Can Chen

Ph.D., University of Nebraska

Public Budgeting & Financial Management, Infrastructure Finance & Policy, Fiscal Transparency

Can Chen is an associate professor in the Andrew Young School of Policy Studies at Georgia State University. He founds and leads the Infrastructure Finance & Policy Lab (iFPL). His core research agenda is developing and promoting innovative, efficient, and effective infrastructure financing to support critical infrastructure that is sustainable and resilient in its financing and funding, use, performance, and maintenance. Dr. Chen’s substantive research topic interests include infrastructure finance & policy, fiscal transparency, disaster finance, and the intersection between public finance and public management & policy. His methodological interests are causal research designs and computational social sciences. His professional website is available at https://sites.google.com/view/canchen/home

Dr. Chen has published a book on innovative infrastructure finance (Palgrave Macmillan, 2022). His journal publications appear in Public Budgeting & Finance, Public Finance Review, Journal of Public Budgeting, Accounting & Financial Management, Municipal Finance Journal, Policy Studies Journal, Journal of Comparative Policy Analysis, Transport Policy, Public Works Management & Policy, Public Administration, American Review of Public Administration, Public Management Review, International Public Management Journal, International Review of Administrative Sciences, State and Local Government Review, and others. He has received three national research awards: the ASPA’s William J. Petak Best Paper Award, the ASPA’s Garcia-Zamor Best Paper Award, and the NASPAA’s Best Doctoral Student Manuscript Award. His research was supported by grant funding from the World Bank, GASB, ICMA, Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, and Open Government Partnership.

Professionally, Dr. Chen serves as the chair of the American Society of Public Administration (ASPA) Section on Transportation Policy and Administration (STPA) and an Executive Board Member for the Association of Budgeting and Financial Management (ABFM).  He is a certified research associate at the Mineta Transportation Institute, a friend of the Economics, Revenue, and Finance (AJE50) committee on the Transportation Research Board (TRB), and an affiliated faculty member for the Center for State and Local Finance at GSU. He is the Associate Editor for the Journal of International Review of Public Administration (IRPA) and the Journal of Chinese Public Administration Review.