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Leah Stokes will discuss her recent academic research, including ongoing projects. She will share findings from her book, Short Circuiting Policy, which examines the role that utilities have played in promoting climate denial and rolling back clean energy laws. She will also discuss current working papers that look at protests against wind energy and the effect of power shut offs to prevent wildfires on politics.

Leah Stokes is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science and affiliated with the Bren School of Environmental Science & Management and the Environmental Studies Department at the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB).

Her work on energy, climate and environmental politics: Within American Politics, her work focuses on representation and public opinion; voting behavior; and public policy, particularly at the state level. Within environmental politics, she researches climate change, renewable energy, water and chemicals policy. Her publications in top journals including the American Political Science Review, American Journal of Political Science, British Journal of Political Science, Nature Energy, Energy Policy, and Environmental Science & Technology. She has also written articles for The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, The Guardian, CNN and elsewhere and is frequently quoted in national media.

Leah received her PhD in Public Policy in the Department of Urban Studies and Planning’s Environmental Policy & Planning group at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). She holds a masters from MIT's Political Science Department. Prior to that, she completed an MPA in Environmental Science & Policy at the School of International & Public Affairs (SIPA) and the Earth Institute at Columbia University.  She has a BSc in Psychology and East Asian Studies from the University of Toronto. Prior to academia, she worked at the Parliament of Canada and Resources for the Future.

This event is part of the David Bradford Energy and Environmental Policy Seminar Series, organized by the Center for Policy Research on Energy and the Environment.