Dr. Evan J. Andrews is a Banting Postdoctoral Researcher based in the Department of Geography at Memorial University, St. John’s, Canada. He holds a PhD from the University of Waterloo's School of Environment, Resources and Sustainability. His research advances capacities and knowledge for institutions to facilitate human dignity and sustainability. More broadly, his research focuses on the nexus of environmental governance, social-ecological change, and transdisciplinarity, especially in the context of small-scale fisheries as well as fisheries and oceans sustainability.
Dr. Ian Babelon is Research Fellow at Northumbria University in Newcastle (UK). His research interests include digital tools for collaborative spatial planning, sustainability in the built environment, and communities of practice in the field of community engagement in Europe and beyond. As consultant, Ian contributed to the design of participatory climate transition at local authorities in France.
Dr. Robert Berry is a Senior Lecturer in Informatics at the Faculty of Computing, Engineering and Science, University of South Wales, UK. He is a computational geographer working in a wide range of areas across the fields of human and physical geography. His current research interests include exploring the integration of natural language processing (NLP) and geographical information systems (GIS), and developing high-speed computing solutions for tackling complex and data-intensive geospatial data science problems.
Dr. Wiebren J. Boonstra is a sociologist at the Department of Earth Sciences, Uppsala University. His research explores the cultural diversity of users of local natural environments, resistance against sustainability transitions, conflicts over marine environments, retro-innovation and craftsmanship in farming, and the sociological-historical dynamics of killing animals. Together with V. Mellegård he received in 2021 the Rabel J. Burdge and Donald R. Field Outstanding Article Award for the article ”Craftsmanship as a carrier of indigenous and local ecological knowledge: photographic insights from Sámi Duodji and archipelago fishing” published in Society & Natural Resources, 33(10), 1252-1272.
Dr. Beth Brockett works for Great Britain Forest Research as a social science and interdisciplinary specialist. Beth is currently working on projects which seek to provide us with better understanding of the social and cultural values people hold in relation to trees outside of woodland, the local community benefits of new tree planting, and how social sciences can be better integrated into the environment sector. She also has a particular interest in working with different forms of knowledge to promote sustainable land management.
Jasmine K. Brown is pursuing a doctorate in Forestry at Michigan State University, where her research focuses on the enduring histories of African Americans in forests and the forestry profession. Brown holds a Bachelor’s degree in Natural Resources from the University of Connecticut, where she spent a year at Alabama A&M University (HBCU). Brown also holds a Master’s degree in Forest Ecosystems and Society from Oregon State University, where her research focused on the history of demographic diversity within natural resources literature.
Dr. Angie Carter is a rural sociologist studying food justice, resistance to extractive energy projects, and agricultural change in the US Midwest. She serves on the board of the Women, Food and Agriculture Network and is currently an associate professor of environmental/energy justice in the Department of Social Sciences at Michigan Technological University in Houghton, Michigan.
Yan Chen is an interdisciplinary PhD student at Dalhousie University. Her recent research focuses on understanding energy landscape transitions and so-caused social stories using social media data and machine learning/deep learning technologies. She is particularly interested in how landscape changes can impact human social lives and their perceptions of the living places, as well as developing machine power tools to mine and analyze large-sized social media data. She has experience in qualitative approaches using secondary social media data and scoping reviews.
Dr. Jessica Cockburn grew up in rural KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa as the daughter of a farmer and a teacher. Here she learnt early on that human well-being and social justice are inextricably linked to the environment, and strongly influenced by socio-economic and political realities. In her PhD at the Department of Environmental Science, Rhodes University (RU), Jessica adopted a transdisciplinary approach to studying collaborative stewardship in multifunctional landscapes. During her postdoctoral research at the Environmental Learning Research Centre (RU), Jessica deepened this focus on multistakeholder collaboration through the lens of relationality, drawing on learning theories, and realist evaluation methodology. Now, as a lecturer in Environmental Science, Jessica continues to work in the landscapes-linkages-learning nexus, exploring engaged ways of teaching and researching at this interface.
