I'm a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Watson Institute for International & Public Affairs, jointly between the China Initiative and the Rhodes Center for International Economics and Finance. My research is centered on the role of the state in financing a green transition. I draw from four years of work experience in China's primary think tank on green finance, the International Institute of Green Finance, and over 200 interviews conducted in China, Vietnam, India, Ethiopia, and Brazil. I explore how state-steered green financing approaches are feasible in the global South, under different political preconditions, by using different policy tools, and while facing different challenges. Each of my journal articles explore a different aspect of this topic while my book project makes an overarching argument. The book shows how global South countries demonstrate the feasibility of taking a state-steered approach to financing their green transition, rather than relying on the problematic terms entailed by the derisking ultimatum presented by global North actors. The book is titled: An End to Ultimatums: How the Global South Can (and Will) Finance its Own Green Transition.

I hold a dual PhD in international political economy from Copenhagen Business School and the Chinese Academy of Sciences, a dual Master’s degree in international business & politics from Copenhagen Business School and Rotterdam School of Management, as well as a dual Master’s degree in international development from Sciences Po Paris and Peking University. I have worked for UN organizations, Chinese think tanks, and am fluent in Chinese. My research has been published in 17 articles across leading journals, such as the Review of International Political Economy, Socio-Economic Review, New Political Economy, Global Policy, and Regulation & Governance. An additional 14 draft papers are at different stages of the review process.

Get in touch at mathias_larsen@brown.edu