Professional Bio

I am a dual-title Ph.D. Candidate in Political Science (major in Comparative Politics and minor in Methodology) and Social Data Analytics (SoDA) at the Pennsylvania State University. I study the intersection between authoritarian politics, contentious politics, and political communication, with a regional focus on East Asia. My dissertation, under the supervision of Prof. Joseph Wright, focuses on the role of social media influencers, or what I call online opinion leaders, in (de)mobilizing public dissent in authoritarian countries and beyond. Currently, I am studying how the Chinese government co-opts social media influencers to engage in foreign propaganda campaigns targeting citizens living in democracies.

I received my B.S.Sc in Government and Public Administration from the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) in 2015 and my M.A in International Political Economy from the University of Warwick in 2016. Before my PhD study, I worked as a research officer at the Hong Kong Council of Social Services and published three reports on Hong Kong's social welfare policies.

My research has been published in Policing, East Asia, and other journals. I also contribute op-eds on Chinese media, such as Mingpao Daily 明報 and the Initium 端傳媒