Ricky Li
I recently successfully defended my PhD thesis in the Department of Politics and International Studies at the University of Warwick. I hold an MSc in Political Theory from the London School of Economics. I also hold a BSc in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics from the University of Warwick.
Research
My research focuses on applied moral and political philosophy, with a particular emphasis on the normative issues surrounding big data and Artificial Intelligence. My PhD thesis, titled ‘The Moral Foundations of Data Protection Laws’, develops a moral theory—drawing on canonical philosophical ideas such as contractualism and the interest theory of rights—that offers a coherent and systematic foundation for understanding key ethical challenges in the digital age. These include informational privacy, data ownership, data transactions, and the moral duty to share personal data for significant public causes. I argue that, with appropriate refinements, the existing EU data regulatory framework has the potential to realise the moral ideals articulated in my theory. Beyond this, I am also interested in topics such as the validity of online consent, the ethics of data-driven healthcare, and questions of distributive justice in an AI-driven world. In 2022–2023, I worked as a Research Assistant at the Interdisciplinary Ethics Research Group on a UKRI-funded project examining ethical issues in contemporary practices in pathology.
Teaching
At Warwick, I have taught seminars for two modules, Applied Ethics (Philosophy) and Principles of Political Economy: Philosophy & Politics (a core PPE module), for which I was nominated and shortlisted for the Warwick Awards for Teaching Excellence in 2025.