Professor Liu Hong Recognised Among World’s Top 2% Scientists for Sixth Consecutive Year

Widely regarded as one of the most authoritative measures of scholarly influence worldwide, the Stanford–Elsevier World’s Top 2% Scientists List for 2025 celebrates the most impactful researchers across all fields of science and scholarship. Professor Liu Hong, Tan Lark Sye Chair Professor in Public Policy and Global Affairs at the School of Social Sciences and Director (Research and Executive Education) at the Nanyang Centre for Public Administration who also holds a courtesy appointment at the School of Humanities, has once again been included for both “Career-long Citation Impact” and “Single-Year Citation Impact.” This marks the sixth consecutive year he has been featured in the single-year rankings and the fifth consecutive year in the career-long rankings — a testament to his sustained global impact and enduring contributions to research on governance, transnational networks, and global Asia.

Professor Liu’s scholarship sits at the confluence of cultural analysis, political economy, and historical inquiry, and the scope of recognition in 2025 reflects the depth and reach of his work in the Social Sciences as a main field. In the subfield of Cultural Studies — an interdisciplinary field of academic inquiries covering globalization, migration studies, area studies, and the studies of power and identity etc, which forms a core of his intellectual contribution — Professor Liu is ranked 30th among 8,313 scholars worldwide (thus placing him on top 0.4%) for single-year citation impact. He remains within the global top 2% in Economics, Political Science, Public Administration, Sociology, and International Relations. Professor Liu is placed within top 0.1% of 18,820 scholars worldwide in Historical Studies, underscoring the global resonance of his historically- grounded approach to international governance and global Asian studies. Collectively, these recognitions reflect the breadth and coherence of Professor Liu’s work, which bridges disciplinary boundaries and enriches global debates on governance and institutional change — emblematic of NTU’s growing strength in interdisciplinary social science research with a strong focus on Global Asia.

The Stanford–Elsevier list is compiled from comprehensive Scopus data and field-normalised indicators (including h-index and co-authorship-adjusted citation metrics), offering a transparent view of both recent and career-long scholarly impact across 22 broad fields and 174 subfields. The data are derived from publications by 10,933,183 authors for the year of 2024.

More information on the selection criteria and methodology of Top 2% Scientists List can be found: https://elsevier.digitalcommonsdata.com/datasets/btchxktzyw/8  (19 Sep 2025).

Selected recent publications by Professor Liu Hong since 2022:

Journal Articles  

1. Huang Jianan, Cong Cao, and Hong Liu, “Indigenization and the Politics of Inclusion in Chinese Academia,” Nature Human Behaviour, accepted for publication.  

2. Hong Liu and Yao Chao, “From Infrastructure Space to Network Power: Chinese Cross-border Collaborative Special Economic Zones in Southeast Asia,” Asia Europe Journal, , on-line first, August 2025. 

3. Lee, C., Hong Liu, and Van Cao, T, “Applying the Singapore Model in Cambodia and Thailand? Implications for Transnational Policy Transfer,” Public Administration and Development, on-line first, January 2025.   

4. Hong Liu and Miao Chunzi, “Digital Geopolitics in a VUCA World: China Encounters a New Global Order,” Global Policy, vol 15, no. S6 (2024), pp. 67-83.  

5. Hong Liu, Celia Lee, Jeremy Goh, “Introduction: Agile Governance for a Volatile, Uncertain, Complex and Ambiguous World,” Global Policy, vol. 15, S6 (2024), pp. 5-11.  

6. Hong Liu, Xu Chengwei, Lim Guanie, “The China Effect on Regional Economic Integration: A Longitudinal Study of Central, South, and Southeast Asia,”  Journal of the Asia Pacific Economy, vol. 29, no. 4 (2024), pp. 2110-2132.  

7. Hong Liu and Jeremy Goh, “Emerging Business Transnationalism in Singapore and Greater China: Governance, Networks, and Strategies,” Asia and Pacific Business Review, vol. 30, no. 4 (2024), pp. 640-666. 

8. Liu Hong and Zhang Huimei, “Tan Kah Kee and Chinese Business Networks in Southeast Asia,” China Economic Studies, no. 3 (2024), pp. 1-7. [In Chinese].  

9. Liu Hong and Zhang Huimei, “Research on Tan Kah Kee from an Interdisciplinary Perspective,” Journal of Chinese Social and Economic History, no. 2 (2024), pp. 1-6. [In Chinese].  

10. Hong Liu and Na Ren, “Between Positionality and Nudging: A Rising China and Chinese Voluntary Associations in Southeast Asia,” Asia Pacific Viewpoint, vol. 64, no. 3 (2023), pp. 304-316.  

11. Hong Liu and Guanie Lim, “When the State Goes Transnational: The Political Economy of China’s Engagement with Indonesia,” Competition and Change, vol. 27, no. 2 (2023), pp. 402-421.  

