Patrick Weller and Xu Yi-chong are professors in the School of Government and International Relations at Griffith University. Patrick Weller has been writing about political executives for the past 40 years. Among his books on Australian politics are: Can Ministers Cope? (1981, co-author), Malcolm Fraser Prime Minister (1989), Dodging raindrops: John Button A Labor Life (1999), Australia’s Mandarins (2001), Don’t tell the prime minister (2002), Cabinet Government in Australia (2007), Learning to be a Minister (2010, co-author) and From Post box to Powerhouse: a Centenary History of the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet (2011, co-author). His comparative books include First among Equals: prime ministers in Westminster systems (1985), The Hollow Crown (co-edited 1997), The changing world of top officials (co-edited 2001), Westminster Legacies (co-edited, 2005) and Westminster Compared (co-authored 2009). He has acted as a consultant for state and federal governments. In 2009-10 he was a member of the Prime Minister’s Advisory Group on Reform of Australian Government Administration. Xu Yi-chong is the author of Powering China, Reforming the electric power industry in China (2002), Electricity reform in China, India and Russia: The World Bank Template and the Politics of Power (2004) and The Politics of Nuclear Energy in China (2010). She is (co) editor of The Politics of Sovereign Wealth Funds (2010), Nuclear Development in Asia (2011) and The Political Economy of State-owned Enterprises in China and India, (2012). She is currently undertaking research on state-owned enterprises in China