The Dean of Shandong

Confessions of a Minor Bureaucrat at a Chinese University

By: Daniel A. Bell

Narrated by: Wyntner Woody

This audiobook narrated by Wyntner Woody provides an inside view of Chinese academia and what it reveals about China’s political system

On January 1, 2017, Daniel Bell was appointed dean of the School of Political Science and Public Administration at Shandong University—the first foreign dean of a political science faculty in mainland China’s history. In The Dean of Shandong, Bell chronicles his experiences as what he calls “a minor bureaucrat,” offering an inside account of the workings of Chinese academia and what they reveal about China’s political system. It wasn’t all smooth sailing—Bell wryly recounts sporadic bungles and misunderstandings—but Bell’s post as dean provides a unique vantage point on China today.

Bell, neither a Chinese citizen nor a member of the Chinese Communist Party, was appointed as dean because of his scholarly work on Confucianism—but soon found himself coping with a variety of issues having little to do with scholarship or Confucius. These include the importance of hair color and the prevalence of hair-dyeing among university administrators, both male and female; Shandong’s drinking culture, with endless toasts at every shared meal; and some unintended consequences of an intensely competitive academic meritocracy. As dean, he also confronts weightier matters: the role at the university of the Party secretary, the national anticorruption campaign and its effect on academia (Bell asks provocatively, “What’s wrong with corruption?”), and formal and informal modes of censorship. Considering both the revival of Confucianism in China over the last three decades and what he calls “the Communist comeback” since 2008, Bell predicts that China’s political future is likely to be determined by both Confucianism and Communism.

©2023 Daniel A. Bell (P)2023 Princeton University Press

Critic reviews

“In The Dean of Shandong, Daniel Bell takes us where few Westerners have gone—into the faculty lounge, teaching rooms, and party meetings of a Chinese university in the era of Xi Jinping. Think Lucky Jim meets Brave New World: Bell’s account of life as a senior Western academic in a Chinese university is by turns humane, disturbing, hilarious—and always eye-opening.”—Rana Mitter, author of Forgotten Ally: China’s World War II, 1937-1945

“If you think a book about a ‘minor educational bureaucrat’ in provincial China must be dull, think again. This is a sparkling, compulsively readable book about how an Oxford-educated Canadian political scientist became the leading theorist of political Confucianism in China. Bell’s story is charming and filled with self-deprecating humor, but it is also remarkably courageous, given the current climate. It will leave you with a sense that you understand the Chinese and the Chinese system much better than you did before.”—James Hankins, author of Virtue Politics: Soulcraft and Statecraft in Renaissance Italy

“Bell offers a fascinating glimpse into the workings of a Chinese university as both an insider (a dean) and an outsider (a Canadian). Along the way he treats, with a light hand, the cultural and philosophical underpinnings of contemporary China. This is a book anyone interested in that country will enjoy.”—Shadi Bartsch, author of Plato Goes to China: The Greek Classics and Chinese Nationalism

A must listen for expats

Currently teaching in China and hoping to assend the ladder of success, some need insight into the possibility was need. The book is a short compilation of anecdotal essays from a foreign teachers journey through China over the past 20 specifically highlighting the past decade.