Professor and PhD supervisor at the Academy of Social Sciences and the Institute of International Relations of Tsinghua University. He is the Executive Director of Tsinghua University's Belt and Road Institute of Strategic Studies, Deputy Director of Tsinghua University's Think Tank Centre, Vice-President of the China-Europe Relations Council, and Director of the Centre for Sino-French Studies.

He has served as Secretary of the Party Committee of the School of Humanities and Social Sciences and the School of Social Sciences, and as Head of the Department of International Relations at Tsinghua University.

His part-time positions include Editor-in-Chief of Silk Road Encyclopedia, Vice-President of the "Belt and Road" Branch of the Chinese Society for Higher Education, Executive Director of the Chinese Society for the History of International Communism, Visiting Professor at the Centre for Italian Studies of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Council Member of the British Studies Association, and Director of the Tsinghua-Carnegie Institute of China, a leading global think tank. -He is also a member of the core team of the high-end think tank of the Central Compilation and Administration Bureau.

From September 1981 to July 1985, he studied English at the Foreign Language Department of Henan Normal University, and from September 1989 to July 1992, he studied for a Master's degree at the Theory Department of the Party School of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, and from September 1994 to July 1997, he studied at the School of International Relations of Peking University, where he received a Doctorate in Law.

He was appointed by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People's Republic of China to observe the parliamentary elections in the Kyrgyz Republic in February 2005. He was an observer.

His research interests include the Belt and Road Strategy, international relations, comparative political parties and government, European party politics, social democracy, and Sino-European relations. His major academic publications include The Transformation of the Italian Communist Party and Political Change in Italy, Globalisation and the Transformation of Social Democracy in Europe, and co-authored books including Globalisation and the Transformation of Political Parties in the World, Party Politics and Party Building, Studies on China-EU Relations, and Party Lessons: A Study of the Historical Development of Communist Parties and the Laws of Governance, etc. His translations include European Politics in Transition, Political Parties and Government: The Relationship between Government and Supportive Parties in Liberal Democracies. He has also published hundreds of academic articles and commentaries.