Environmental studies scholars

William Balée (born 1954) is a professor of anthropology at Tulane University in New Orleans, Louisiana.

Pieter Winsemius (born 7 March 1942) is a retired Dutch politician of the People's Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD) and businessman.

Steve Chase is the director of the Advocacy for Social Justice and Sustainability program in the department of Environmental Studies at Antioch University New England. He is an activist, organizer, Quaker, lecturer, and editor.

Erle Christopher Ellis (born 11 March 1963 in Washington, DC) is an American environmental scientist. Ellis's work investigates the causes and consequences of long-term ecological changes caused by humans at local to global scales, including those related to the Anthropocene. As of 2015 he is a professor of Geography and Environmental Systems at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County where he directs the Laboratory for Anthroecology.

Roger S. Gottlieb (born October 20, 1946) is professor of philosophy and Paris Fletcher Distinguished Professor in the Humanities at Worcester Polytechnic Institute. He has written or edited 21 books, including two Nautilus Book Awards winners, and over 150 papers on philosophy, political theory, (environmental) ethics, religious studies, (religious) environmentalism, religious life, contemporary spirituality, the Holocaust, and disability. He is internationally known for his work as a leading analyst and exponent of religious environmentalism, for his passionate and moving account of spirituality in an age of environmental crisis, and for his innovative and humane description of the role of religion in a democratic society.

Gernot Wagner (1980 in Austria) is a climate economist, academic, and author. He holds an AB and a PhD in political economy and government from Harvard University, as well as an MA in economics from Stanford University. He teaches at New York University, writes the Risky Climate column for Bloomberg News, and is the co-author, with Martin L. Weitzman, of Climate Shock, a Top 15 Financial Times-McKinsey Business Book of the Year 2015. He is married to Siripanth Nippita, a gynecologist at NYU Langone Medical Center and the chief of the family planning division as well as the director of Reproductive Choice at Bellevue Hospital.

Just Gjessing (Oslo, 13 July 1926 – 29 October 2005) was a Norwegian geographer. Gjessing obtained a Ph.D. degree in 1960 with a study on Norway’s hydrology during deglaciation. One year later he was appointed full professor. In the late 1960s Gjessing became increasingly interested in nature conservation so that in the 1970s shifted the focus of his research into environmental impact assessments. This meant leaving behind his work on pure fluvial geomorphology that had previously brought him acclaim. Following this interest he joined in 1967 the Oslo University’s Commission for Watercourse Regulation. In 1971 he became chairman of the commission while also entering the Joint Commission for Hydroelectric Power Development and Nature Conservation, of which he was a member until 1981. He co-authored various notable books including Beste Store Norge Atlas (1983) and the five volume work Norge (1984–1986) and the journal Norsk Geografisk Tidsskrift from 1979 to 1987. In the 1980s the work of Gjessing turned increasingly international with many travels to West and North Africa where he studied environmental issues in arid and semi-arid landscapes. Gjessing’s personality and approach made him subject of strong and lasting criticism from so-called “rejectionist” even within his own department at the University of Oslo. Despite their opposition Gjessing managed to establish the course Resource Geography and Landscape Ecology in 1985, attending student demands that had emerged in the 1970s about the need of courses on natural resources and environmental management.

Clare Palmer (born 1967) is a British philosopher, theologian and scholar of environmental and religious studies who is currently a professor in the Department of Philosophy at Texas A&M University. She has previously held academic appointments at the University of Greenwich, the University of Stirling, Lancaster University and Washington University in St. Louis, among others. Palmer is known for her work in environmental and animal ethics.

Carl Frederick Kraenzel (November 1, 1906 – July 26, 1980) was an American sociologist. Most of Kraenzel's work focuses on the people of the Great Plains, covering a range of topics including quality of life, power relations, resource use, and mental health. Kraenzel has been widely published in a variety of professional journals, monographs, research bulletins, special reports, and books in the fields of rural sociology, Great Plains sociology, and natural resource sociology. His best known work, The Great Plains in Transition, describes the challenges of social life and connections to the natural environments in the North American semiarid region located between the 98th meridian and the Rocky Mountains. While Kraenzel may not have been a historian, The Great Plains in Transition has greatly influenced the study of Great Plains history.

Paul Henry Landis, (5 March 1901 – 30 August 1985) was an American sociologist. A prolific writer of over 20 books and 100 journal articles, Landis's work spanned the fields of rural sociology, Natural Resource Sociology, Sociology of Education, Adolescence, Social Control, and many other topics. Born in Cuba, Illinois, Landis was raised in a fundamentalist religious upbringing, before attending Greenville College and eventually the University of Michigan for a Masters Degree and The University of Minnesota for a PhD. After graduation from the University of Minnesota in 1931, Landis joined the faculty of South Dakota State University (then called South Dakota State College) as an assistant professor in the Department of Rural Sociology. His PhD dissertation on Minnesota's Iron Range was published as the book Three Iron Mining Towns: a study in cultural change, now considered a landmark in Natural Resource Sociology. In 1935 he joined the faculty of the Washington State University (at the time called the State College of Washington), eventually becoming the official State Professor of Sociology, as well eventually Dean of the Graduate School at Washington State. Landis was elected and served as President of the Rural Sociological Society from 1945-1946.