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Wai-Fung (Danny) Lam is Professor of Public Administration, Director of the Centre for Civil Society and Governance (CCSG), Co-Director of the Centre for Water Technology and Policy (CWTP), Director of the Doctor of Public Administration (DPA) Programme, and Director of the Master Public Administration (MPA) Programme at The University of Hong Kong. He finished his undergraduate study at The Chinese University of Hong Kong, and received a Ph.D. in Public Policy from Indiana University, Bloomington. Professor Lam is an expert in common-pool resource management, institutional policy analysis, public policy process, public governance, and civil society. His research has focused on the design of efficient institutional arrangements for the governance and management of public resources, a core issue in public administration, sustainable development, and civil society.
| 1989-1994 | Indiana University, Bloomington, USA |
| PhD in Public Policy |
| 1984-1988 | The Chinese University of Hong Kong |
| BSocSc in Government and Public Administration |
| 1995-present | The University of Hong Kong |
| Department of Politics and Public Administration | |
| Professor (2010-Present) Head of Department (2008-2010, 2022-Present) Associate Professor/Senior Lecturer (2005-2010) Associate Professor/Lecturer (1998-2004) Assistant Professor/Lecturer (1995-1998) |
| 2008-present | The University of Hong Kong |
| Centre for Civil Society and Governance | |
| Director (2019-Present) Deputy Director (2008-2019) |
| 2013-2017 | The University of Hong Kong |
| Faculty of Social Sciences | |
| Associate Dean (Innovation) |
| 1994-1995 | Indiana University, Bloomington, USA |
| The Vincent and Elinor Ostrom Workshop in Political Theory and Policy Analysis | |
| Research Associate |
Professor Lam’s research has evolved around institutional analysis, common-pool resources, public governance, civil society, policy process and dynamics, and public sector reform. He is the author of Governing Irrigation Systems in Nepal: Institutions, Infrastructure, and Collective Action (1998), coeditor of Asian Irrigation Systems in Transition: Responding to the Challenges Ahead (2005), co-author of Improving Irrigation in Asia: Sustainable Performance of an Innovative Intervention in Nepal (2011) and Public Policymaking in Hong Kong: Civic Engagement and State-Society Relations in a Semi-Democracy (2012). He has published in major international journals including Governance, International Review of Administrative Sciences, Journal of Institutional Economics, Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly (NVSQ), Policy Sciences, Voluntas, and World Development, and served on the Editorial Committees of Public Administration Review (PAR), International Review of Administrative Sciences (IRAS), Journal of Comparative Policy Analysis (JCPA), Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly (NVSQ), and Asian Politics and Policy (APP). He is co-editor of The Asia-Pacific Journal of Public Administration (APJPA). In 2010, Professor Lam was named Icon of Honor by the Farmer Managed Irrigation Systems Promotion Trust, Nepal, in recognition of his outstanding contribution to the study of self-governance in water management.
Books
Governing Irrigation Systems in Nepal: Institutions, Infrastructure, and Collective Action. Oakland, CA: Institute for Contemporary Studies (ICS) Press. 1998.
Asian Irrigation Systems in Transition: Responding to the Challenges Ahead (co-edited with Ganesh P. Shivakoti, Douglass Vermillion, Elinor Ostrom, Ujjwal Pradhan, Robert Yoder). New Delhi/Thousand Oaks/London: Sage Publications. 2005.
Improving Irrigation in Asia: Sustainable Performance of an Innovative Intervention in Nepal (with Elinor Ostrom, Prachanda Pradhan and Ganesh P. Shivakoti). Cheltenham: Edward Elgar. 2011.
Public Policymaking in Hong Kong: Civic Engagement and State-Society Relations in a Semi-Democracy (with Eliza Wing Yee Lee, Elaine Yee Man Chan, Joseph Cho Wai Chan, Peter Tsan Yin Cheung, and Wai-man Lam). London: Routledge. 2012
Revitalizing Rural Communities (with Jessica Williams, Vivian Chu, and Winnie Law). Singapore: Springer Nature. 2021.
Articles
“Bureaucratizing Coproduction: Institutional Adaptation of Irrigation Associations in Taiwan” (with Ching-Ping Tang and Shih-Ko Tang). Water Alternatives 14(2): 435-52. 2021.
