Steering Committee
Kristen A. Sheeran
Executive Director, Economics for Equity and the Environment Network
Kristen Sheeran is the director of Economics for Equity and the Environment Network (E3), a nationwide network of economists developing new arguments for environmental protection with a social justice focus. Her research is focused on the tension between equity and efficiency in public goods provision, the political economy of environmental policy, and climate change mitigation. She is author of Saving Kyoto (New Holland, 2009) with Graciela Chichilnisky. In addition to her popular writing about economics and the environment and publications for the E3 Network, she as published scholarly articles in Environmental and Resource Economics, Ecological Economics, Climatic Change, Journal of Economic Issues, Eastern Economic Journal, Seattle Journal for Social Justice, and Berkeley La Raza Law Journal. Prior to her role with Economics for Equity and the Environment Network, she was an associate professor of economics at St. Mary’s College of Maryland. She graduated summa cum laude with a B.A. in economics and political science from Drew University, and received her Ph.D. in economics from American University.
Frank Ackerman
Senior Scientist, Stockholm Environment Institute – U.S. Center
Frank Ackerman is an economist who has written extensively about the economics of climate change and other environmental problems. His book, Priceless: On Knowing the Price of Everything and the Value of Nothing, is a widely cited critique of cost-benefit analysis and its abuse in U.S. environmental policy. His latest books are Poisoned for Pennies: The Economics of Toxics and Precaution (Island Press, 2008), and Can We Afford the Future? Economics for a Warming World (Zed Books, 2009). He has written numerous academic and popular articles, and has directed policy reports for clients ranging from Greenpeace to the European Parliament. At Tufts University since 1995, he worked for many years at the university’s Global Development and Environment Institute (GDAE), and is now at the Stockholm Environment Institute’s U.S. Center, based at Tufts. He is a founder and member of the steering committee of Economics for Equity and Environment Network, and a member scholar of the Center for Progressive Reform. Frank received his BA in mathematics and economics from Swarthmore College and his PhD in economics from Harvard University, and has taught economics at Tufts University and at the University of Massachusetts.
James Boyce
Professor of Economics, University of Massachusetts
Jim Boyce is a professor of economics at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, where he directs the program on development, peacebuilding, and the environment at the Political Economy Research Institute. He is the author of The Political Economy of the Environment (Edward Elgar, 2002), and co-editor of Natural Assets: Democratizing Environmental Ownership (Island Press, 2003). His current work focuses on strategies for combining poverty reduction with environmental protection, and on the relationship between economic policies and issues of war and peace. He received his B.A. from Yale University and his Ph.D. from Oxford University. He is a founder and member of the steering committee of Economics for Equity and the Environment Network.
Stephen DeCanio
Professor of Economics, Emeritus University of California, Santa Barbara
Steve DeCanio is Professor of Economics, Emeritus at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Professor DeCanio’s research focuses on global environmental protection. He has written about both the contributions and misuse of economics to debates over long-run policy problems such as climate change and stratospheric ozone layer protection. Professor DeCanio has written extensively on corporate organization and behavior as it pertains to the adoption of energy-efficient technologies. His most recent book, Economic Models of Climate Change: A Critique (Palgrave-Macmillan, 2003) discusses some of the limitations of conventional general equilibrium models when applied to climate policy. From 1986 to 1987 DeCanio was Senior Staff Economist at the President’s Council of Economic Advisers. He has been a member of the United Nations Environment Programme’s Economic Options Panel, which reviewed the economic aspects of the Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer, and served as Co-Chair of the Montreal Protocol’s Agricultural Economics Task Force of the Technical and Economics Assessment Panel. He participated in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change that shared the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize, and was a recipient of the Leontief Prize for Advancing the Frontiers of Economic Thought in 2007. In 1996 he received a Stratospheric Ozone Protection Award, and in 2007 a “Best of the Best” Stratospheric Ozone Protection Award, from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Professor DeCanio has been Director of the UCSB Washington Program since 2004. DeCanio directed the UCSB Washington Program from 2004 to 2009. He is on the steering committee of Economics for Equity and the Environment Network.
Eban Goodstein
Director, Bard Center for Environmental Policy; Co-Director, The National Teach-In
B.A., Williams College; Ph.D., University of Michigan. Prior to Directing the Bard Center for Environmental Policy, Goodstein had a 20-year career as a Professor of Economics at Lewis & Clark and Skidmore Colleges. From 2006 to 2009, Goodstein led the National Teach-In on Global Warming Solutions, coordinating educational events at over 2500 colleges, universities, high schools and other institutions across the country. Goodstein is the author of a college textbook, Economics and the Environment, (John Wiley and Sons: 2007) now in its fifth edition, as well as The Trade-off Myth: Fact and Fiction about Jobs and the Environment. (Island Press: 1999). His most recent book is Fighting for Love in the Century of Extinction: How Passion and Politics Can Stop Global Warming (University Press of New England: 2007). Articles by Goodstein have appeared in The Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Land Economics, Ecological Economics, and Environmental Management. His research has been featured in The New York Times, Scientific American, Time, Chemical and Engineering News, The Economist, USA Today, and The Chronicle of Higher Education. He serves on the editorial board of Sustainability: The Journal of Record, and Environment, Workplace and Employment, is a founder and a member of the steering committee of Economics for Equity and the Environment Network, and is a Member Scholar at the Center for Progressive Reform.
Astrid Scholz
Vice President, Knowledge Systems Ecotrust
Astrid Scholz is Vice President for Knowledge Systems at Ecotrust, a Portland, Oregon–based conservation organization committed to building a future that strengthens communities and the environment from Alaska to California. An ecological economist by training, she conceptualizes and analyzes the linkages between ecological, economic and social systems in the West Coast's emerging conservation economy. In her capacity as a member of Ecotrust's executive team, she is responsible for managing a staff of 12, overseeing several projects and contracts, and fundraising. She is an affiliate faculty member of Oregon State University's College of Oceanic and Atmospheric Sciences, and is the co-editor of a book on integrated marine geographic information systems, Place Matters (OSU Press, 2005). She serves on the boards of the Pacific Marine Conservation Council, Habitat Media, and the Living Oceans Society, and is a member of the Science Advisory Team to the Marine Life Protection Act in California. She received her M.A. in Economics and Philosophy from the University of St. Andrews, her M.Sc. in Economics from the University of Bristol, and her Ph.D. in Energy and Resources from the University of California, Berkeley. She is a founder and member of the steering committee of Economics for Equity and the Environment Network.