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Staff Profile

Dr Ka Ming Chan

Lecturer in Comparative Politics

  • Email: ka-ming.chan@ncl.ac.uk
  • Personal Website: https://www.kmchan.page/
  • Address: Room 4.47
    Henry Daysh Building
    School of Geography, Politics and Sociology (Politics)
    Newcastle University
    Newcastle upon Tyne, NE1 7RX
    United Kingdom
Background

I am a Lecturer (Assistant Professor) in Comparative Politics at the School of Geography, Politics, and Sociology, Newcastle University. I am one of the convenors of the Governance and Political Organisations (GPO) Cluster at Newcastle University. Since 2023, I have been serving on the Early Career Researcher Board of Political Psychology. 


Before joining Newcastle, I was a postdoctoral fellow at the Consortium on Electoral Democracy (C-Dem) in Canada. I obtained my PhD in Political Science at LMU Munich in June 2022. During my graduate study, I was a visiting researcher at Berlin Social Science Center (WZB).



I am happy to supervise students who investigate on topics that align with my research interests.

Research

Broadly speaking, I study public opinion and political behaviour. My substantive research interest lies in the intersection of autocratization, radical politics, and information updating during elections. In terms of methodology, I often use surveys and causal inference. 


I am currently working on a project called “Spillover in an Autocratization Age (SpAA)”. It studies how citizens in multi-level systems update various events (e.g. US Capitol insurrection; military coups; authoritarians/oppositions' electoral victories). As these events took place in an international system, I analyze whether and how these events change citizens’ political attitudes and behaviour across borders. Overall, this project aims to challenge the state-centred assumption that underlies the autocratization literature.


My other projects further explore how citizens and political elites react to autocratization at the domestic level. In particular, I am interested in whether and how citizens and political elites update their perceptions, political attitudes and behaviour during autocratization. Have a look at my publication page to learn more about my research works.


My works have received awards from the PSA Specialist Group on Autocracy and Regime Change and the American Association for Public Opinion Research (AAPOR). My research has been funded by various institutions, including DAAD (German Academic Exchange Service), European Survey Research Association, the German Federal Foreign Office, and Heinz und Sybille Laufer Foundation.

Teaching

Teaching Statement

One key of my teaching approach is to require students to organize, visualize, and analyze different kinds of data in their assignments and group projects. I often direct students to various sources of datasets that are of their interest. In the guiding process, I suggest under-explored questions that can be answered by these datasets. These skills of data analysis are indispensable for students’ success in jobs inside and outside of the academy. 

Another key of my teaching approach is to include teaching material that promotes equity, diversity, inclusion, and decolonization. I always include literature and examples of non-Western countries. Very often, these non-Western cases can widen students’ horizons and generate new perspectives. On the other hand, when I deliver lectures related to Western countries, I ask students to consider whether underrepresented social groups behave differently and how. By doing so, students will put themselves into the shoes of these underrepresented groups, which can deepen their understanding of the subject matter.



Courses Taught

POL8025   Autocratisation in Global Politics

POL2111 Democracy or Autocracy? What are the differences and how do we analyse them


Publications