Student Information
Graduate Student
Sustainability
College of Global Futures
Long Bio
Leah Shaffer is a doctoral candidate studying the intersection of governance, collective action, and land stewardship in Polar regions. In particular, Shaffer focuses on how stakeholders and rights holders in complex social-ecological systems engage in collective decision-making and resource stewardship in the face of rapid changes spurred by climate change. Shaffer is most interested in subsistence resources in the context of Alaska because they lie at the intersection of Indigenous culture, resource stewardship, food sovereignty, and climate vulnerability. Though her background is in economics and math, Shaffer now blends econometric findings from numerical data with the deep understanding that is gained from interviews, stories, and ethnographic conversations.
Research Interests
Polar and Arctic governance, institutions, and decision-making, in addition to cross-cultural collaboration and resource stewardship.
Research Group
The Arctic Lab in the School of Human Evolution and Social Change. Lab PIs are Dr. Shauna BurnSilver and Dr. Abigail York. Learn more about the Arctic Lab here.
Economics for Sustainability Lab in the School of Sustainability. Lab PIs are Dr. Joshua Abbott, Dr. Kailin Kroetz, and Dr. Danae Hernandez-Cortes. This lab supports students pursuing the Environmental and Sustainability Economics Graduate Certificate. Learn more about the ESE Graduate Certificate here.