Yao Lu

Professor Lu received her PhD in sociology and MS in public health from UCLA. Her research focuses on how migration intersects with social and political processes in China. Her current work examines how rural-to-urban migration and return migration shapes collective action and state-society relations in rural China, how the feminization of migration reconfigures gender attitudes and practices, and how the migration of parents affects family dynamics and the well-being of left-behind children and migrant children.

Professor Lu’s recent publications on China include “Empowerment or Disintegration? Migration, Social Institutions, and Collective Action in Rural China,” American Journal of Sociology (2019); “Migration and Children’s Psychosocial Development in China: When and Why Migration Matters,” Social Science Research (2019); “Organizational Structure and Collective Action: Lineage Networks, Semi-autonomous Civic Associations, and Collective Resistance in Rural China,” American Journal of Sociology (2017); “Migration and Popular Resistance in Rural China: Wukan and Beyond,” China Quarterly (2017); “Female Migration, Cultural Context, and Son Preference in Rural China,” Population Research and Policy Review (2015); and “Emigration from China in Comparative Perspective,” Social Forces (2013).