Public Policy

Group photo at the closing ceremony