Maron E. Greenleaf
Assistant Professor
Appointments
Assistant Professor
Affiliate of Ecology, Evolution, Environment & Society (EEES) PhD Program
Area of Expertise
environmental anthropology,
political anthropology,
economic anthropology,
sociolegal studies,
political ecology,
ethnography,
green economies,
nature-based solutions,
forests,
the Amazon,
energy transitions,
United Kingdom
Biography
I am a cultural anthropologist, political ecologist, and legal scholar studying human-environment relations in this time of environmental change and crisis. My research centers on how efforts to address linked environmental crises—like climate change and biodiversity loss—shape everyday life. I am interested in how these efforts shift people's relationships with nature, including how they interact with, understand, value, and govern it. Topics of focus include efforts to protect and restore landscapes, make nature valuable, and create "green" economies, as well as related issues of environmental justice and land rights.
My published work has centered on green capitalism, carbon credits, deforestation, tree planting, postindustrial restoration, and energy transitions in Brazil, the US, and the UK. This work includes my first book—Forest Lost: Producing Green Capitalism in the Brazilian Amazon—and collaborative work on energy justice in the United States and South America. My current research centers on tree planting and environmental restoration in postindustrial England.
For more, check out my website.
Education
B.A. Yale University
J.D. NYU School of Law
Ph. D. Stanford University
Publications
Greenleaf, Maron. 2024. Forest Lost: Producing Green Capitalism in the Brazilian Amazon. Duke University Press.
Greenleaf, Maron. 2021. "Beneficiaries of Forest Carbon: Precarious Inclusion in the Brazilian Amazon." American Anthropologist.
Mendoza, Marcos, Maron Greenleaf, and Eric Thomas. 2021 "Green Distributive Politics: Legitimizing Green Capitalism and Environmental Protection in Latin America." Geoforum.
Greenleaf, Maron. 2020. "Rubber and Carbon: Opportunity Costs, Incentives and Ecosystem Services in Acre, Brazil." Development and Change.
Greenleaf, Maron. 2020. "The Value of the Untenured Forest: Land Rights, Green Labor, and Forest Carbon in the Brazilian Amazon." Journal of Peasant Studies.
Works in Progress
Greenleaf, Maron. 2024. "'Growing a Better Future': Tree Planting, Temporality, and Environmental Restoration." Environment and Society.
Selected other writing
<p>Greenleaf, Maron. 2019. "<a href="https://theconversation.com/california-polluters-may-soon-buy-carbon-of… Polluters May Soon Be Able to Buy Carbon ‘Offsets’ from the Amazon—is that Ethical?</a>” <i>The Conversation</i>, September 26, 2019. </p>
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