Li Ying is Assistant Professor of Communication at the University of Macau. Her work mainly focuses on strategic public communication to promote social and cultural change. She is especially interested in grassroots, participatory, and user-generated media practice for the purpose of networked advocacy beyond real and imagined boundaries, namely, transnational campaigning, public diplomacy, and place branding. Her research investigates how organizations and communities adopt, excel, and/or abuse a convergence of communication means to achieve advocacy and empowerment goals. She approaches this line of inquiry through blending theoretical frameworks like communication interventions, public relations, participatory communication, and the anthropology of visual communication.

In 2008, Li Ying led a major research project for CPD entitled <a target="_blank" data-cke-saved-href="http://uscpublicdiplomacy.com/index.php/research/project_detail/the_2008..." href="https://uscpublicdiplomacy.org/%3Ca%20href%3D"http://uscpublicdiplomacy.com/index.php/research/project_detail/the_2008_pro_china_demonstrations_over_tibet_and_chinas_public_diplomacy/">http://uscpublicdiplomacy.com/index.php/research/project_detail/the_2008..." title="The 2008 " pro-china"="" demonstrations="" over="" tibet="" and="" china's="" public="" diplomacy.""="">The 2008 "Pro-China" Demonstrations over Tibet and China's Public Diplomacy.