CURRENT ROLE
​
Principal’s Research Chair
Professor of Political Science
University of British Columbia,
​Okanagan (Syilx Okanagan Nation Territory)
Department of Economics, Philosophy,
​and Political Science


Class of 2021, Royal Society of Canada College of New Scholars, Artists and Scientists
Associate Editor, Political Research Quarterly
EDUCATION

Ph.D
University of California, San Diego, 2008
Field of Study: Political Science
Dissertation: “Centralizing Principles: How Amnesty International Shaped Human Rights Politics through its Transnational Network.”

​M.A.
University of California, San Diego, 2004

B.A.
University of California, Berkeley, 2002
Political Science with Distinction

RESEARCH AREAS AND SELECT PUBLICATIONS

​Civil Society/Non-state Actors

GRNDS (The Global Register of Nonprofit Data Sources) helps us understand how global civil society organizations are regulated in their respective states.  Unlike other data, this cross-national dataset allows us to compare how much data countries collect and release publicly.  Collaborative project with Dr. Elizabeth Bloodgood (Concordia University), Dr. Sarah S. Stroup (Middlebury College), and Ajah. ​
“Strategic Philanthropy and International Strategies: The Ford Foundation and Investments in Law Schools and Legal Education, 1951-2003” (with Ron Levi and Ronit Dinovitzer). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 2022.

“Understanding National Nonprofit Data Environments” (with Elizabeth Bloodgood, Jesse Bourns, Michael Lenczner, Takumi Shibaike, and Jenny Tabet.) Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly. 2022. 

“What Counts? How to use Different Sources of NGO Data” (with Elizabeth Bloodgood and Sarah S. Stroup). Voluntas. 2021.

“The Stories They Tell: What INGO Mission Statements Reveal about their Authority” (with Takumi Shibaike, Sarah S. Stroup, and Alfred Oduro). Global Society: 1-28. 2021.

Human ​Rights

Human rights are one of the main innovations of the 20th century.  Their emergence after World War II promised a new world of universalized humanity.  Yet, proliferation of digital data (i.e. datafication) and its intertwining with our lives, coupled with the growth of artificial intelligence (AI), reveals a painful truth: human rights need a serious reboot, now. 
“What COVID-19 Revealed about Health, Human Rights, and the WHO” (with Eileen A. Wong). Journal of Human Rights 19 (5): 568-581. 2020.

“Did the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child Reduce Child Mortality Around the World? An Interrupted Time Series Analysis” (with Christopher A. Tait, Abtin Parnia, Nishan Zewege-Abubaker, Heather Smith-Cannoy, and Arjumand Siddiqi). BMC Public Health 20 (1): 707. 2020.

“When Everyone Agrees: Human Rights Norms on Women and Children and their Effects on Health” (with Heather Smith-Cannoy, Arjumand Siddiqi, Christopher Tait, and Abtin Parnia). The International Journal of Human Rights 24 (10): 1537-1571. 2020.

“Can the Health Effects of Widely-Held Societal Norms be Evaluated?  An Analysis of the United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (UN-CEDAW)” (with Christopher A. Tait, Ifrah Abdillahi, Heather Smith-Cannoy, and Arjumand Siddiqi). BMC Public Health 19: 279-289. 2019.

“Mind the Understanding Gap: New Directions in Research on Human Rights.” Journal of Human Rights 18 (5): 619-624. 2019. 

Global Governance of ​Emerging Technologies (GGET)

We, the Data: Human Rights in the Digital Age. MIT Press. 2023.

“We Haven’t Gone Paperless Yet: Why the Printing Press Can Help Us Understand Data and AI” (with Julian Posada and Nicholas Weller).  Proceedings of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence/Association for Computing Machinery, Artificial Intelligence, Ethics, and Society (AIES) conference. 2021.
Featured on: Neither Free nor Fair podcast, Political Economy Forum, University of Washington

View non-academic publications