Research Assistant Internships

APARC Summer Research Assistant Internships

Each summer quarter, Shorenstein APARC offers paid research assistant internships to highly motivated and dedicated Stanford students. RAs work with assigned APARC faculty on projects researching topics related to contemporary Asia and U.S.-Asia relations, including economic, environmental, social, political, foreign policy, security, and health issues. 

You can view below the materials required for our summer RA applications and a sample of the projects for 2025 RAs.

All summer research assistant positions are eight-week, on-campus roles open to current Stanford undergraduate students only (not coterminous). The hourly pay rate will be set in accordance with university policies.

Read on for information about the application process and the research projects for summer 2025 RAs.

Please follow these application guidelines:

I. Prepare the following materials:

• A current CV;
• A cover letter (up to 1 page);
• Completed Student Information Sheet (please enter "N/A" for the "Supervisor Name" field)

II. Fill out the online application form for summer 2025, including the above two attachments, and submit the complete form.

III. Arrange for a letter of recommendation from a faculty to be sent directly to Shorenstein APARC by March 1, 2025. Please note: the faculty members should email their letters directly to Kristen Lee at kllee@stanford.edu. We will consider only applications that include all supporting documents.
 

Summer Research Projects Include:

China’s Largest Corporations – Led by Andrew Walder: For a comparative project on large global corporations focusing on contemporary China, the RA will search internet sources to expand draft case histories of corporations, with English or Chinese web searches, or both. Chinese language facility is useful though not required; the ability to code and analyze data using STATA and Excel is also a plus. The purpose of the project is to identify the distinctive features of China’s largest corporations, both state and private, by examining their formation, structures, ownership, and global reach.

Development, Foreign Investment, and Regional Security in Southeast Asia – Led by David Cohen: The research will focus on international development and investment in Southeast Asia and their linkages to the current political divisions in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) generated by the rivalry of outside powers for political influence and economic advantage. The project would involve research on infrastructure investment by ASEAN's major dialogue partners (Japan, China, United States, South Korea, Australia, and EU) compared with investment in extractive industries, real estate development/land acquisition, energy, and other key areas. The focus will be on Indonesia, Malaysia, Cambodia, the Philippines, Thailand, and Lao PDR.

Evolution of China’s Local State Development – Led by Jean Oi: Seeking an RA for statistical work on a new project about the localities development of new industries, integrated industrial parks, and the Belt and Road (BRI), as well as continuation of research on local finance and local government debt. The responsibilities of the RA would include finding and analyzing relevant data sets, and creating tables and graphs based on questions laid out by the faculty. This would use publicly available data, some of which would be at EAL at Stanford or other electronic databases.  

Healthy Aging in Asia – Led by Karen Eggleston: Seeking an RA for data analysis for health economics research on healthy aging in Asia, including health disparities and intergenerational health transmission (India, China); healthcare and elder care workforce (Japan, Korea); AI for aging-in-place (Korea); productivity of medical spending (Korea, Japan); and the impacts of telehealth, AI-enabled robotics, and health insurance reforms (China, India, Korea, Japan).

The Invisible Role of Nations in the U.S. Academic Field – Led by Gi-Wook Shin and Ruo-Fan Liu: This project investigates the role of states in expanding their soft power within the U.S. academic field, focusing on how nations mobilize elites and resources across borders. We use a mixed-methods approach to interview state actors and elites on their migration patterns. Research assistants will help with interviews and transcription, data coding, and literature review. Language proficiency in Korean, Mandarin, or Japanese is required.

Korea Family Project – Led by Paul Chang: South Korean families have changed dramatically in recent decades. The “demographic crisis” in Korea is reflected in the diversification of household structures, which, in turn, is driven by plummeting fertility and marriage rates. We seek an RA who can read Korean language documents, analyze basic quantitative data, and assist in administrative tasks related to the project.

Security and international relations – Several projects led by Oriana Mastro: RA responsibilities include conducting literature reviews, drafting memos, revising and editing documents, and evaluating English and Chinese language primary and secondary sources relating to China-Russia military relations, Chinese overseas basing, internal forces training, and gathering data on recent tensions over the Taiwan Strait.

1. A book project on the history of China-Russia military relations, where Professor Mastro traces the historical drivers and wedges in the Sino-Russian relationship, its implications for the liberal international order, and proposes a new framework for understanding the nature and purpose of the contemporary China-Russia strategic alignment.
2. A research project on a comprehensive analysis of the body of work on deterrence theory, developing a set of principles about why deterrence in the Taiwan Strait is particularly challenging, and their implications for Indo-Pacific security.
3. An article on the training of foreign police forces by the Chinese, which expands Professor Mastro’s existing dataset and will include fieldwork and case studies of the experiences of Italy and Indonesia with Chinese policing, which will be submitted to peer-reviewed journals.

Stanford Japan Barometer – Led by Kiyoteru Tsutsui: Seeking an RA with the skill set to assist with surveys in Japan on a wide range of topics from gender and immigration to technology and national security. Tasks include assistance in survey questionnaire construction, survey programming, quantitative analyses of survey results, and computational text analysis of social media feeds. Japanese language skills are preferred but not required.

Testing the Ideological Competition Between China and the United States – Led by Gi-Wook Shin and Xinru Ma: The notion that China and the United States are engaged in global ideological competition has become the de facto assumption of contemporary international relations discourse. Scholars and policymakers frequently assume this competition exists, measuring its outcomes through public opinion data on attitudes toward China and the U.S. However, this approach is logically flawed as it presupposes that China has an intentional, coordinated strategy for exporting its ideology, rather than empirically demonstrating such efforts. This project aims to rigorously test whether an ideological competition between China and the U.S. is occurring by analyzing China’s activities across multiple dimensions. By empirically testing this premise, this research challenges assumptions of a zero-sum ideological rivalry and offers new insights into great power dynamics and the role of ideology in contemporary geopolitics. Research assistants will help with literature review, data collection, and coordinating and conducting expert interviews.

Contact

For questions about APARC summer RA opportunities and the application process, please contact Kristen Lee at kllee@stanford.edu.