Arun Agrawal

Arun Agrawal "is Professor and Associate Dean for Research in the School of Natural Resources & Environment at the University of Michigan. His research and teaching emphasize the politics of international development, institutional change, and environmental conservation. He has written critically on indigenous knowledge, community-based conservation, common property, population and resources, and environmental identities. His recent interests include adaptation to climate change, urban adaptation, REDD+, and the decentralization of environmental governance. He coordinates the International Forestry Resources and Institutions network, and is currently carrying out research in central and east Africa and South Asia. He is the author of Greener Pastures and Environmentality, and his recent work has appeared in Science, PNAS, Conservation Biology, World Development, and Development and Change among other journals.

"Awards & Grants: 2007-11: NSF, CNH: “Environmental Governance, Forests, and Logging Concessions: The Effects of Institutional Complexity on Forest Systems, Cover and Change in Central Africa.” (1,497K) 2006-09: NSF: “HSD Supplemental Grant Proposal on Human Environmental Systems Interactions.” (44K) 2006-09: MacArthur Foundation “Training and Capacity Building for IFRI” (305K). 2005-08: Program in Human-Environmental Systems Interactions. National Science Foundation. (with Co-PI’s: Dan Brown and Rick Riolo). (497K)

"Research Interests: Political Economy, Environmental Governance, Community-Based Conservation, Indigenous Knowledge, Decentralization, Local Governance, Institutional Analysis

"Current/Recent Research Projects: - Environmental Subjects - Environmental Policy Decentralization - International Forest Resources and Institutions - Logging, NGOs, and Forest Cover in Congo

"Selected Publications: Forthcoming. Institutions, co-governance, and forests in the Indian Himalaya. Studies in Comparative International Development. (with Ashwini Chhatre) Forthcoming (2007). A Greener Revolution in Making? Environmental Governance in the 21st Century.” Environment Forthcoming (2007). Forests, Governance, and Sustainability: Common Property Theory and its Contributions. International Journal of the Commons 1(1). 2006: Decentralization/Recentralization: How National Governments Maintain Control over Forest Resources. World Development (with Anne Larson and Jesse Ribot). 2006: (with Maria Carmen Lemos) Environmental Governance. Annual Review of Environment and Resources. 2006. Political Science and Conservation Biology: The Dialog of the Deaf? Conservation Biology 20(3): 681-82 (with Elinor Ostrom). 2006. Explaining Success on the Commons: Community Forest Governance in the Indian Himalaya. World Development. (with Ashwini Chhatre) 2005. Environmentality: Technologies of Government and Political Subjects (Duke University Press; Oxford University Press, Delhi). rpt. 2006. 2005. Decentralization and participation: The governance of common pool resources in Nepal's Terai. World Development 33(7): 1101-14 (with Krishna Gupta). 2005. Environmentality: Community, intimate government and environmental subjects in Kumaon, India. Current Anthropology 46(2), April 2005 (Substantially shortened version in French published in July 2005 as Communautés, gouvernement rapproché et sujets de l’environnement au Kumaon, Inde. Anthropologie et Societe. 29(2)."


 * Executive Committee, Graham Environmental Sustainability Institute