Dr. Ana Carolina Esteves Dias is an interdisciplinary professional, currently working on the sustainability industry. Her area of expertise relies on human dimensions of coastal governance and ways in which communities interact with and value nature, especially in the context of small-scale fisheries. Her experiences are centered in Latin America, with collaborations in Africa and Asia as a former postdoctoral researcher at the V2V Global Partnership. She is a Biologist by training and holds a PhD in Social and Ecological Sustainability from the University of Waterloo and a Masters in Ecology, from the University of Campinas.
Dr. Michael J. Dockry is a member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation with traditional territories around Lake Michigan and contemporary tribal lands in Central Oklahoma. Mike is an Assistant Professor of tribal natural resource management at the University of Minnesota in the Department of Forest Resources and an affiliate faculty member of the American Indian Studies Department. His interdisciplinary research and teaching focus on incorporating Indigenous knowledge into forestry and natural resource management. His work supports tribal sovereignty and addresses tribal environmental issues. He earned a BS in Forest Science from the University of Wisconsin, an MS in Forest Resources from Penn State University and a PhD in Forestry from the University of Wisconsin.
Dr. Rebecca Ford is a senior research fellow at the University of Melbourne, Australia. She draws on psychological and interdisciplinary frameworks to study people and their interactions with forests, as well as forest and fire management, considering aspects such as experience, values, social acceptability and decision-making.
Dr. Madu Galappaththi is currently a Senior Policy Advisor at the Ontario Ministry of Environment, Conservation and Parks, Canada. Prior to this position, Madu worked as a Postdoctoral Fellow at both Brock University, Ontario and Memorial University, Newfoundland. Her research examined the topics of gender, intersectionality, social wellbeing, and environmental governance within the context of small-scale fisheries. The geographic focus of her work was primarily on South Asia. Madu completed her PhD in Social and Ecological Sustainability at the University of Waterloo, Canada in 2022.
Dr. Caitlin Hafferty is a Postdoctoral Researcher in Environmental Social Science at the Environmental Change Institute, School of Geography and the Environment, at the University of Oxford. With expertise spanning human geography and environmental planning, she conducts theoretically driven research with real-world impact in inter- and transdisciplinary settings. Caitlin is currently researching the governance and equity dimensions of Nature-based Solutions and nature recovery in the UK, funded by the Leverhulme Centre for Nature Recovery.
Dr. Paul Hebinck, who passed away in 2022, before the publication of this book, was a rural sociologist and Emeritus Associate Professor in the Sociology of Development and Change group at Wageningen University in the Netherlands. He was also an adjunct professor at the University of Fort Hare, South Africa, and senior research associate in the Department of Environmental Science at Rhodes University in Grahamstown, South Africa. Paul specialized in rural development, land and agrarian reform, resource management and agricultural livelihoods. He did long-term research in remote rural villages in Kenya, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Namibia and South Africa.
Dr. Sarah Hitchner is an Assistant Research Scientist and an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Anthropology at University of Georgia. She holds a PhD in Anthropology from the University of Georgia and has conducted long-term ethnographic research in Malaysia, Indonesia, and the U.S. South on cultural landscapes, conservation and indigenous communities, local impacts of bioenergy development, perceptions of climate change, and African American forest management. She is Co-Director of UGA’s Bali & Beyond study abroad program, where she teaches a course in ethnographic writing.
Dr. Michaela Hoffelmeyer is an assistant professor in the Department of Community and Environmental Sociology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Michaela studies topics related to gender, sexuality, and labor, specifically queer farmers and meat processing workers. Their work examines how structural inequalities influence access to and participation in the agrifood system.
Dr. James Hoggett is a Senior Specialist in Social Science at Natural England who specialises in intergroup conflict and social influence. Informed by Social Identity Theory, his interest in digital tools for engagement is based on the role online identities and group membership play in informing and influencing participation.
