Wenjue Knutsen

Professor Wenjue L. Knutsen is one of Canada’s leading academics who studies nonprofit organizations and public policy. She is jointly appointed in three departments at Queen’s: the Smith School of Business, the Faculty of Health Sciences – School of Nursing, and the School of Policy Studies. She holds a doctorate (Ph.D.) in public administration from one of the leading public administration programs in the United States, the Reubin O’D. Askew School of Public Administration and Policy at Florida State University. She also holds a Masters in Public Administration (M.P.A.) from Wayne State University.

Professor Knutsen’s research spans issues of management, health care, public policy, and public administration, all in the public, private, and nonprofit sectors. She has studied issues about government-nonprofit collaboration, as well as the effectiveness of applying business managerial strategies in the nonprofit sector. She is currently studying how to lead social change through business means and how to address the lack of financial independence of the social sector through social innovations. Her research implicates issues with social enterprises, social finance, social enterprise ethics, and social enterprise legal structures.  

Professor Knutsen is a co-editor of the country’s leading nonprofit management textbook: Management of Nonprofit and Charitable Organizations in Canada (5^th edition). Her work has appeared in top academic journals such as Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly and Voluntas: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations, as well as in books and journals published around the world. She is also currently an editorial board member for Voluntas: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations. She has presented her academic work throughout Canada, the United States, Europe, Israel and China.

She was awarded the Felice Davidson Perlmutter Award in 2016 for her research contributions by the Association for Research on Nonprofit Organizations and Voluntary Action, America’s leading academic organization for nonprofit scholars.

Professor Knutsen is frequently invited by media, government, and industry to provide her perspectives about nonprofit organizations, whether in the news or at an event or conference.

CV [229 kb]