Joseph Yu-shek Cheng is Chair Professor of Political Science and Co-ordinator of the Contemporary China Research Project, City University of Hong Kong. He is the founding editor of the Hong Kong Journal of Social Sciences and The Journal of Comparative Asian Development. He has published widely on political development in China and Hong Kong, Chinese foreign policy and local government in southern China. He has recently edited volumes on China's Challenges in the Twenty-first Century and The July 1 Protest Rally - Interpreting a Historic Event.

Joseph Cheng was chairman of the Hong Kong Observers, 1980-82; and convenor of Power for Democracy, 2002-04. He has been a Justice of Peace since 1992; and is the founding President of the Asian Studies Association of Hong Kong, 2005-06. In 2006, he serves as the secretary-general of the Civic Party.

Professor Cheng has been heavily involved in the pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong, and has been a frequent commentator on Asia/Pacific affairs for international media. In 2006, he was one of the inaugural recipients of the Distinguished Alumni Awards from Flinders University.