Dr. Durdana Islam is a Project Director at Narratives Inc. and a sessional instructor at the University of Winnipeg. She has a PhD in Natural Resources and Environmental Management. Dr. Islam's Interdisciplinary research background, coupled with a decade of university teaching experience allows her to bring a wealth of knowledge and expertise to her work. Her portfolio demonstrates expertise in Indigenous relations, food sovereignty, participatory action research, boundary objects, climate change, and project management.
Dr. Douglas Jackson-Smith is professor and Kellogg Chair of Agroecosystem Management in the School of Environment and Natural Resources at The Ohio State University, USA. He has published extensively in social science and interdisciplinary journals and served as president of the Rural Sociological Society.
Dr. Christopher Jadallah is an Assistant Professor of Environmental Justice in the Department of Education at the University of California, Los Angeles, where he is also affiliate faculty in the Institutes of the Environment and Sustainability. His work engages issues of power, place, and participation in examining how learning environments can be designed to foster social and ecological transformation.
Dr. Robert Emmet Jones is a professor in the Department of Sociology and a research associate at the Institute for a Secure and Sustainable Environment and the Center for the Study of Social Justice at the University of Tennessee. He is an environmental sociologist who conducts research on the human dimensions of ecological change, ecosystem management, and environmental policy. He is an organizer and charter member of the International Association for Society and Natural Resources, served as an associate editor and reviewer for its journal, Society and Natural Resources, served on steering committees and presented numerous papers at its international symposiums and has chaired the Student Paper Awards Committee for the ISSRM since 2015.
Dr. Rachel Kelly is a knowledge broker and marine socioecologist at the Centre for Marine Socioecology (CMS), University of Tasmania. She oversees the centre's approach to end-user engagement and research uptake in the context of understanding ocean and climate issues and informing solutions. Her own research focuses on human dimensions of sustainability and inter/transdisciplinary approaches - and centres around collaboration with diverse interdisciplinary and international teams to identify and develop sustainable solutions ocean and climate challenges.
Dr. E. Carina H. Keskitalo is Professor of Political Science, Umeå University, Sweden. She has published widely on environmental policy including climate change adaptation. Keskitalo has studied often comparative multi-level governance cases including cases in natural resource use, in particular forestry and multi-use forest cases.
Dr. Richard Dimba Kiaka is a lecturer on the human dimensions of conservation at the School for Field Studies, Kenya. He holds a PhD in anthropology from the University of Hamburg. His Ph.D. research focused on environmental justice concerns in community-based natural resource management in Namibia. He has since then maintained collaboration with communal conservancies in Namibia, as well as extending research interests to socioecological transformation in Kenya’s southern rangelands. Richard is also an associate of the Collaborative Research Centre 228: Future Rural Africa - Future-making and social-ecological transformation. Richard’s contribution in this volume received financial support from Global South Studies Centre at the University of Cologne.
Dr. Christine Knott is an interdisciplinary scholar with degrees in Anthropology (BA), Women's Studies (BA and MWS), Sociology (PhD), and is currently an Assistant Professor in the Department of Women's Studies at San Diego State University. Her research aims to better understand the broader social and ecological ramifications of resource extraction and processing industries. Thus, attention is paid to the implications of often gendered and racialized corporate growth strategies on rural and remote coastal communities, work quality, employment-related mobility, and citizen as well as animal rights.
Bryanne Lamoureux is a Senior Research Associate at the University of Winnipeg's Environment and Society Co-Laboratory, where she does community engaged research in the renewable natural resources sector. She completed a BA Hons in Environmental Studies and a BA in Sociology at the University of Winnipeg, and a Master of Environmental Studies at Dalhousie University with research focused on food justice, food sovereignty, and the role of farmers in working towards a more just food system.
Dr. María Andrée López Gómez holds a PhD from Pompeu Fabra University. Her work centers on the social determinants of health that are related to work. As a Social Epidemiologist, her research focuses on the impact that public and organizational policies and their implementation have on workers' health and wellbeing, and occupational outcomes for future generations. Her research includes the study of the impact that social-ecological changes and policies have on work in marine industries and the assessment of inequalities related to working lives and retirement age. She is currently a postdoctoral researcher at the Centre for Demographic Studies in Barcelona, Spain.
