Khoo Ying Hooi, PhD, is an Associate Professor at Universiti Malaya (UM) and leads the UM Research Group on Human Rights. Her research centres on human rights, democracy, and civil society in Southeast Asia, with particular focus on Malaysia and Timor-Leste, and on how geopolitics shapes domestic politics, civic space, and rights discourses. She also works extensively on human rights education and academic freedom. 

She is the author of The Bersih Movement and Democratisation in Malaysia (SIRD/ ISEAS/ Lexington Books, 2020) and co-editor of Rethinking Human Rights and Peace in Post-Independence Timor-Leste through Local Perspectives (Palgrave Macmillan, 2022), alongside several other edited volumes. 

Ying Hooi is Editor-in-Chief of the Malaysian Journal of International Relations (MJIR) and serves on several international editorial boards. She is appointed by the Timor-Leste government to the Centro Nacional Chega! International Advisory Council, and is a founding member of the Southeast Asian Coalition for Academic Freedom (SEACAF). She has held fellowships and visiting appointments at Kyushu University, Mahidol University, Humboldt University of Berlin, and Beijing Foreign Studies University, and previously served at the Human Rights Commission of Malaysia (SUHAKAM).