[8] While a student, he was a leader in the campus anti-apartheid movement, which sought to force Tulane to divest from companies still doing business with the government of South Africa.

His anti-apartheid activism was first brought to national attention in 1988, when South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu announced he would turn down an offer of an honorary degree from Tulane after Wise's group informed him of the school's ongoing investments there.

[12] Later in the 1990s, Wise began lecturing around the country on the issues of racism, criticizing white privilege (his own included),[2] and defending affirmative action.

Although he concedes that personal, overt bias is less common than in the past (or at least less openly articulated), Wise argues that existing institutions continue to foster and perpetuate white privilege, and that subtle, impersonal, and even ostensibly race-neutral policies contribute to racism and racial inequality today.

[18] He is a critic of Israel, and philosophically opposed to Zionism, which he views as not only oppressive to non-Jews in Palestine, but detrimental to Jews as well, and counter to Jewish values.