“Irrigation Management in East Asia: Institutions, Socioeconomic Transformation and Adaptations” (with Raymond Yu Wang and Jinxia Wang). Water Alternatives 14(2): 319-31. 2021.
“Social Expectations for Charitable Giving in China” (with Lin Nie and Kwan Nok Chan). Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly. Forthcoming. 2021.
“Nonprofit Online Responsiveness: An Exploratory Field Experiment in China” (with Lin Nie). Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly, DOI: 10.1177/08997640211007574. 2021.
“Elite Bargains and Policy Priorities in Authoritarian Regimes: Agenda Setting in China under Xi Jinping and Hu Jintao” (with Kwan Nok Chan and Shaowei Chen). Governance, DOI: 10.0000/gove.12543. 2020.
“Online or Offline? Nonprofits Choice and Use of Social Media in Hong Kong” (with Lin Nie). Voluntas 31:111-28. 2020
“Bureaucratic Control and Information Processing: An Institutional Comparison” (with Kwan Nok Chan). Governance 31(3):575-92. 2018.
“Policy Advocacy in Transitioning Regimes: Comparative Lessons from the Case of Harbour Protection in Hong Kong” (with Kwan Nok Chan). Journal of Comparative Policy Analysis: Research and Practice 19(1):54 – 71. 2017.
“Institutional Nesting and Robustness of Self-governance: The Adaptation of Irrigation Systems in Taiwan” (with Chung Yuan Chiu). International Journal of the Commons 10(2):953 – 81. 2016
“How Authoritarianism Intensifies Punctuated Equilibrium: The Dynamics of Policy Attention in Hong Kong” (with Kwan Nok Chan). Governance 28(4):549 – 70. 2015.
“Giving in Hong Kong: A Growing Sector Evading Regulation” (with Elaine Chan). In The Palgrave Handbook of Global Philanthropy, eds. Pamala Wiepking and Femida Handy, 369 – 87. Palgrave Macmillan. 2015.
“The Tragedy of the Commons.” In Encyclopedia of Political Science, eds. B. Badie, D. Berg-Schlosser, and L. Morlino, Leonardo. Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications. 2011
“Governing the Commons.” In Handbook of Governance, ed. Mark Bevir, 501 – 17. Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications. 2010.
“Analyzing the Dynamic Complexity of Development Interventions: Lessons from an Irrigation Experiment in Nepal” (with Elinor Ostrom). Policy Sciences 43:1 – 25. 2010.
“Foundations of a Robust Social-ecological System: Irrigation Institutions in Taiwan.” Journal of Institutional Economics 2(2):1 – 24. 2006.
“Coordinating the Government Bureaucracy in Hong Kong: An Institutional Analysis.” Governance 18(4):633 – 54. 2005.
“Coping with Change: A Study of Local Irrigation Institutions in Taiwan.” World Development 29(9):1569 – 92. 2001.
“The Role of the Nonprofit Sector in Hong Kong’s Development” (with James Perry). Voluntas 11(4):357 – 75. 2000.
“Institutional Design of Public Agencies and Coproduction: A Study of Irrigation Associations in Taiwan.” World Development 24(6): 1039 – 54. 1996.
“Improving the Performance of Small-Scale Irrigation Systems: The Effects of Technological Investments and Governance Structure on Irrigation Performance in Nepal.” World Development 24(8):1301 – 15. 1996.
Centre for Civil Society and Governance
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Fax: 2857-2521
Email: ccsg@hku.hk
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Jenna is a Product Policy Manager on Facebook’s Misinformation Policy team. She specialises in global health misinformation and misinformation in the Asia-Pacific region, and is based in Singapore.
Sam Traynor is the Product Policy manager for Inauthentic behavior at Facebook. For almost the last decade he has been working in the integrity space in variety of roles and companies mainly focusing on protecting user voice, the authenticity of conversations, and the integrity of the civic process.
Meg Chang is the Content Regulation Policy Lead for Facebook in the APAC region. Prior to this role, she was an Elections Manager and led Facebook’s election integrity efforts across EMEA, including the European Elections, the UK general election, and the Polish parliamentary and presidential elections, among many others. Before Facebook, she was the head of operations and publisher at EUobserver, a Brussels-based EU political and investigative news outlet. She also worked as a management consultant for Global 1000 companies in North America, Europe and the Asia Pacific region. She studied politics and law at the University of Kent in the UK.
