About

Daniel Mattingly is an Associate Professor of Political Science at Yale University. His research focuses on the domestic and international politics of authoritarian regimes, with a particular emphasis on China. He is the author of The Art of Political Control in China, published by Cambridge University Press in 2020, which examines how the Chinese state controls protests and implements social policies. This book was recognized as one of the best books of 2020 by Foreign Affairs and received the best book award from the Democracy and Autocracy Section of the American Political Science Association. His current book project explores the role of the military in China’s domestic and international politics. Dr. Mattingly holds a Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley, and a B.A. from Yale University.

Research topics

• Political Science
• Sociology
• Law
• Political economy
• Computer Security
• Computer Science
• Media studies
• Law and economics
• Social psychology
• Economics
• Engineering
• Psychology
• Public relations

Selected publications

• Foreign influencer operations: How TikTok shapes American perceptions of China

  ArXiv.org · 2026-01-20

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  How do authoritarian regimes strengthen global support for nondemocratic political systems? Roughly half of the users of the social media platform TikTok report getting news from social media influencers. Against this backdrop, authoritarian regimes have increasingly outsourced content creation to these influencers. To gain understanding of the extent of this phenomenon and the persuasive capabilities of these influencers, we collect comprehensive data on pro-China influencers on TikTok. We show that pro-China influencers have more engagement than state media. We then create a realistic clone of the TikTok app, and conduct a randomized experiment in which over 8,500 Americans are recruited to use this app and view a random sample of actual TikTok content. We show that pro-China foreign influencers are strikingly effective at increasing favorability toward China, while traditional Chinese state media causes backlash. The findings highlight the importance of influencers in shaping global public opinion.

  PublisherOA PDF

• Foreign influencer operations: How TikTok shapes American perceptions of China

  arXiv (Cornell University) · 2026-01-20

  preprintOpen accessSenior author

  How do authoritarian regimes strengthen global support for nondemocratic political systems? Roughly half of the users of the social media platform TikTok report getting news from social media influencers. Against this backdrop, authoritarian regimes have increasingly outsourced content creation to these influencers. To gain understanding of the extent of this phenomenon and the persuasive capabilities of these influencers, we collect comprehensive data on pro-China influencers on TikTok. We show that pro-China influencers have more engagement than state media. We then create a realistic clone of the TikTok app, and conduct a randomized experiment in which over 8,500 Americans are recruited to use this app and view a random sample of actual TikTok content. We show that pro-China foreign influencers are strikingly effective at increasing favorability toward China, while traditional Chinese state media causes backlash. The findings highlight the importance of influencers in shaping global public opinion.

  PublisherDOI

• Placebo-Augmented PICA Design (PICA-2): Assessing the Influence of Foreign Propaganda

  The Journal of Politics · 2025-09-19 · 1 citations

  articleSenior author
  PublisherDOI

• Networks of coercion: Military ties and civilian leadership challenges in China

  American Journal of Political Science · 2025-04-07 · 1 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior authorCorresponding

  Abstract Civilian‐led coups are one of the most common routes to losing power in autocracies. How do authoritarian leaders secure themselves from civilian leadership challenges? We argue that autocrats differentiate civilian rivals in part by their social ties to the military. To reduce the threat of coups, leaders buy off civilians with strong military ties by promoting them to lower‐tier institutions—but isolate these same civilians by denying them promotion to higher‐tier institutions that afford opportunities to challenge the leader. We introduce an original data set of over 117,000 postings of 34,140 Chinese military officers and map ties between the entire civilian and military elite between 1927 and 2014. We find that civilian leaders with strong ties to the military improve prospects for promotion to the Central Committee, but degrade the likelihood of promotion to the apex Politburo Standing Committee, particularly for civilians outside the leader's social network.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Chinese state media persuades a global audience that the “China model” is superior: Evidence from a 19‐country experiment

  American Journal of Political Science · 2024-07-20 · 23 citations

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  Abstract Many are skeptical of the appeal of authoritarian political systems. We argue that global audiences will embrace authoritarian models when they believe that autocracies can meet governance challenges better than democracies. We collect comprehensive data on the external messaging of the Chinese and American governments. We then conduct a randomized experiment in 19 countries across six continents exposing global citizens to real messages from the Chinese and American governments’ external media arms. We find that exposure to a representative set of Chinese messages strengthens perceptions that the Chinese Communist Party delivers growth, stability, and competent leadership. It also moves the average respondent from slightly preferring the American model to slightly preferring the Chinese model. In head‐to‐head matchups, messages from the US government are less persuasive. Our findings show how autocracies build global support by selling growth and competence, with important implications for democratic resilience.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Chinese State Media Persuades a Global Audience That the “China Model” is Superior: Evidence From A 19-Country Experiment

