My research, teaching, and practice focus on the world political economy of labor and the environment, with particular attention to power, (in)equality and (in)justice, social divisions of labor, and just transitions. My work programmatically fuses academic research with political practice. I received the 2024 John N. Stern Distinguished Professor Award of the College of Liberal Arts.

At the undergraduate level I teach international relations, international political economy, and green political economy with a focus on justice. I have also taught capstones on global labor politics and just transitions. At the graduate level I teach The Politics of the Environment and Sustainability, Governance of the World Political Economy, Theories of International Relations, International Environmental Politics as well as special seminars on social regulation, green political economy and just transitions.

My most recent books are Just Transitions: Promise and Contestation (Cambridge University Press, 2023), The Palgrave Handbook of Environmental Labour Studies (2021, coedited with Nora Räthzel and David Uzzell) and Just Transitions: Social Justice in the Shift Towards a Low-Carbon World (Pluto Press, 2020, coedited with Edouard Morena and Dunja Krause).

As a collaborator of Adapting Canadian Work and Workplaces to Climate Change I wrote Labour Unions and Green Transitions in the USA: Contestations and Explanations (2019). As joint coordinator I completed various projects with the Just Transition Research Collaborative (UNRISD). As a member of the Just Transition Listening Project Research Group I co-created the project and co-authored the Workers and Communities in Transition: Report of the Just Transition Listening Project (2021). The Research Group has now started the Critical Minerals and Metals Just Transition Listening Project, funded by the Sloan Foundation. I co-convene the Planetary Justice Task Force of the Earth System Governance Project which has completed a special issue of Environmental Politics on Planetary Justice and is organizing a global series of webinars on Exploring Planetary Justice. I am currently co-authoring the report of the Just Transition and Care Initiative and participating in the Global People’s Platform for Socio-Ecological Transformation, supported by the Misereor Foundation, as part of the Transformative Just Transitions Initiative of the Global Labour University. With respect to production and consumption I am active in the Political Economy Working Group of the Systems of Sustainable Consumption and Production of Knowledge Action Network of Future Earth. I continue to pursue research on the environmental politics of labor unions, the labor politics of environmental organizations, global union organizations, and ‘hidden figures’ in global environmental and labor politics.

At Colorado State University I co-led the creation of the Graduate Certificate in Political Economy and I am a founder and co-direct the Center for Environmental Justice at Colorado State University, currently facilitating its Graduate Certificate in Environmental Justice. The Center is the southern anchor of the Mountains and Plains Thriving Communities Collaborative (EPA Region 8 Environmental Justice Technical Assistance Center, led by Montana State University) of which I am a co-founder and member of the Executive Committee. I am also a member of the Worker Subcommittee of the Colorado Just Transition Advisory Committee.

I am active in the public affairs of Colorado State University, serving as the treasurer of AAUP/AFT CSU- Fort Collins. In that capacity I am involved in a continuous effort to raise the collective voice of all workers at CSU, including several events associated with the 2023-2024 Year of Democracy.