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Ken Conca Professor Environment, Development & Health

Degrees: PhD, University of California, Berkeley; M.S., University of Wisconsin-Madison; Sc.B., Brown University
Languages Spoken: Portuguese
Favorite Spot on Campus: SIS Atrium; the Dav
Book Currently Reading: Drive your Plough over the Bones of the Dead, by Olga Tomarczuk; A Council of Dolls, by Mona Susan Power
Bio: Dr. Ken Conca’s research and teaching focus on global environmental governance, environmental peacebuilding in war-torn societies, environmental politics and policy in the United Nations system, water governance, and environmental policy analysis. His most recent books are The Oxford Handbook of Water Politics and Policy and An Unfinished Foundation: The United Nations and Global Environmental Governance. He is the editor of the widely used teaching anthology Green Planet Blues. Dr. Conca's research has been recognized with several prestigious awards, including the Grawemeyer Prize for Ideas Improving World Order; the International Studies Association’s Harold and Margaret Sprout Award, for best book on international environmental affairs; the Chadwick Alger Prize, for best book in the field of International Organization; and the Al-Moumin Environmental Peacebuilding Award.

For the Media: To request an interview for a news story, call �鶹��Ƶ Communications at 202-885-5950 or submit a request.; �鶹��Ƶ Experts

Teaching

Fall 2024

SIS-620 Stds in Global Envirn Politics: Water Governance
SIS-811 Dissertation Develop Workshop
SIS-899 Doctoral Dissertation

Spring 2025

SIS-620 Stds in Global Envirn Politics: Policy Analysis for GEP
SISU-350 Topics in Env Sustain/Glb Hlth: The Politics of Water

Scholarly, Creative & Professional Activities

Selected Publications

Ken Conca: Publications by Research Area

1. Water

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After the Floods: the Search for Resilience in Ellicott City (New York: Oxford University Press, 2024).

“World Water Day: How water can be a power force to bring people together.” Podcast interview, Public Health on Call Podcast, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, March 20, 2024. Available at

“Climate change, adaptation, and risk of conflict in international river basins.” Luis Paolo Silva, Wagner Ribeiro, and Isabela Espindola, eds. New Perspectives on Transboundary Water Governance: Interdisciplinary Approaches and Global Case Studies (New York: Routledge, 2024).

“Managing resilience and adaptation conflicts around water.” New Security Beat, May 2, 2022.

(Edward Elgar Publishing, 2021).

Anita Milman, Andrea Gerlak, Tamee Albrecht, Mark Colosimo, Ken Conca, Anoulak Kittikhoun, Péter Kovács, Richard Moy, Susanne Schmeier, Kelsey Wentling, William Werick, Ivan Zavadsky, and Jim Ziegler. “Addressing knowledge gaps for transboundary environmental governance.” Global Environmental Change vol. 64 (September 2020) article 102162. 13pp.

“.” Podcast interview, New Security Beat, March 29, 2019.

“.” Podcast interview, New Security Beat, January 18, 2019.

Ken Conca and Erika Weinthal, eds., Oxford Handbook of Water Politics and Policy (New York: Oxford University Press, 2018).

Ken Conca and Erika Weinthal, “The Political Dimensions of Water.” In Conca and Weinthal, eds., (New York: Oxford University Press, 2018).

. Blog post, New Security Beat, November 29, 2017.

“.” Podcast, Woodrow Wilson Center, March 24, 2017.

“” Blog post, , November 3, 2016.

Water Alternatives 8 no. 3 (October 2015):��301-316.

Benjamin Pohl, Alexander Carius, Ken Conca, Geoffrey D. Dableko, Annika Kramer, David Michel, Susanne Schmeier, Ashok Swain, and Aaron Wolf, The Rise of Hydro-diplomacy: Strengthening Foreign Policy for Transboundary Waters (Berlin: Adelphi Research and Federal Foreign Office, 2014). 52 pp.

Blog post: “Water: What to Do,” , March 14, 2014.

Claudia Pahl-Wostl, Ken Conca, Annika Kramer, Josefina Maestu, and Falk Schmidt, “Missing Links in Global Water Governance: A Processes-Oriented Analysis,” Ecology andSociety vol. 18 no. 2 (June 2013), article 33 (10 pp).

“Decoupling Water and Violent Conflict,” Issues in Science and Technology, vol. XXIX no. 1 (Fall 2012): 39-48.

Video interview, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, February 2010.

“U.S. Foreign Water Policy,” Journal of Environment and Development vol. 17 no. 3 (September 2008): 215-237.