  2022-08-25 · 8 citations

  preprintOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  Many are skeptical of the appeal of authoritarian political systems. By contrast, we argue that global audiences will embrace authoritarian models when they believe that autocracies can meet governance challenges better than democracies. We conduct a randomized experiment in 19 countries across 6 continents exposing a global audience to real messages from the Chinese and American governments’ external media arms. We also collect comprehensive data on the external messaging of the Chinese and American governments. We find that exposure to a representative set of Chinese mes- sages strengthens perceptions that the CCP delivers growth, stability, and competent leadership. It also triples the proportion of respondents who think the Chinese system is superior to the American system, from 16 to 54 percent. In head-to-head match- ups, messages from the U.S. government are less persuasive. Our findings show how autocracies build global support by selling growth and competence, with important implications for democratic resilience.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• When People Want Punishment: Retributive Justice and the Puzzle of Authoritarian Popularity. By Lily L. Tsai. Cambridge University Press, 2021. 278p. $84.99 cloth, $29.99 paper.

  Perspectives on Politics · 2022-08-31

  article1st authorCorresponding

  An abstract is not available for this content so a preview has been provided. Please use the Get access link above for information on how to access this content.

  PublisherDOI

• When Does Public Diplomacy Succeed? Evidence from China's `Wolf Warrior' Diplomats

  Harvard Dataverse · 2022-06-16 · 1 citations

  datasetOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  How does public diplomacy shape global public opinion? In this note, we theorize that positive public diplomacy that emphasizes aid and friendship works, while negative messages that criticize international rivals is ineffective. We conduct an experiment, to our knowledge the first of its kind, that randomly exposes Indian citizens to real Twitter messages from Chinese diplomats. We find that positive messages emphasizing aid and friendship improve perceptions of China, even in times of escalating violent conflict. However, ``Wolf Warrior" messages criticizing the United States for its political values are ineffective. We argue public diplomacy can be a useful tool for global powers, but that domestic political pressure can create a perverse dynamic in which diplomats highlight the least effective messages.

  PublisherDOI

• How the Party Commands the Gun: The Foreign–Domestic Threat Dilemma in China

  American Journal of Political Science · 2022 · 57 citations

  1st authorCorresponding
  • Political Science
  • Political Science
  • Public relations

  Abstract The leaders of authoritarian states face a dilemma between building a loyal military to guard against domestic threats and a professional military that can guard against foreign threats. In this article, I argue that leaders respond to domestic threats by promoting loyal officers and to foreign threats by promoting experienced officers. I draw on a new dataset, the first of its kind, of over 12,000 appointments to the People's Liberation Army of China. The data show that career ties and combat experience are critical for officer promotion to key military and party offices. However, in periods of high domestic threat, party leaders promote unusually large numbers of officers with personal ties to the top leader. In periods of foreign threat, on the other hand, leaders are more likely to promote officers with prior combat experience. The article challenges the conventional wisdom, showing how autocrats face a trade‐off between guarding against internal and external threats.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• How Soft Propaganda Persuades

  Comparative Political Studies · 2022 · 147 citations

  1st authorCorresponding
  • Political Science
  • Sociology
  • Political economy

  An influential body of scholarship argues that authoritarian regimes design “hard” propaganda that is intentionally heavy-handed in order to signal regime power. In this study, by contrast, we link the power of propaganda to the emotional power of “soft” propaganda such as television dramas and viral social media content. We conduct a series of experiments in which we expose over 6800 respondents in China to real propaganda videos drawn from television dramas, state-backed social media accounts, and state-run newscasts, each containing nationalist messages favored by the Chinese Communist Party. In contrast to theories that propaganda is unpersuasive, we show that propaganda effectively manipulates anger as well as anti-foreign sentiment and behavior, with heightened anti-foreign attitudes persisting up to a week. However, we also find that nationalist propaganda has no effect on perceptions of Chinese government performance or on self-reported willingness to protest against the state.

  PublisherDOI

Frequent coauthors

• Trevor Incerti

  University of Amsterdam

  27 shared

• Jiahua Yue

  Duke Kunshan University

  25 shared

• Frances Rosenbluth

  Yale University

  25 shared

• Seiki Takana

  24 shared

• Seiki Tanaka

  4 shared

• J. Kevin Corder

  Parsons (United States)

  4 shared

• Christina Wolbrecht

  University of Notre Dame

  4 shared

• Elaine Yao

  3 shared

Awards & honors

• 2023 Luebbert Best Article Award
• 2025-04-01 - How the Party Commands the Gun: The Foreign-Dom…
• 2021-09-03 - Gaddis Smith International Book Prize for best…
• 2020-12-04 - The Art of Political Control in China Named One…