معرفی
Tong Zhang is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Finance at BI Norwegian Business School, where he has been employed since 2019. For the 2025-2026 academic year, he will also serve as a Visiting Scholar at the Centre for Modern East Asian Studies (CeMEAS) at the University of Göttingen, expanding his academic reach across European institutions.
His research interests span an impressive interdisciplinary range including economics, sociology, philosophy of science, and religious studies. Professor Zhang critically examines foundational concepts like meritocracy and critical realism while developing innovative theoretical frameworks such as the 'Law of Divine Selection,' which posits that societal motives and adopted worldviews fundamentally determine social organization and evolution. His work provides consistent and parsimonious explanations for various macro-historical puzzles including the Great Divergence between West and China, the eruption of World Wars, and patterns in Nobel Laureate distributions.
Professor Zhang's publication record demonstrates consistent scholarly output in reputable journals including Social Science Information, Social Epistemology, and Max Weber Studies. His recent work shows a clear trajectory of increasingly sophisticated interdisciplinary analysis that bridges economic theory with sociological and philosophical inquiry, particularly focusing on Weberian themes and critical evaluations of contemporary social paradigms.
His academic achievements include earning both PhD and Master's degrees summa cum laude from the University of Zurich, completing a visiting PhD stint at Yale University, and passing the CFA level III exam. These diverse qualifications reflect his unique position at the intersection of rigorous economic training and broader sociological-philosophical inquiry.
As an educator, Professor Zhang has taught Master's level courses in Derivatives and Computational Methods at BI Norwegian Business School, bringing his interdisciplinary perspective to finance education. His referee service for journals like Journal of Critical Realism further demonstrates his standing within academic communities studying foundational social theories.
