Shiran Victoria Shen, Ph.D.

svshen.academic@gmail.com


Assistant Professor

Washington University, Saint Louis

Year of PhD: 2018

Country: United States (Missouri)

Website


Social Media:

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Research Interests

Environmental Policy

Energy And Climate Policy

Public Policy

Development

Air Pollution

Environmental Governance

China

Climate Change Politics

Countries of Interest

China

United States

Uganda

India

Publications:

Journal Articles:

(2024) Social competition drives collective action to reduce informal waste burning in Uganda, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

Improving urban air quality is a pressing challenge in the Global South. A key source of air pollution is the informal burning of household waste. Reducing informal burning requires governments to develop formal systems for waste disposal and for residents to adopt new disposal behaviors. Using a randomized experiment, we show that social competitions between pairs of neighborhoods in Nansana municipality, Uganda, galvanized leadership and inspired collective action to reduce informal burning. All 44 neighborhoods in the study received a public health campaign, while 22 treated neighborhoods were paired and competed to reduce waste burning over an 8-mo period. Treated neighborhoods showed a 24 percent reduction (95% CI: 11 to 35 percent) in waste burning relative to control neighborhoods at the end of the competition period. There is no evidence that treated neighborhoods experienced a rebound in waste burning several months after the competitions. Community leaders reported greater effort in coordinating residents and more pride in their neighborhood when assigned to the competition treatment. These results suggest that creating focal points for leadership and collective action can be an effective and low-cost strategy to address policy problems that require broad participation and costly behavior change.

Books Written:

(2022) The Political Regulation Wave: A Case of How Local Incentives Systematically Shape Air Quality in China, Cambridge University Press

Why has there been uneven success in reducing air pollution even in the same locality over time? This book offers an innovative theorization of how local political incentives can affect bureaucratic regulation. Using empirical evidence, it examines and compares the control of different air pollutants in China-an autocracy-and, to a lesser extent, Mexico-a democracy. Making use of new data, approaches, and techniques across political science, environmental sciences, and engineering, Shen reveals that local leaders and politicians are incentivized to cater to the policy preferences of their superiors or constituents, respectively, giving rise to varying levels of regulatory stringency during the leaders' tenures. Shen demonstrates that when ambiguity dilutes regulatory effectiveness, having the right incentives and enhanced monitoring is insufficient for successful policy implementation. Vividly explaining key phenomena through anecdotes and personal interviews, this book identifies new causes of air pollution and proposes timely solutions. This title is also available as Open Access on Cambridge Core.

Media Appearances:

Radio Appearances:

(2022) Hoover Institution, Stanford University

Join the Hoover Book Club for engaging discussions with leading authors on the hottest policy issues of the day. Hoover scholars explore the latest books that delve into some of the most vexing policy issues facing the United States and the world. Find out what makes these authors tick and how they think we should approach our most difficult challenges. In our latest installment, watch a discussion with Hoover National Fellow Shiran Victoria Shen, author of The Political Regulation Wave: A Case of How Local Incentives Systematically Shape Air Quality in China, moderated by Bill Whalen on Thursday, April 28 at 10AM PT/1:00PM ET.

Newspaper Quotes:

(2021) Agence France-Presse (AFP)

US-China climate pact: What does it mean for Beijing?

(2019) Caixin

Chinese Support Wind Turbines, Just Not in Their Backyard

Blog Posts:

(2024) AirQo Africa

How Social Competitions Can Motivate Sustainable Waste Management

(2022) The Hill

Next steps in US-China climate cooperation

(2021) The Hill

How political science can advance climate models

(2021) Cambridge University Press

Local Actions Central to Achieving Carbon-Neutrality Goal in China

(2021) The Hill

How to process China's underwhelming climate pledge

(2021) The Breakthrough Institute

Deregulation Is Not the Enemy: It Can Be Good for the Economy—and the Environment Too