“Water, Conflict, and International Cooperation,” Fudan Review of International Studies, vol. 7 (March 2007).

,” Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, Washington, June 2006.

Ken Conca, Fengshi Wu and Ciqi Mei, “Global Regime Formation or Complex Institution Building? The Principled Content of International River Agreements.” International Studies Quarterly 50 (June 2006): 263-285.

“,” Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, Washington, May 2006. Panel discussion with Ken Conca, Patricia Kameri-Mbote, and Lyla Mehta.

“Administrar el agua: globalización, redes y nueva faz del conflicto del agua (Governing Water: Globalization, Networks, and the New Face of Water Conflict).” Vanguardia Dossier, no. 21, October-December 2006.

(Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2006).

Policy Brief no. 3 of the Navigating Peace Initiative, Environmental Change and Security Program, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, November 2006. Reprinted in Environmental Change and Security Program Report 13 (2008-09): 76-79.

“Transnational Dimensions of Freshwater Ecosystem Governance,” in A.R. Turton, J. Hattingh, G.A. Maree, D.J. Roux, M. Claassen, and W.F. Strydom, eds., Governance as a Trialogue: Government-Society-Science in Transition (Berlin: Springer-Verlag, 2006).

“Water,” in Roland Robertson and Jan Aart Scholte, eds., Encyclopedia of Globalization (New York: Routledge, 2006).

“Growth and Fragmentation in Expert Networks: The Elusive Quest for Integrated Water Resources Management”, in Peter Dauvergne, editor, Handbook of Global Environmental Politics (Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar, 2005).

“Global Water Prospects,” in Dennis Pirages and Kenneth Cousins, eds., From Resource Scarcity to Ecological Security: Exploring New Limits to Growth (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2005).

2. Environment, Conflict, and Peacebuilding

"Thought-Leaders and Frontline Workers in Environmental Peacebuilding--An Oral History: Dr. Ken Conca and Dr. Geoffrey D. Dabelko. Podcast interview, New Security Beat, Woodrow Wilson Center, March 19, 2024. Available at

“Environmental peacebuilding: Yesterday, today and tomorrow.” The Journal of Social Encounters 8 Issue 1 (2024): 4-12.

Katy Davis, Laura Peters, Jamon Van Den Hoek, and Ken Conca. 2023. “Power in environmental peacebuilding. World Development Sustainability 3:100110 (December).

“.” Interview, Business Insider, March 10, 2022.

“Managing resilience and adaptation conflicts around water.” New Security Beat, May 2, 2022.

Tobias Ide, Carl Bruch, Alexander Carius, Ken Conca, Geoffrey D. Dabelko, Richard Matthew, and Erika Weinthal, “The past and future(s) of environmental peacebuilding.” International Affairs 97 no. 1 (January 2021): 1-16.

“.” Interview, New Security Beat, January 15, 2020.

Ken Conca and Anita Van Breda, “Enduring responses to war and disaster: The environmental dimensions of recovery.” Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, 2020.

“” Environment 61 no. 1 (January/February 2019): 4-15.

Ken Conca and Michael D. Beevers, “Environmental pathways to peace.” In Ashok Swain and Joakim Öjendal, eds., (New York, Routledge, 2018).

Review of Shirley V. Scott and Charlotte Ku, eds., Climate Change and the UN Security Council (Northampton, MA: Edward Elgar, 2018) in Nature Climate Change 8 (2018): 660-661.

Ken Conca, Joe Thwaites, and Goueun Lee, “” Global Environmental Politics 17 no. 2 (May 2017).

, 2017.

“.” Sustainable Security, December 6, 2017.

Video Interview “.” Climate Diplomacy, December 2017.

“.” Podcast, Woodrow Wilson Center, March 24, 2017.

Report of the Friedrich Ebert Foundation, New York, October 2017.

Tim Kovach and Ken Conca, “.” Journal of Peacebuilding and Development 11 no. 2 (August 2016): 4-24.

New Security Beat, May 20, 2016.

An Unfinished Foundation: The United Nations and Global Environmental Governance (New York: Oxford University Press, 2015).

“”, McGill International Journal of Sustainable Development Law and Policy (online), May 2015.

Book review essay: “Complex Landscapes and Oil Curse Research,” Global Environmental Politics vol. 13 no. 3 (August 2013): 131–137.

