Faculty Profile

George Wong is Senior Lecturer of Sociology at the School of Social Sciences at the Singapore Management University. He is also a visiting Senior Research Fellow at the Wealth Management Institute (WMI). His research sits at the intersection of urban regime politics and governance, community power, and capital flows in Asian cities. He is also a trained ethnographer with a decade of experience in examining state-sponsored urban community development as political legitimacy projects in Asia. His current research projects include a study of state-sponsored grassroots leaders in neighbourhood micro-governance, an eco-political analysis of sustainability regimes in Asian cities, and a study of private concessional capital in tri-sector urban development. His works have been published in the Journal of Intercultural Studies, Anthrozoös, and Asian Studies Review. He currently teaches Big Questions and Understanding Societies.

Qualifications

• PhD in Sociology, Nanyang Technological University, 2022
• MA in Sociology, Nanyang Technological University, 2017
• BSocSc in Political Science & Sociology, Singapore Management University, 2014

Research Interests

• Urban regime analysis and community power
• State-sponsored grassroots organizations in urban governance and politics in Asia
• Urban eco-politics
• Philanthropic and concessional capital in urban development

Course(s) Taught in SMU

• Big Questions
• Understanding Societies