Keywords

  • community sociology
  • community sustainability and resilience
  • environmental and natural resource sociology
  • environmental risk
  • human dimensions of natural resources
  • land use change
  • place attachment
  • public participation
  • sustainable forest management

Stedman, Richard C.

Assistant Professor
As a faculty member in resource policy and management, my teaching, outreach, and research focus on the interaction between social and ecological systems. My training is in sociology, and I use the theories and methodologies of this discipline as a lens for examining a broad array of human/environment conflicts. I am particularly interested the challenges that rapid social and ecological changes pose for the sustainability of forested ecosystems, watersheds, and human communities.

research

research and scholarship focus

My current research activity examines (i) the sustainability of resource-dependent communities, especially as they transition to natural resource-based tourism development; (ii) environmental risk perception and management at the community level; (iii) causes and consequences of land-use change along a gradient from very rural to very urban systems, with an emphasis on the urban-rural fringe; (iv) natural resource-based decision making among private (agricultural and forest) landowners; and (v) socio-ecological factors that underlie attachment to place and foster subsequent environmental behavior.

affiliations

faculty appointment in

member of graduate field

teaching

teaching focus

My teaching, both at the graduate and undergraduate level, operates at the boundary between social and ecological systems. I currently teach an undergraduate course that introduces students to social science perspectives on environmental problems, and trains them for later in-depth I also co-teach a graduate course that links graduate students with training in ecology to those from the social sciences to focus on socio-ecological system health.

background

educational background

PhD University of Wisconsin, Madison, 2000
MS Cornell University, 1993
BA University of Wisconsin, Madison, 1989

publications

selected publications (listing in progress)

  • Stedman, R.C., R.C. Lathrop, B. Clark, J.Ejsmont-Karabin, P. Kasprzak, K. Nielsen, D. Osgood, M. Powell A.M.Ventela, K.E. Webster, and A.Zhukova. 2007. Place attachment and perceived environmental quality in North American and European temperate lake districts. Lake and Reservoir Management. In Press.

     

  • Stedman, R.C., W. White, M. Patriquin, D. Watson. 2007. Measuring community forest sector dependence: Does method matter? Society and Natural Resources 20:629-646.

     

  • Wellstead, A.M., and R.C. Stedman. 2007. Coordinating future climate change policies across Canadian natural resources. Climate Policy 7:29-45.

     

  • Stedman, R.C. 2006. Understanding place attachment among second home owners. American Behavioral Scientist 50(2): 1-19.

     

  • Stedman, R.C., and R.B. Hammer. 2006. Environmental perception in a rapidly growing, amenity-rich region: the effects of lakeshore development on perceived water quality in Vilas County, Wisconsin. Society and Natural Resources 19(2): 137-151.

     

  • Stedman, R.C., J. Parkins, and T. Beckley. 2005. Forest reliance and community well being in rural Canada: variation by forest sector and region. Canadian Journal of Forest Research 35:215-220.

     

  • Stedman, R.C., T.M. Beckley, S. Wallace, and M. Ambard. 2004. A picture and 1000 words: Using resident-employed photography to understand attachment to high amenity places. Journal of Leisure Research 36(4):580-606.

     

  • Stedman, R.C., D. Diefenbach, C. Swope, J. Finley, A. Luloff, H. Zinn, G. San Julian, and G. Wang. 2004. Integrating wildlife and human-dimensions research methods to understand hunters. Journal of Wildlife Management 68(4): 762-773.

contact

email address

Keywords: community sociology, community sustainability and resilience, environmental and natural resource sociology, environmental risk, human dimensions of natural resources, land use change, place attachment, public participation, sustainable forest management