Schwartz Reisman Institute Research Lead Wendy H. Wong has been named to the Royal Society of Canada’s College of New Scholars, Artists and Scientists, an honour that recognizes up-and-coming researchers who demonstrate high levels of achievement. Wong’s research on international nongovernmental organizations and public policy focuses on the relationships between technology, data, and human rights. — *Schwartz Reisman Institute Research Lead* *Wendy H. Wong* *has been named to the Royal Society of Canada’s* *College of New Scholars, Artists and Scientists*, an honour that recognizes up-and-coming researchers who demonstrate high levels of achievement. Wong’s research on international nongovernmental organizations and public policy focuses on the relationships between technology, data, and human rights.

Wendy H. Wong, an award-winning scholar recognized internationally for her work on the impact of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) and the growth of human rights, has been named to the Royal Society of Canada’s (RSC’s) College of New Scholars, Artists and Scientists.

The college recognizes up-and-coming researchers who have demonstrated a high level of achievement in their careers to date.

Wong is a research lead at the Schwartz Reisman Institute for Technology and Society, a professor in the Faculty of Arts & Science’s Department of Political Science, and a Canada Research Chair, Global Governance and Civil Society.

Her research on international non-governmental organizations (INGOs) and human rights includes current work on the relationship between rights and technology in the age of big data.

“It’s such an honour to be invited to join such a distinguished group of scholars, in recognition of my achievements to this point,” says Wong. “I look forward to contributing to this interdisciplinary community!”

According to the RSC, Wong is “an award-winning, curiosity-driven, and policy-relevant scholar recognized internationally for her work.”

Since Wong received her PhD in 2008, the Canada Research Chair program, the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, and CIFAR have each singled her out for critical support, leading her to be considered one of the strongest voices in NGO research.

Wong has also written two books and published nearly 30 peer-reviewed and non peer-reviewed articles in a variety of academic journals and books.

Her first book, Internal Affairs, won the Association for Research on Nonprofit Organizations and Voluntary Action (ARNOVA) Outstanding Book Award in 2014. Internal Affairs emphasized the importance of understanding the organizational structure of NGOs in order to draw conclusions about their influence on international human rights.

Her second book, The Authority Trap (2017), which she co-authored, won the same ARNOVA award in 2019. The Authority Trap argues that more authority leads INGOs to make more conservative choices, hence, the “trap.” The book creates a measurable standard of INGO “power” and documents INGOs varying ability to influence various global audiences. It then shows how these different abilities affect the strategies adopted by INGOs in their efforts to address human rights, environment, humanitarianism, and development.

At the Schwartz Reisman Institute, Wong’s work broadly encompasses the ways in which powerful new technologies like AI necessitate a rethinking of the international framework of human rights. She has studied and written about topics including:

What consequences do the decisions of big technology companies have for who we are as human beings and the protection of our autonomy by human rights? How can policy-making create effective, humane, and manageable tech governance mechanisms?
Are big technology companies positioning themselves as global governors of digital content—including freedom of expression—online? What are the consequences of having private corporations with this much power over our social and political lives?
Who is making decisions about our lives in the age of data and artificial intelligence (AI), including the protection of our rights?
How can we ensure accountability to the public when decisions about the online/digital space and massive amounts of data are privately held?
What do “consent” and “privacy” mean in the use of tools like facial recognition technology?
Where do we exist when we become data? Are we our data? Who has rights to this data about us? How can we protect our dignity, autonomy, and human rights in the age of big data?

Named to the RSC, Wong intends to use her newfound network to greatly expand her research, discover new collaborators, and discuss new ideas including her forthcoming book with MIT Press which explores the profound impact of datafication on human rights. The growth of big data and AI “reveal a painful truth: human rights need a serious reboot, soon,” says Wong.

With all of this and several other research projects on the horizon, it’s no surprise that Wong is “excited to learn from colleagues in different fields and at different universities throughout Canada to gain insights into how we can use our research to move forward on tackling global problems.

“Many of the most pressing and interesting questions before us require interdisciplinary collaboration to solve,” adds Wong. “Things like the datafication of human life, or global warming, or human rights are all challenges that cannot be resolved through one approach.”

Wong also intends to continue her contributions to public debates and causes. She was a regular guest blogger with the international relations blog Duck of Minerva. She’s been an invited panelist and presenter at numerous NGO- and human rights-related international conferences this year, and she’s been a guest on a number of popular radio broadcasts and podcasts, in addition to contributing articles to the Toronto Star, National Post and The Globe and Mail.

All of this work aligns perfectly with the RSC’s goal of placing a brighter spotlight on the work of academic scholars.

“Part of the RSC College’s mandate emphasizes engaging the public through our research,” says Wong. “I intend to look for opportunities to reach non-academic audiences with my findings. In so doing, I would like to explain the importance of political science and social sciences more generally in understanding our modern world.”

“I’m delighted, but not surprised, to learn that Wendy has been invited to join the College of New Scholars,” says Ryan Balot, the Department of Political Science’s acting chair.

“Wendy’s work is creative, wide-ranging, and interdisciplinary. It is a source of inspiration to both students and colleagues. Along with her impressive scholarly achievements, Wendy has continually demonstrated the relevance of her work to public policy and to wider political discourse.”

Want to learn more?

Read about a recent Globe & Mail op-ed by Wong on facial recognition technologies, datafication, and human rights.
Watch Wong’s contribution to the SRI Seminar Series, “Rebooting human rights in a datafied world” (April 2021).
Listen to an interview with Wong on the Down to Business podcast, discussing her work on datafication and human rights.
Listen to an interview with Wong on the Neither Free Nor Fair podcast, discussing her new work on how the printing press can help us understand data and AI.
Read Wong’s op-ed about Facebook and free speech in The Conversation and The National Post.
Read Wong’s op-ed about data generated from images captured by facial recognition technology in The Conversation.