Research Bio
My research examines rangeland management from an historical, ecological, and critical geographical perspective. I work with ranchers and ecologists in the Southwestern US to understand how the reproduction of capital takes place on and through desert grasslands, mediated by biophysical processes (drought, grazing, vegetation and soils), political processes (public land management policies, wildlife conservation regulations), and management practices (grazing systems, infrastructural investments, prescribed fire, vegetation manipulations). I also work with community-based conservation organizations formed by ranchers to prevent subdivision of their landscapes for residential development and to restore and enhance grasslands.
Research Expertise and Interest
climate change, endangered species, rangelands, political ecology, pastoralism, ranching, environmental history, suburbanization, human-environment interactions, environmental geography, range science and management, Southwestern US, scale, community-based conservation
In the News
Researchers receive grants from Bureau of Cannabis Control
How to feed a starving world? A new center at Berkeley seeks solutions
How to feed a fast-growing world where 900 million people are undernourished? Claire Kremen, a conservation biologist, sees traditional, sustainable practices as the solution. She and a group of Berkeley colleagues are establishing a new Berkeley Center for Diversified Farming Systems to find ways to scale up agroecological practices around the globe. A special report from the College of Natural Resources.