Jennifer Wallace and Ken Conca, “Peace through Sustainable Forest Management in Asia: the USAID Forest Conflict Initiative,” in Päivi Lujala and Siri Aas Rustad, Eds., High-Value Natural Resources and Post-Conflict Peacebuilding (Abingdon, UK: EarthScan, 2012). Also published in Carl Bruch, Mikiyasu Nakayama, and Ilona Coyle, Harnessing Natural Resources for Peacebuilding: Lessons from U.S. and Japanese Assistance (Washington: Environmental Law Institute, 2011).

“Decoupling Water and Violent Conflict,” Issues in Science and Technology, vol. XXIX no. 1 (Fall 2012): 39-48.

Video interview, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, February 2010.

“.” Video interview, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, February 2010.

Ken Conca and Jennifer Wallace, “Environment and Peacebuilding in War-Torn Societies: Lessons from the UN Environment Programme’s Experience with Postconflict Assessment,” Global Governance vol. 15 no. 4 (Oct-Dec 2009): 485-504. Reprinted in David Jensen and Steve Lonergan, eds., Assessing and Restoring Natural Resources in Post-Conflict Peacebuilding (Abingdon: EarthScan: 2012).

Ken Conca, Alexander Carius and Geoffrey D. Dabelko, “Building Peace Through Environmental Cooperation,” in The Worldwatch Institute, State of the World 2005: Redefining Global Security (New York: W.W. Norton, 2005).

Ken Conca, Alexander Carius, and Geoffry D. Dabelko, “Promoting Environmental Cooperation as a Peace-Building Tool.” Worldwatch Institute, Global Security Brief no. 6, June 2005.

Ken Conca and Geoffrey D. Dabelko, eds., (Washington: Woodrow Wilson Center Press and Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2002).

“The Case for Environmental Peacemaking,” in Ken Conca and Geoffrey D. Dabelko, eds., Environmental Peacemaking (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press and Washington: Woodrow Wilson Center Press, 2002).

“Environmental Cooperation and International Peace,” in Paul F. Diehl and Nils Petter Gleditsch, eds., Environmental Conflict (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 2000).

Anne H. Ehrlich, Peter Gleick, and Ken Conca, “Resources and Environmental Degradation as Sources of Conflict,” Pugwash Occasional Papers vol. 2 no. 3 (September 2001): 108-138. Discussion paper for the 50th Pugwash Conference On Science and World Affairs: Eliminating the Causes of War, Cambridge, UK, August 2000.

"Environmental Confidence Building and Regional Security in Northeast Asia" in Miranda Schreurs and Dennis Pirages, eds., Ecological Security in Northeast Asia (Seoul: Yonsei University Press, 1999).

"The Environment-Security Trap," Dissent, Summer 1998, pp. 40-45.

"Peace, Justice, and Sustainability," in Dennis C. Pirages, ed., Building Sustainable Societies (Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe, 1996).

"In the Name of Sustainability: Peace Studies and Environmental Discourse," in Jyrki Kakonen, ed., Green Security or Militarized Environment (Aldershot, UK: Dartmouth Publishing Company, 1994). Reprint of article appearing originally in Peace and Change.

3. Global Environmental Governance

Frank Biermann, Jeroen Oomen, Aarti Gupta, Saleem H. Ali, Ken Conca, Maarten A. Hajer, Prakash Kashwan, Louis J. Kotzé, Melissa Leach, Dirk Messner, Chukwumerije Okereke, Åsa Persson, Janez Potočnik, David Schlosberg, Michelle Scobie, Stacy D. VanDeveer. 2022. “Solar geoengineering: The case for an international non-use agreement.” WIRES Climate Change 13 no. 2 (May/June). DOI:

“.” Co-author and initiator, January 2022.

“Where Climate Meets Religion: Mobilization, Discourse, and Authority.” In Evan Berry, ed., Climate Politics and the Power of Religion (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2022). Synthesis chapter for the project Religion and Climate Change in Cross-regional Perspective, Center for Latin American and Latino Studies, �鶹��Ƶ.

Frank Biermann, Jeroen Oomen, Aarti Gupta, Saleem H. Ali, Ken Conca, Maarten Hajer, Mike Hulme, Prakash Kashwan, Louis J. Kotzé, Melissa Leach, Dirk Messner, Chukwumerije Okereke, Åsa Persson, Janez Potočnik, David Schlosberg, Michelle Scobie, Stacy D. VanDeveer. “.” Correspondence published in Nature vol. 595 no. 30 (2021).

