Peking University, July 15, 2025: Justin Yifu Lin, Dean of the Institute of New Structural Economics at Peking University, has received the 2025 Eurasia Business and Economics Society (EBES) Fellow Award, becoming the first scholar from China to receive the organization’s highest academic honor.
Justin Yifu Lin, Dean of the Institute of New Structural Economics, Peking University
The award was presented at the 52nd EBES Conference(July 3–5, 2025), held in Istanbul, Turkey. Mr. Lin was recognized for his lifetime contributions to Development Economics, Agricultural Economics, and research on Transition Studies, marking a career that has shaped both theory and practice in global development.
EBES Fellow Award 2025
Founded in 2008, EBES is one of the world’s leading academic associations in economics and business, with over 2,500 members from more than 80 countries. The EBES Fellow Award, established in 2015, honors one scholar each year whose research has demonstrated enduring global impact in theory, empirical evidence, or methodology in the corresponding academic field.
During the conference, Mr. Lin delivered a keynote lecture titled “What Drives Development Success? New Institutional Economics Meets New Structural Economics.” He argued that the key to a country’s development success lies in whether its government adopts a development strategy aligned with the country’s comparative advantage as determined by its endowment structure.
According to this perspective, every country has the potential to achieve dynamic growth, provided it can identify industries consistent with its comparative advantages under market conditions and leverage proactive government support to scale and strengthen these industries.
Mr. Lin’s work has helped redefine how economists and policymakers approach industrial upgrading, poverty reduction, and the global challenges of inclusive growth. His recognition by EBES adds to a growing international acknowledgment of China’s role in expanding the frontier of development thinking.
Written by: Zhang Yang, Zhang Yiyi
Edited by: Chen Shizhuo
Source: PKU Humanities and Social Sciences WeChat (
Chinese)
