Gabe Schwartzman

Dr. Schwartzman is a human geographer who studies economic development and environmental politics. His research focuses on rural economic transitions and the social implications of decarbonization. In his current research projects, he studies the decline of the coal industry in Central Appalachia and the politics surrounding economic transition in the Appalachian region.

He has two active research projects: one studying the human dimensions of emerging forest carbon offset regimes in Central Appalachia; and a second project tracing the financial geographies of coal mine bankruptcies, bond forfeiture, and the looming crisis of funding the environmental reclamation of strip mines.

Schwartzman has studied the politics of development, climate change, and economic transition on the US Gulf Coast and in the Brazilian Amazon. His scholarship contributes to the fields of political ecology, development studies, and studies of race and gender.