Global Connections Television with Bill Miller. Interview, June 2021. Available at

Sikina Jinnah, Simon Nicholson, David Morrow, Zachary Dove, Paul Wapner, Walter Valdivia, Leslie Paul Thiele, Catriona McKinnon, Andrew Light, Myanna Lahsen, Prakash Kashwan, Aarti Gupta, Alexander Gillespie, Richard Falk, Ken Conca, Dan Chong, and Netra Chhetri. “.” Sustainability 11 no. 14 (2019): article 3954 (9 pp.). ��Special edition on Climate Change Law, Policy and Governance for Sustainable Development.

“.” Environmental Politics 28 no. 3 (May 2019): 417-440.

“” Environment 61 no. 1 (January/February 2019): 4-15.

Academic Working Group on Climate Engineering Governance, Governing Solar Radiation Management. Washington: Forum for Climate Engineering Assessment, October 2018.

“Causes of the New Earth: The Changing Shape of Global Environmental Politics,” in Sikina Jinnah and Simon Nicholson, eds., New Earth Politics (MIT Press, 2016).

“” Blog post, , October 16, 2016.

An Unfinished Foundation: The United Nations and Global Environmental Governance (New York: Oxford University Press, 2015).

“.” �鶹��Ƶ, School of International Service, June 2015.

“”, McGill International Journal of Sustainable Development Law and Policy (online), May 2015.

“.” �鶹��Ƶ, School of International Service, June 2015.

“The Rise of the Regional in Global Environmental Politics,” Global Environmental Politics vol. 12 no. 3 (August 2012): 127-133.

“Stockholm Conference of 1972,” in Akira Iriye and Pierre-Yves Saunier, eds., The Palgrave Dictionary of Transnational History (Hampshire, UK: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009).

Jacob Park, Ken Conca and Matthias Finger, eds., (London: Routledge, 2008).

“Rethinking Authority, Territory, and Knowledge: Transnational Socio-Ecological Controversies and Global Environmental Governance,” in Jacob Park, Ken Conca and Matthias Finger, eds., The Crisis of Global Environmental Governance: Towards a New Political Economy of Sustainability (London: Routledge: 2008).

“Old States in New Bottles? The Hybridization of Authority in Global Environmental Governance,” in John Barry and Robyn Eckersley, eds., The State and the Global Ecological Crisis (Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2005).

“Environmental Governance After Johannesburg: From Stalled Legalization to Environmental Human Rights?” Journal of International Law and International Relations vol. 1 nos. 1-2 (December 2005): 121-138.

“Ecology in an Age of Empire: A Reply to (and Extension of) Dalby’s Imperial Thesis,” Global Environmental Politics vol. 4 no. 2 (May 2004): 12-19.

“Beyond the Earth Summit Framework,” Politics and the Life Sciences vol. 21 no. 2 (September 2002): 53-55.

"The World Commission on Dams and Trends in Global Environmental Governance," Politics and the Life Sciences vol. 21 no. 1 (March 2002): 67-70.

“The WTO and the Undermining of Global Environmental Governance,” Review of International Political Economy vol. 7 no. 3 (Autumn 2000): 484-494. Reprinted in Angus Cameron, Anastasia Nesvetailova, and Ronen Palan, eds., International Political Economy (London: Sage 2007).

"Beyond the Statist Frame: Environment in a Global Economy,” in Fred P. Gale and R. Michael M’Gonigle, eds., Nature, Production, Power: Towards an Ecological Political Economy (Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar, 2000).

"Environmental Protection, International Norms, and National Sovereignty: The Case of the Brazilian Amazon," in Gene Lyons and Michael Mastanduno, eds., Beyond Westphalia? State Sovereignty and International Intervention (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1995).

"Greening the United Nations: Environmental Organizations and the U.N. System," Third World Quarterly vol. 16 no. 3 (Fall 1995): 441-457. Reprinted in Thomas Weiss and Leon Gordenker, eds., NGOs, the UN, and Global Governance (Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 1996).

"Global Environmental Governance: Causes, Components, and Consequences," The Journal of Green Cross Korea vol. 1 no. 1 (Summer 1995): 98-110.

"Rethinking the Ecology-Sovereignty Debate," Millennium: Journal of International Studies vol. 23 no. 3 (January 1995): 701-711. Reprinted in Peter M. Haas, ed., Environment in the New Global Economy (Cheltenham, UK: Edwin Elgar, 2003) and in Ken Conca and Geoffrey D. Dabelko, eds., Green Planet Blues: Four Decades of Global Environmental Politics (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 2010).

Ronnie D. Lipschutz and Ken Conca, eds., (New York: Columbia University Press, 1993).

