Madeleine Zelin is a Dean Lung Professor of Chinese Studies at Columbia University. Zelin’s recent research has focused on legal history, the role of law in the Chinese economy and the interface between law, culture, and the market in early modern China. She is the author of The Merchants of Zigong: Industrial Entrepreneurship in Early Modern China (Columbia University Press, 2005), which was awarded the Fairbank Prize (American Historical Association), Alan Sharlin Memorial Award (Social Science History Association) and the Humanities Prize of the International Conference on Asian Studies (ICAS).

Jeffery Wasserstrom is a Chancellor’s Professor of History at the University of California, Irvine. Wasserstrom is a modern Chinese social and cultural historian interested in connecting China’s past to its present, placing both into a comparative and global perspective. He is the author of several books, including China in the 21st Century: What Everyone Needs to Know (Oxford University Press, 2010 and 2013). He is the Editor of the Journal of Asian Studies as well as a member of the editorial board of Dissent Magazine. In addition to writing for academic periodicals, Wasserstrom has contributed reviews and commentaries to general interest magazines and newspapers such as Time, News Week, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the Wall Street Journal, and the Financial Times.