Liu Xiaodong

Liu Xiaodong (1966–2026) was a native of Xuzhou, Jiangsu, and held a doctorate in education. He was a professor at Nanjing Normal University and East China Normal University, and devoted his career to early childhood education and the philosophy of childhood. His representative work, Discovering the Great Child: From the Philosophy of Childhood to Childism, embodies his thinking on child-centered educational theory. He also authored monographs including The Philosophy of Children's Spirit, Liberating Children, and Children's Culture and Children's Education, making important contributions to the development of foundational theory in early childhood education in China. Three of his works are included in the collection; besides children's education, they also touch on the East Asian order in the Ming dynasty and research on investment behavior, showing that his reading and writing span such fields as social science, Eastern philosophy, and management.