13. Hong Liu and Lingli Huang, “Paradox of Superdiversity: Contesting Racism and ‘Chinese Privilege’ in Singapore,” Journal of Chinese Overseas, vol. 18, no. 2 (2022), pp. 287-311.  

14. Hong Liu, “China Engages the Global South: From Bandung to  the Belt and Road Initiative,” Global Policy,  vol. 13 (2022), pp. 11-22.  

15. Hong Liu, Celia Lee, and Chris Alden, “The Dynamics of Governance and Sustainable Development Goals in the Global South,” Global Policy, vol. 13 (2022), pp. 5-10.  

16. Ren Na and Hong Liu, “Southeast Asian Chinese Engage a Rising China: Business Associations, Institutionalised Transnationalism, and the Networked State,” Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, vol. 48, no. 4 (2022), pp. 873-893.  

 

Books

 

1. Hong Liu, Cheun Hoe Yow, and Huimei Zhang, eds., The Making of Singapore as an Asian Regional Corridor: Historicity, Trade, and Diaspora (London: Routledge, forthcoming 2026). 

3. Hong Liu, Celia Lee and Jeremy Goh, eds., ASEAN Centrality and the Revitalisation of Regional Connectivity (Singapore: World Scientific Publishing, 2025). 

4. Liu Hong, The Mobile Borders: Studies in Migration, Culture, and Politics of Identity.  Hangzhou: Zhejiang University Press, 2024. [In Chinese].  

5. Hong Liu, Celia Lee and Jeremy Goh, eds., Governing a Volatile, Uncertain, Complex and Ambiguous World. London: University of Durham and John Wiley, 2024. 

6. Hong Liu, Celia Lee, and Jeremy Goh, eds., Good Governance in the Post COVID-19 World – Global Health and Economic Recovery. Brussels: International Institute of Administrative Sciences (IIAS Public Governance Series), 2023.  

7. Hong Liu, The Political Economy of Transnational Governance: China and Southeast Asia in the 21st  Century. London  and New York: Routledge, 2022.  

8. Ban Guorui [Gregor Benton] and Liu Hong, Dear China: Emigrant Letters and Remittances, 1820-1980. Shanghai: China Publishing Group & Eastern Publishing Centre, 2022. [in Chinese]. [Chinese version of the 2018 Book of the same title published by the University of California Press].  

9. Hong Liu, Tan Kong Yam and Lim Guanie, eds., The Political Economy of Regionalism, Trade, and Infrastructure:  Southeast Asia and the Belt and Road Initiative in a New Era. Singapore: World Scientific Publishing, 2022.  

 

Book Chapters 

 

1. Hong Liu, Cheun Hoe Yow, & Huimei Zhang, “Historicity, Trade and Diaspora in the Making of Singapore as an Asian Regional Corridor: An Introduction,” in idem eds., The Making of Singapore as an Asian Regional Corridor: Historicity, Trade, and Diaspora (London: Routledge, forthcoming 2026). 

2. Hong Liu, “The Belt and Road Initiative from the Perspectives of Political Economy and Business Transnationalism,”  in Yos Santasombat, Kian Cheng Lee, and Decha Tangseefa, eds., China’s BRI in Southeast Asia: Concepts and Methodologies (Kyoto: Kyoto University Press; Boston: Trans Pacific Press, 2025), pp. 233-266. 

3. Hong Liu, “The Chinese Diaspora in Southeast Asia and the Belt and Road Initiative: With Special Reference to Singapore,” in Yos Santasombat and Lee, K. C. (eds) The Impact of China's Belt and Road Initiative in Southeast Asia (Singapore: Springer, 2025), pp. 47-67. 

4. Min Zhou and Hong Liu, “Diasporic Development and Socioeconomic Integration: New Chinese Migrants in a Globalized World,” in Khatharya Um and Chiharu Takenaka, eds., Globalization and Civil Society in East Asian Space (London & New York: Routledge, 2023), pp. 141-161. 

5. Hong Liu, “Identity, Politics, and Transnationalism: Deciphering New Chinese Diaspora in Singapore, 2010-2020,” in Yos Santasombat ed., Transnational Chinese Diaspora in the Era of Globalization (London: Palgrave MacMillan, 2022), pp. 125-152. 

6. Hong Liu, Kong Yam Tan, and Lim  Guanie, “In Pursuit of Regionalism, Trade, and Infrastructure: Southeast Asia, China, and the Belt and Road Initiative in a New Era,” in idem, eds.,  The Political Economy of Regionalism, Trade, and Infrastructure:  Southeast Asia and the Belt and Road Initiative in a New Era (Singapore: World Scientific Publishing, 2022), pp. xxvii-xlvi.