Dr. Rodgers Lubilo holds a PhD in Development Sociology with focus on wildlife conservation and community-based natural resource management (CBNRM). With 25 years of experience in community conservation in Southern Africa, he has worked in supporting institutional development and governance with communal conservancies in Zambezi region of Namibia. He has managed and supported CBNRM at many sites in Zambia, Namibia, Botswana, South Africa and Mozambique. His research interests in CBNRM include: governance, benefit sharing and sustainable natural resources management. Currently, Rodgers is the Director of CBRMM at Frankfurt Zoological Society Zambia and Chairperson for the Zambia CBNRM Forum.
Dr. Vanessa Masterson is a researcher and theme leader of the Biosphere Stewardship and Transformation theme at the Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University. Vanessa’s research explores how the meanings that we attach to place and nature influence our ability to navigate complex environmental changes. She is interested in how sense of place supports care and stewardship of landscapes and the collective ability to cope with rapid change and transformation. Born in South Africa, Masterson is a visiting researcher at the Department of Geography at Exeter University, UK, and an Honorary Associate at the Anthropology Department, Rhodes University, South Africa.
Jaye Mejía-Duwan is a PhD candidate in the Department of Environmental Science, Policy & Management at UC Berkeley whose work draws from the fields of queer-of-color ecology, critical agrarian studies, feminist political ecology, and environmental disability studies. Their current research uses ethnographic methods to investigate QTPOC (Queer & Trans People of Color) agricultural collectives and land projects as exercises of antiracist and anticapitalist queer ecological kinship. Past research projects have included an investigation of strategies of resistance among queer and trans climate-induced migrants from Puerto Rico and Central America, a mixed-methods environmental health study of childhood asthma among Spanish-speaking residents of the South Bronx, and a quantitative analysis of the environmental justice impacts of California electric vehicle policy.
Dr. Brett Alan Miller works for the U.S. Forest Service as the Shared Stewardship and Southwest Ecological Restoration Institutes Program Manager for the Southwestern Region. He holds a PhD from Utah State University in Environmental, Community, and Natural Resource Sociology and an MS in Natural Resources with an emphasis on Bioregional Planning and Ecosystem Services from the University of Idaho. Before working for the U.S. Forest Service, Brett contributed to place-based, participatory research on environmental co-management. In his current role, Brett applies insights from his research and training on place-based and community-based land management and collaborative governance to improve shared stewardship and co-stewardship between and among state agencies, communities, stakeholders, and tribes as unique sovereign nations in order to improve transboundary land management outcomes for underserved communities across the Southwestern Region.
Maddison Miller is a Darug woman and Lecturer at The University of Melbourne in Indigenous cultural ecological knowledges. She is deeply committed to telling stories with and of place, weaving many ways of knowing together. Maddi works closely with communities and knowledge holders to create rich narratives.
Dr. Abraham Miller-Rushing is the Science Coordinator for Acadia National Park and Schoodic Education and Research Center. His research extends across diverse areas in conservation and ecology, from phenological studies to studies investigating citizen science as a tool for integrating research, management, and education.
Nosiseko Mtati is a Catchment Coordinator for the Tsitsa Project. This is a government (Department of Forestry, Fisheries and Environment) funded project based at Rhodes University that is working with communities in the Tsitsa River catchment in Maclear. She has a Master in Environmental Education, and a Master in Environmental Science, both from Rhodes University. Her interests include working with communities, upskilling people, stakeholder engagement and the management of relationships and creating and maintaining good communication lines. She was born in the rural areas of the former Transkei, in Willowvale, Eastern Cape, which makes it easy to engage with communities she works with.
Dr. Solange Nadeau has worked as a social scientist with the Natural Resources Canada/Canadian Forest Service for the last twenty years. She is one of the pioneers in bringing a strong social emphasis to forest management in Canada. Her work has strengthened the capacity of government and stakeholders to address the human dimension of complex forestry issues. She has a PhD in Forest Resources from Oregon State University, a MSc in Forest Resources and a BSc in Forest Management from Université Laval.