Alex Pompe is a Research Manager on Facebook’s Data for Good team. This team builds privacy-protecting data sets to aid response work for natural disasters and public health crises (here is a recent example from the COVID19 response: https://research.fb.com/blog/2020/06/protecting-privacy-in-facebook-mobility-data-during-the-covid-19-response/). Previously, Alex led the growth team at a startup scaling the company to 35 countries over 3 years. Prior to this he worked on access to information and Internet programs for 6 years at an international NGO called IREX; first in Ukraine, next in Namibia, and then in Washington DC. He served as a Peace Corps volunteer teaching mathematics in Namibia from 2006 to 2008. Alex holds a BS in physics from the University of Illinois, and an MS from the University of Michigan (where he also taught astrophysics.) He has served as a guest lecturer for the University of Maryland’s School of Information.
Raina is the Head of Privacy and Data Policy, Engagement, APAC for Facebook. She is a lawyer by training and is a former regulator, having previously worked at the Hong Kong Privacy Commissioner for Personal Data in the position of Assistant Privacy Commissioner (Legal, Policy & Research). Prior to joining the Hong Kong data protection authority, Raina had extensive legal in-house experience and held management positions in both Hong Kong and Shanghai. She served as the Assistant Chief Counsel – Head of Legal at Hong Kong Disneyland and was the Deputy Chief Counsel – Head of Legal at Shanghai Disney Resort during the initial construction stage of the project when she helped set up the legal function at the Shanghai Disney Resort. Raina held a Bachelor of Laws (Hons) degree from the University of Melbourne, Australia.
Dr. Chan’s primary research concerns the institutions that shape the consumption and distortion of information in different organizational settings. His current research explores how bureaucrats handle information and the impact of institutions on their choices.
Ongoing projects deal with different aspects of bureaucratic control in authoritarian regimes, such as administrative oversight, juridical intervention, internal reporting, and legislative decision-making.
He holds a PhD Degree in Public Policy from the O’Neill School of Public and Environment Affairs and the Department of Political Science, Indiana University Bloomington.
Dr Winnie Law is the Deputy Director and Principal Lecturer at the Centre for Civil Society and Governance of The University of Hong Kong. She teaches undergraduate and postgraduate courses on sustainable development, community planning and environmental management. She also works with a team of researchers and conducts policy research, action research and knowledge exchange projects on rural revitalization, social innovation, community engagement and corporate sustainability. Dr Law has been a director of the Conservancy Association since 2005 and has served on a number of HKSAR Government’s advisory committees including Advisory Council for the Environment. At the regional level, Dr Law was commissioned by the EU and UNDP as a planning and social monitoring expert for their city planning and environmental management programmes in Vietnam. Dr Law was one of the invited speakers for the first TedxTongChongSt’s series on Hacking the Future and delivered a talk on Future of Sustainability in 2019.
Wai-Fung (Danny) Lam is Director of the Centre for Civil Society and Governance (CCSG), and Professor in Public Administration at the University of Hong Kong. He finished his undergraduate study at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, and received a Ph.D. in Public Policy from Indiana University, Bloomington. Professor Lam is an expert in common-pool resource management, institutional policy analysis, public governance, and civil society. His research has focused on the design of efficient institutional arrangements for the governance and management of public resources, a core issue in public administration and sustainable development. Professor Lam has served on the editorial committees of Public Administration Review (PAR), International Review of Administrative Sciences (IRAS), Journal of Comparative Policy Analysis (JCPA), Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly (NVSQ), and Asian Politics and Policy (APP), and is co-editor of The Asia-Pacific Journal of Public Administration (APJPA).
George Chen joined Facebook in January 2016 as the company’s first-ever policy representative based in Hong Kong, home for Facebook in the Greater China region. Currently as the Public Policy Director for Greater China, Mongolia, and Central Asia, George serves as Facebook’s “ambassador” to engage with the people and governments across the vast and diverse regions.
Prior to Facebook, George has worked in the media sector for about 15 years. George was a 2014 Yale World Fellow and a 2015 fellow of the US State Department’s International Visitor Leadership Program. George is a doctoral candidate at the University of Hong Kong where he focuses his research on freedom of expression and misinformation.
