People

Zhixiang (David) Su is currently a second-year PhD student in sociology at Berkeley. Born and raised in Southern China, he earned a bachelor’s degree in Sociology from Wuhan and his Mphil in Sociology and Demography from Oxford University. Previously, he has been invested in a social network research project, applying survey and computational methods to study how personal networks shape social inequality in health, especially during the pandemic in Wuhan. He conducted a survey among the college population in Wuhan that examines how network mobilization produces heterogeneous outcomes for different population subgroups during the pandemic. More recently, he is deeply interested in the platform economy in China and how it intersects with the state’s macro-economic policy on climate change and laws regulating gig work. Under the support of California-China Climate Institute, he comparatively examines the everyday working conditions within the ride-hailing platform and food-delivery platform in Guangdong Province, China. Using extended-case method, in-depth interview, and environment data, he attempts to address why climate policy implementation achieved their goals in some platform industries but severely backfired in others, leading to pushbacks in lower-level government and the market, as well as increasing grievance among affected workers. Zhixiang is wholeheartedly grateful to the California-China Climate Institute that grants him an incredible opportunity to conduct his fieldwork, not only to enrich academic understanding but also shed light on effective and inclusive climate policy frameworks that advance climate justice and encourages both top-down and bottom-up climate change actions.