David Kaye is a professor of law at the University of California, Irvine, School of Law and is at RWI Research and Education Department as the 2023-2024 Fulbright Distinguished Scholar in Public International Law. From 2014 to 2020 he served as UN Special Rapporteur on freedom of opinion and expression. His 2019 book, Speech Police: The Global Struggle to Govern the Internet (Columbia Global Reports), explores the ways in which companies, governments and activists struggle to define the rules for online expression.

While in Lund, his main goal is to conduct research and writing on government regulation of digital technologies, in particular their impact on and consistency with human rights law, and pursue ongoing projects related to mercenary spyware/surveillance and the development of an American National Human Rights Institution. In addition to his research, he is the Independent Board Chair of the Global Network Initiative and a Trustee of ARTICLE 19.

Some of David’s recent publications include the following:

The Scourge of Commercial Spyware – and How to Stop It (with Sarah McKune), Lawfare, August 25, 2023.

The United Nations Charter, International Human Rights, and the Hollowness of Sovereignty Claims, Oxford Handbook of Human Rights Advocacy (2023/forthcoming).

A review of Samuel Moyn’s Humane: How the United States Abandoned Peace and Reinvented War, 117 American Journal of International Law 177 (2023).

Online Propaganda, Censorship and Human Rights in Russia’s War Against Reality, 116 American Journal of International Law Unbound 140 (2022).

Convergence and Conflict: Reflections on Global and Regional Human Rights Standards on Hate Speech (with Evelyn Aswad), 20 Northwestern Journal of Human Rights 165 (2022).

The Troubled World of Hate Speech Regulation (review essay), 21 Journal of Human Rights 110 (2022).

Freedom of Opinion and Expression, Elgar Encyclopedia of Human Rights (eds., Nowak et al) (2022).

The Spyware State and the Prospects for Accountability, 27 Global Governance 483 (2021).