Announcing New Asia Program Fellows

• March 11, 2025

The Foreign Policy Research Institute (FPRI) is pleased to welcome the appointment of five new Asia Program Fellows. These scholars will enhance our research agenda, focusing on key issues such as security, strategic technologies, geoeconomics, and applied history. Through their original research, they will contribute valuable insights through policy-relevant analyses.

“We are thrilled to welcome these outstanding experts to the Asia Program,” said Asia Program Director Michael Beckley. “Their diverse perspectives and deep expertise will be invaluable in advancing our understanding of the critical security, technological, and economic challenges shaping Asia’s future.”

Victoria Chonn Ching is a Non-Resident Fellow with the Asia Program at the Foreign Policy Research Institute. She has a PhD in Political Science and International Relations, an MA in Economics from the University of Southern California (USC), and an MA in Chinese Studies from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. Her work centers on host country agency and the dynamics between foreign and domestic policymaking, using the China-Latin America relationship as her main setting. Additional research interests include the relationship between economics and power; the political economy of resource extraction, and the political economy of new security domains (with particular attention to the Global South). 

Suyash Desai is a Non-Resident Fellow in the Asia Program at the Foreign Policy Research Institute and a political scientist specializing in China’s defense, foreign policies, and nuclear strategy. His research focuses on Chinese military affairs, security and foreign policy issues, nuclear strategy, India-China relations, and strategic and security developments in East Asia and the Indo-Pacific region. He authors The PLA Bulletin, a newsletter providing news and analysis on the PLA, with subscribers from academic and policymaking circles across 150 countries. Currently, he is studying advanced Chinese language (traditional script) at National Taiwan Normal University, Taipei.

Lucie Lu is a Non-Resident Fellow in the Asia Program at the Foreign Policy Research Institute. She is currently a postdoctoral fellow at Princeton University’s Center on Contemporary China. Her research interests include international organization, human rights, and Chinese foreign policy and global governance, with a special focus on how China uses overseas economic engagement to influence international norms. Previously, she was a postdoctoral fellow at the Columbia-Harvard China and the World Program at Columbia University, and a Project Fellow at the Penn Project on the Future of US-China Relations. She received her PhD in political science at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 2023.

Takuya Matsuda is a Non-Resident Fellow in the Asia Program at the Foreign Policy Research Institute and an assistant professor at Aoyama Gakuin University in Tokyo, Japan. His research focuses on alliance politics, great power relations, and US grand strategy with a focus on the western Pacific. He has held research positions at the Institute for Security and Conflict Studies at George Washington University, the Notre Dame International Security Center, the National Taiwan University, and the University of Tokyo and received his PhD from King’s College London, MA from Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) and BA from Keio University in Tokyo, Japan.

Shannon Vaughn is a Non-Resident Fellow with the Asia Program at the Foreign Policy Research Institute and the General Manager of Virtru Federal, a data privacy company headquartered in Washington, DC. Shannon brings over 20 years of government and military experience as he has served in multiple leadership roles, including VP of Technology, Chief Product Owner, and Chief Innovation Officer. Shannon served nearly a decade in the Defense Attaché Service supporting US embassies across east Asia. He is also a career US Army officer, currently serving as the Chief of Artificial Intelligence for the Military Intelligence Reserve Command at Fort Belvoir, Virginia.