As an environmental sociologist, I approach the intersection between social and environmental sustainability by exploring questions of how our underpinning knowledge settings about environmental issues are constructed; how they deployed in decision making processes, risk assessments and environmental governance; and how they shape and are shaped by socio-environmental controversies. I specialise in the topical areas of nuclear energy, climate policy and green finance where most of my research examine how elites, knowledge brokers, institutions, technologies and environments interact and account for conflicts in risk perceptions, management and communication. I am also interested in how these interactions influence decisions, from individual energy choices or investment decisions, to climate policy, environmental regulation and resource allocation.

I use a mix of qualitative methods such as fieldwork and organisational ethnography and field experiments. My research has taken me to various field sites including India, China, Australia, Singapore, the UK, Luxembourg and the Netherlands. 

In 2019, I received the Institute for Advanced Sustainability Studies (IASS) Directorate Fellowship in Potsdam (Germany) to expand my work on green finance, and in 2021, I was awarded a Research Scholarship at the University of Cambridge, Centre for the Study of Existential Risk (CSER).

I received my PhD in Sociology from the Australian National University (ANU) and a Masters in Global Studies from the University of Freiburg in Germany. I have held research positions at James Cook University (Australia), the University of Luxembourg (Luxembourg), and the National University of Singapore (Singapore). I also spent time in the private sector as a business planning analyst at Hewlett Packard in Ireland, programme coordinator at the Global Development Network in India, and a journalist for The Business Times and The Straits Times in Singapore.

Book

Wong, C.M.L (2018) Energy, Risk and Governance: The Case of Nuclear Energy in India. London: Palgrave Macmillan Publishers, DOI: 10.1007/978-3-319-63363-3

Journal Articles

Wong, C. M. L & Wu Y.Y. (2023) “Limits to inoculating against the risk of fake news: a replication study in Singapore during COVID-19”, Journal of Risk Research, DOI: 10.1080/13669877.2023.2249909

Wong, C. M. L. (2021) “Temporality and systemic risk: the case of green bonds”, Journal of Risk Research, 45(1): pp110-120

Wong, C., Hesse, M., & Sigler, T. J. (2021). “City-states in relational urbanization: the case of Luxembourg and Singapore.” Urban Geography, pp1-22. doi:10.1080/02723638.2021.1878331

Mark C. J. S., McLevey, J., Schweizer, V. and Wong, C. M. L. (2020) “Climate change and energy futures - theoretical frameworks, epistemological issues, and methodological perspectives”, Society & Natural Resources, 33(11): pp1331-1338

Wong, C. M. L. and Lockie, S. (2020) “Climate policy and industry elite perceptions of risk and uncertainty: a cross-national study”, Society & Natural Resources, 33(11), pp1399-1418

Wong, C. M. L. and Jensen, O. (2020) “The paradox of trust: perceived risk and public compliance during the COVID-19 pandemic in Singapore”, Journal of Risk Research, 23(7-8): pp1021-1030

Hesse, M. and Wong, C. M. L. (2019) “A relational lens on cities. Niche-economic strategies and related urban development trajectories in Geneva (Switzerland), Luxembourg (Luxembourg) and Singapore”, Geographischen Zeitschrift, 108(2020/2), pp74-98

Wong, C. M. L and Lockie, S. (2018) “Sociology, risk and the environment: a material-semiotic approach”, Journal of Risk Research, 21(9), pp1077-1092.

Wong, C. M. L (2018) “Review of fact and fiction in global energy policy: 15 contentious questions.”, Edited by B. K. Sovacool, M. A. Brown, and S. V. Valentine, Risk Analysis, 38(4), pp866-868.

Jetzkowitz, J., Koppen, V-K., Lidskog, R., Lieske, V-K, Wong, C. M. L., (2017) “The significance of meaning. Why IPBES needs the social sciences and humanities”, Innovation: The European Journal of Social Science Research, 31(1), pp38-60.

Wong, C. M. L (2016) “Assembling interdisciplinary energy research through an Actor Network Theory (ANT) frame”, Energy Research and Social Science, Vol. 12 (February 2016), pp106-110.

Wong, C. M. L (2015a) “The mutable nature of risk and acceptability: a hybrid risk governance framework”, Risk Analysis, 33 (11), pp.1969-1982.

Wong, C. M. L (2015b) “Organisational risk perception and transformations in India’s nuclear establishment", Journal of Risk Research, 8(8), pp1012-1029.

Wong, C. M. L (2012) “The developmental state in ecological modernisation and the politics of environmental framings: the case of Singapore and implications for East Asia” Nature and Culture, 7(1), pp95-119.

Goodsite, M., Wong C. M. L, Hertel, O., Moseholm, L. (2010) “Responses to air pollution based on historical and current policies in the EU and ASEAN”, Global Environment, 3(6), pp150-183.

Book Chapters

Lockie, S., and Wong, C. M. L. (2018) "Conflicting temporalities of social and environmental change". In M. Boström and D. Davidson (Eds.), Environment and Society: Concepts and Challenges. (pp. 327-350). London: Palgrave and Macmillan.

