MA in PKU, China, asking opinions on US PhD program

[Teesang]

I am currently a grad student in Scool of Government, PKU, China, majoring in Political Theory. I am now asking for opinions on pursuing a PhD program in US.

GPA: grad:3.5/4 (midiocore); undergrad: 3.59/4(Nanjing Univ., 1st in class)

TOEFL:102, no GRE scores yet.

Attended several field researches(Basically sending out questionaire and collecting data); no published materials

Graduation Thesis was honored as the "Outstanding Work" in NJU, in which I discuss the causal relations between state capacity and democratic consolidation, using data from Polity IV and Fragile State Index. In the paper, I try to demonstrate that, despite no evidence shows that two parameters share a strong positive relations, state capactiy can still be founded as a determinant to the stability of democratic regime.

Focus:Comparative Politics; state building/capacity theory; democratic consolidation; political culture.

It's my long desire to pursue acadamic study in US. I would love to have more info from GradCafe, since there has been 6 years in a row in my Dept. that no grad students apply for US PhD program, so I can't really see how this is going. What's worse, after talking with some professors, I was aware that competition has been much more intense as more Chinese students choose to attend undergrad programs in US since 2000s(almost 16 years from now), and they are more competitive compared to students in mainland China. Don't know if that is the case.

Long to hear more opinions from you guys. I am kind of anxious right now.