Dr. Sarah Naiman received their PhD in Conservation Social Sciences from Cornell University’s Department of Natural Resources and the Environment. As an environmental justice scholar, Sarah has collaborated with researchers, students, practitioners, and community members to conduct mixed-methods research at various organizational and academic projects including 1) gaining a baseline understanding of how US Latines conceptualize environmental problems and their solutions, 2) identifying organizational diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI), needs and priorities, and 3) evaluating the effectiveness of environmental education, outreach, and implementation programs across the U.S.
Phuc (Polly) Nguyen is a junior environmental scientist with a Master of Resource and Environmental Management from Dalhousie University. She has experience in quantitative and qualitative data analysis. Polly is passionate about sustainable development and social ecosystem services for marginalized communities, including the relationship between mental health and environmental stewardship within intersectional social identities.
liza Oldach works for First Light, a collaboration building land return to Wabanaki Tribes in the land now called Maine. Her Master's research in Environmental Science and Policy at the University of California, Davis focused on governance of marine commons, including questions of community engagement, and collaborative decision-making in US contexts.
Dr. John Parkins is professor of sociology in the Department of Resource Economics and Environmental Sociology at the University of Alberta. His current research and teaching examines the social context of resource development, renewable and community energy, public deliberation and environmental politics, and sustainable agriculture in Alberta. Recent publications examine case studies of community energy in western Canada, barriers and opportunities for wind power development in Alberta, and the social context of public engagement in the Canadian forest sector.
Dr. Courtenay Parlee has an interdisciplinary PhD (anthropology, sociology) from the University of New Brunswick with over a decade of research experience in Atlantic Canada focused on marine management and governance, qualitative methods, community engaged action research, and conflict resolution. From 2021 until 2023 Courtenay was on term with the Blue Economy Lobster Team in Fisheries and Oceans Maritimes Science Division. Her primary role was to research the human dimensions of the lobster fishery. Prior to working with DFO, she was an Ocean Frontier Institute Postdoctoral Fellow at the Environmental Policy Institute, Memorial University of Newfoundland. In her new role, Courtenay is a Policy Advisor with DFO's Strategic Policy/Fisheries Policy.
Sasha Quahe is a PhD candidate in Sustainability Science at the Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University. Her current research explores crisis and sustainability transformation from a process-relational perspective. Her other research interests include framing and discourse, plural values, science-based targets, corporate reporting, and the Global Biodiversity Framework.
Dr. Archi Rastogi is an evaluation specialist at the Independent Evaluation Unit of the Green Climate Fund. He has worked in media, academia, non-profits, the UN, and management consulting. Rastogi has a PhD in natural sciences, MSc in Environmental Management, and BSc in Biological Sciences. He has spoken and written broadly on career trajectories for early career NRSS scientists. His perspective draws attention to career opportunities and challenges outside of academic sector. He has contributed advise to governments and multilateral organisations on strategy, and helping governments review their projects and programs, with an eye to revising strategies for the future
Dr. Andrea Rawluk is a Senior Lecturer at the University of Melbourne in environmental social science working in complex social ecological challenges, such as communities and wildfire, landscape transformation, and collaborative practice for interdisciplinary research. Andrea addresses interdisciplinary challenges at the nexus of policy, practice, and social change.
Dr. Roesch-McNally, Women for the Land Initiative Director at American Farmland Trust, holds a PhD in Sociology and Sustainable Agriculture and has over a decade of social science research experience. She has published research on farmer adoption of conservation practices, their response and adaptation to climate change and has work that examines structural barriers to agricultural transformation towards a more regenerative agriculture. She also has extension and outreach expertise in engaging women farmers and landowners on the project of farmland preservation, stewardship and climate resilience.
Dr. Prativa Sapkota is a Research Fellow at the University of Melbourne, in environmental social science. She is interested in understanding different aspects of society-environment relationships in the context of change. Her research interests have evolved through her experience from working with communities at grass root level to working at different organisational context such as NGO, INGO and academic institutions in Nepal and Australia.