Lockie, S. and Wong, C.M.L (2017) “Risk, sustainability and time: sociological perspectives” in Schandl, H. and Walker, I. (2017) Sustainability: Social Science Contributions. (pp. 187-198) Canberra: CSIRO Publishing

Wong, C. M. L (2017) “The clash of risk perceptions: reconciling ‘the publics’ and ‘the experts’” in Janardhanan, N., Pant, G. and Grover, R. (Eds) Resurgence of Nuclear Power: Challenges and Opportunities for Asia. (pp. 105-124) Singapore: Springer

Wong, C. M. L (2010) “Facing the storm through the market”, in Montesano, M. J. and Lee, P.O. (Eds), Regional Outlook 2010-2011. (pp. 72-28) Singapore: ISEAS Publishing, ISBN: 978-981-4279-53-6

Technical Reports

Wong, C. M. L. (2021) “Inoculation Against Fake News? An experiment using a fake news game in the context of COVID-19. Preliminary Key Findings Report”, National University of Singapore, Singapore [Download report here]

Wong, C. M. L., Hesse, M. (2019) “Small but Global Cities: A Comparative Analysis of Luxembourg & Singapore: Stakeholder Report”, University of Luxembourg, Luxembourg [Download report here.]

Stoddart, M., Wong, C. M. L, Schweizer, V., McLevy, J. (2018) “Climate Change and Energy Futures: Final Report”, Memorial University, Newfoundland, Canada [Download report here]

Wong, C. M. L (2006), “A Comparative Study of Key Socio-Economic Indicators in China and India”, Ireland: Hewlett-Packard Dublin Inkjet Manufacturing Operation (DIMO), Dublin: HP Internal Publications.

Opinion Editorials & Commentaries (Selected)

Koh. C.G., Lee, L., Lo, C., Wong, C.M.L, Yap, J. (2020) “A socio-psychological perspective” in World Economic Forum Insight Report, Challenges and Opportunities in the Post-COVID-19 World (pp 44-48). Geneva: World Economic Forum

Wong, C. M. L., Koh, C. G and Lee, L. (2020) “Outbreaks of diseases make us exaggerate or under-estimate risks. The COVID-19 shows that”, Channel News Asia, 20 Feb

Wong, C. M. L. (2015) “Energy security in Southeast Asia? Let’s start with the future”, The Kyoto Review of Southeast Asia, No.18, http://kyotoreview.org/yav/energy-security-southeast-asia-the-future/

Wong, C. M. L. (2014) “The Australia-India nuclear deal – a qualitative risk analysis perspective”, Australian Resources and Investment, 8(4), pp155-156 (By invitation)

Wong, C. M. L. (2014) “Australian uranium deal could make Indian nuclear power safer”, The Conversation, 5 Sept

Wong, C. M. L (2012) “India's nuclear programme: Trust abroad but not at home”, Al Jazeera, 3 Nov

Wong, C. M. L. (2010) “When green is the colour of exclusion”, The Straits Times, 6 Jul

Wong, C. M. L (2010) “Fit human life and capitalism to nature”, The Straits Times, 25 Feb

Wong, C. M. L (2009) “Clean-growth opportunities for Southeast Asia”, The Business Times, 17 Nov

"Contested Epistemologies of Sustainability"

This PhD project examines contested epistemologies of sustainability in Asia and Europe. It draws, on the one hand, on the work of Dr. Catherine Wong, who explores epistemologies of sustainability in indigenous communities in Southeast Asia, in particular, the ways in which they engage with and challenge “Western” epistemologies of sustainability. And secondly, it draws on the work of Dr. Jaron Harambam, who looks at conspiratorial epistemologies of sustainability in the Western world, in particular, how conspiracy theorists engage with and challenge “Western” epistemologies of sustainability. 

The selected PhD candidate will develop their own research project, but still couched within the overarching theme of the contested epistemologies of sustainability. Preferably, s/he will draw on, or compare both research streams when designing her/his own project. Central should be the alternative architectures of knowledge and the contested processes, practices and (power) relationships that constitute different understandings of sustainability. Ideally, our candidate will bridge and compare both of our approaches in order to move the field of climate change ahead.

PIs: Dr. Catherine Wong & Dr. Jaron Harambam

“The role of moral narratives in greening financial markets.”

In global efforts to address sustainable transitions, green finance has been touted as a key lever that can facilitate rapid decarbonization by harnessing the logics of the market. It has, however, also been critiqued for the financialisation of nature, greenwashing and exploiting sustainability to generate new revenue streams with little accountability for environmental objectives. While the verdict is still up as to the efficacy of green finance in mitigating climate change, there are some real changes in the way financial markets are governed. New green market devices such as the Environment, Social and Governance (ESG) Framework, the Green Taxonomy, Sustainability Disclosure Requirements (SDR) regulations, and green “codes of conduct” are increasingly being deployed in financial markets. These devices, however, also require moral narratives to legitimise market uptake. Yet, we know little about how moral narratives emerge, which actors produce them, how they are mobilised in the environmental governance of financial markets, and how they are economised (i.e. embedded in financial decisions and market practices).

This project explores the role of moral narratives in green finance with particular focus on 1) which moral narratives are mobilised in green finance and how they are deployed as a means of justification and legitimisation; 2) how moral narratives are economised in greenmarket devices; and 3) what the implications are for the relationship between financial and ecological objectives.

PI: Dr. Catherine Wong

Co-PIs: Dr. Pablo Ignacio Ampuero-Ruiz & Dr. Kobe de Keere 

I teach the following courses:

• Sustainable Cities (MSSS Sociology)
• Environment and Society
• Master Thesis Sociology