Victoria Tran is an urban sociologist who studies how community groups and neighborhoods participate in local politics to influence policies on redevelopment and policing.

Her dissertation studies how community groups participated in and opposed redevelopment in Los Angeles’ Chinatown from 1975-2005. Within systems of urban governance that promote community-engagement and participatory governance, claims of community ownership gives local actors legitimacy to define who governs, how they come to govern, and who speaks for the urban poor. Using archival documents, interviews, and historical quantitative data, her dissertation analyzes how the power to define the neighborhood and its priorities was contested by groups with different social, economic, and cultural ties to the space and how these contestations shaped what groups the government legitimized as community representatives, how projects were prioritized and funded, and who benefited from redevelopment projects.

Outside of UCLA, Victoria volunteers as a tenant organizer. She received a BA in Leadership and Public Policy at the University of Virginia.