LEE Wan Fai Walter

Dr Walter Lee specialises in Chinese international relations, in particular China's epistemological and moral roles played in global governance. He has a broad interest in intellectual history, knowledge production, life philosophy, and multidisciplinary research that examines world politics from the Humanities perspectives. An exemplary outcome is his latest research monograph Principles and Laws in World Politics: Classical Chinese Perspectives on Global Conflict (Singapore; Hackensack, NJ: World Scientific Publishing, 2022, 524 pages).

Dr Lee studied and worked in Hong Kong before obtaining a MA in International Relations from the University of Warwick. He subsequently completed his PhD in Politics and International Relations at the University of Auckland with a thesis on non-interventionism and classical Chinese conceptions of the jus ad bellum. Before joining the HKMU (at the time, OUHK), Dr Lee was Postdoctoral Teaching Associate in Global China Studies and Social Sciences programmes in School of Humanities and Social Science, The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST). He also taught at the University of Auckland and Auckland University of Technology (AUT) in New Zealand.

In research, Dr Lee worked as Senior Research Fellow in China and public international law at the University of Hong Kong (HKU)’s Faculty of Law, and Research Assistant for China in Comparative Perspective Network (CCPN) at London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE). He held Visiting Scholar position at Institute of World Economics and Politics (IWEP), Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) in Beijing, as well as Visiting Fellow position at Centre for Comparative and Public Law (CCPL), HKU. Dr Lee was trained earlier in the Humanities. He graduated with a First Class Honours degree, majoring in English and Comparative Literature. His enduring passion for making the world a better place was much inspired and driven by an internship experience with the United Nations General Assembly at New York Headquarters.

As a continuing project, Dr Lee works on basic research in common principles and laws in world politics and cosmopolitan law. Currently, he is studying: the classical and the contemporary, virtue politics, non/post-Western IR, critical and historical IR, comparative worldview and cosmology in civilisations, narrative building and interaction. He is also interested in photography, aesthetics, and performing arts, in particular concept formation and expression in the world of dance.

Intellectual history and knowledge production

Chinese international relation

Non/Post-Western international relations

Global governance and international law

Multidisciplinary research, non/post-positivism, and hermeneutics

BA Hons (CUHK), PGDE (HKU), MA (Warwick), PhD (Auckland)

Assistant Professor, School of Arts and Social Sciences, HKMU (2017-present)

Founding Programme & Stream Leader of Global and China Studies, HKMU (2018-present)

Visiting Speaker, Finnish Institute of International Affairs (FIIA), Helsinki (2016)

Senior Research Fellow, Department of Law, Faculty of Law, University of Hong Kong  (2015-16)

Visiting Fellow, Centre for Comparative and Public Law (CCPL), Faculty of Law, University of Hong Kong (2013, 2015)

Visiting Scholar, Division of International Politics Theory, Institute of World Economics and Politics (IWEP), Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS), Beijing (2013)

Research Assistant, Researchers Fostering Laboratory, China in Comparative Perspective  Network Global (formerly China in Comparative Perspective Network, CCPN), London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) (2009-10)

Intern, General Assembly Affairs Branch, Department of General Assembly and Conference Management (DGACM), United Nations Secretariat, New York (2008)