"Environmental Change and the Deep Structure of World Politics," in Ronnie D. Lipschutz and Ken Conca, eds., The State and Social Power in Global Environmental Politics (New York: Columbia University Press, 1993).

4. Human Rights, Environmental Justice, and Sustainability

After the Floods: The Search for Resilience in Ellicott City (New York: Oxford University Press, 2024).

“Where Climate Meets Religion: Mobilization, Discourse, and Authority,” in Evan Berry, ed., Climate Politics and the Power of Religion (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, forthcoming.) Synthesis chapter for the project Religion and Climate Change in Cross-regional Perspective, Center for Latin American and Latino Studies, �鶹��Ƶ.

“.” Interview, Organization for Defending Victims of Violence (Iran), September 28, 2021.

“.” Environmental Politics 28 no. 3 (May 2019): 417-440.

“” Blog post, , October 16, 2016.

Report of the Friedrich Ebert Foundation, New York, September 2016.

“.” Op-ed essay in The Guardian, October 1, 2015.

An Unfinished Foundation: The United Nations and Global Environmental Governance (New York: Oxford University Press, 2015).

“”, McGill International Journal of Sustainable Development Law and Policy (online), May 2015.

“.” �鶹��Ƶ, School of International Service, June 2015.

Environmental Human Rights,” in Peter Dauvergne, editor, Handbook of Global Environmental Politics (Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar, 2012).

Tikkun, May/June 2010.

“An Environmental Agenda for Obama.” Dissent, Summer 2009, 73-79.

Thomas Princen, Michael Maniates, and Ken Conca, eds., (Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2002).

“Green Politics in the Bush Era: Anti-Environmentalism’s Second Wave,” Dissent, Summer 2001, pp. 29-33.

“Consumption and Environment in a Global Economy,” Global Environmental Politics vol. 1 no. 3 (Summer 2001): 53-71.

Ken Conca, Thomas Princen, and Michael Maniates, “Confronting Consumption,” Global Environmental Politics vol. 1 no. 3 (Summer 2001): 1-10.

“The Environment in Campaign 2000: Laying a Foundation for Citizen Activism,” Dissent, Summer 2000, pp. 31-37.

"American Environmentalism Confronts the Global Economy," Dissent, Winter 2000, pp. 72-78.

"Peace, Justice, and Sustainability," in Dennis C. Pirages, ed., Building Sustainable Societies (Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe, 1996).

"Peace, Justice, and Sustainability," Peace Review vol. 6 no. 3 (Fall 1994): 325-331. Also published in The Newsletter of the Political Economy of the Good Society (PEGS), no. 1 (Spring 1994).

"In the Name of Sustainability: Peace Studies and Environmental Discourse," Peace and Change vol. 19 no. 2 (April 1994): 91-113.

5. Environmental Education

Ken Conca, Abby Ostovar, and Ratia Tekenet. 2023. “Assessing learning outcomes of a role-playing simulation in international environmental politics.” Journal of Political Science Education 20 no. 1 153-171.

Ken Conca and Geoffrey D. Dabelko, eds., (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, sixth edition forthcoming 2019). Previous editions 2015, 2010, 2004, 1998, 1995.

Video interview, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, February 2010.

"Imagining the State,” in Michael Maniates, ed., Encountering Global Environmental Politics: Teaching, Learning, and Empowering Knowledge (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2003).

6. Brazilian Politics and Political Economy

(Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2006).

"Between Global Markets and Domestic Politics: Brazil’s Military-Industrial Collapse,” Review of International Studies vol. 24 (1998): 497-511.

(Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 1997).

"A Industrializaçao Militar no Brasil: O Período pré-64" in Domicio Proença Jr., ed., Uma Avaliação da Indústria Bélica Brasileira: Defesa, Indústria e Tecnologia (Rio de Janeiro: Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, 1993).

"O Brasil na Economia Global de Armamentos," in Domicio Proença Jr., ed., Uma Avaliação da Indústria Bélica Brasileira: Defesa, Indústria e Tecnologia (Rio de Janeiro: Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, 1993).

Wayne Sandholtz, Michael Borrus, John Zysman, Ken Conca, Jay Stowsky, Steven Vogel, and Steve Weber, The Highest Stakes: The Economic Foundations of the Next Security System (New York: Oxford University Press, 1992).

"Technology, the Military, and Democracy in Brazil," Journal of Interamerican Studies and World Affairs (now Latin American Politics and Society) vol. 34 no. 1 (Spring 1992): 141-177.