Dr. John Schelhas is an Emeritus Research Forester with the Southern Research Station (SRS) of the USDA Forest Service in Athens, GA. His research centers on relationships between people and forests. His primary research focus is private forest landowners and rural communities, addressing land use decision-making, environmental values and discourse, African American forest owners, and tribal forests. He has conducted research in Latin America and the U.S. South. He holds a PhD in Renewable Natural Resources with a Minor in Anthropology from the University of Arizona.
Dr. Kate Sherren is professor of landscape social science in the School for Resource and Environmental Studies at Dalhousie University. She researches the human dimensions of sustainability landscape transitions in diverse contexts including agriculture, energy, cities and coasts. Her recent work focuses on the development of a ‘climax thinking’ framework to understand and reduce resistance to climate-motivated actions such as nature-based coastal adaptation and renewable energy expansion; landscape culturomics using big data to improve social impact assessment; and, cultural ecosystem services to inform landscape decision-making. She holds a PhD in Resource Management and Environmental Studies from the Australian National University.
Dr. Gladman (Glad) Thondhlana is an Associate Professor, and Head of the Department of Environmental Science at Rhodes University where he teaches both undergraduate and postgraduate students. His research work centres broadly on human dimensions of natural resources management, including the links between natural resource use and rural livelihoods, collaborative management of natural resources, conservation conflicts and sustainable consumption. His work is guided by questions aimed at addressing inequality, marginalisation and social injustice in resource management.
Dr. Tobin N. Walton is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University. His mixed-methods research centers on theory, measurement, and modeling of the social psychological and cultural bases of action, behavior, and information processing. He is a Principal Investigator on several National Science Foundation funded projects in which he is adapting the theoretical framework grounding the EIS and the integrative model of pro-ecological behavior to the domains of climate change resilience, food insecurity, and STEM Education.
Dr. Grace Wang is a Professor of Urban & Environmental Planning & Policy, and Director of the Sustainability Engagement Institute at Western Washington University. Dr. Wang is a public lands scholar, with research on Bureau of Land Management decision-making and the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge. Using different social science approaches—focus groups, key informant interviews, sample surveys and questionnaires—Grace has coordinated research which has implications for the management of natural resources, traditional ecological knowledge and the management of public lands. As Institute Director, she brings together Western's educational, co-curricular, and operational functions under the umbrella of sustainability.
Dr. Simon West received his PhD in Sustainability Science from the Stockholm Resilience Centre at Stockholm University in 2016, where he used interpretive social science to explore practices of ecosystem management in Australia and South Africa. He is currently a Lecturer at the Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University, and his current research projects explore issues of gender and conservation in the Global South, Indigenous Land and Sea Management in northern Australia, and relational approaches to sustainability transformations.
Dr. Daniel R. Williams is an Emeritus Research Scientist with the USDA Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Research Station in Fort Collins, Colorado, USA. His research draws from theory and methods of environmental psychology, consumer behavior, and human geography to advance place-based inquiry and practice aimed at adaptive governance of complex social-ecological systems. He recently co-edited a book titled Changing Senses of Place: Navigating global challenges published by Cambridge University Press. He served as Co-Editor-in-Chief of Society and Natural Resources (2011-2014).
Dr. Kathryn Williams is professor in environmental psychology at the University of Melbourne, Australia. Her research is concerned with the psycho-social dimensions of environmental management, particularly the emotional and cognitive factors that shape conservation behaviour and public response to environmental policy and management, and the psychological benefits of nature experience.
Dr. Melanie Zurba is an Associate Professor with the School for Resource and Environmental Studies at Dalhousie University. Much of her work focuses on projects that are developed and implemented in collaboration with communities. She has worked collaboratively with Indigenous and other equity-deserving communities in Canada and abroad on projects focusing on environmental governance and wellbeing in a variety of contexts. Such contexts include protected areas management, climate change responses and adaptations, food security programs, international conservation policy forums, and setting that support the Indigenous knowledge-science interface. Dr. Zurba also contributes to the scholarship of community-engagement, environmental humanities, and arts-based research.
