Roger Kasperson, Ph.D.

Research Professor and Distinguished Scientist
Graduate School of Geography
Clark University
Worcester, MA 01610-1477

Phone: (508) 751-4607
Email: rkasperson@clarku.edu

Professor Roger Kasperson received his Ph.D. from the University of Chicago in 1966. Before coming to Clark he taught at the University of Connecticut and Michigan State University. He has written widely on issues connected with risk analysis, risk communication, global environmental change, risk and ethics, and environmental policy. Dr. Kasperson is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He has been honored by the Association of American Geographers for his hazards research, and is a recipient of the 2006 Distinguished Achievement Award of the Society for Risk Analysis. He has been a consultant or advisor to numerous public and private agencies on energy and environmental issues and served on various committees of the National Research Council and the Council of the Society for Risk Analysis. From 1992 to 1996 he chaired the International Geographical Union Commission on Critical Situations/Regions in Environmental Change. He was Vice President for Academic Affairs at Clark University from 1993 to 1996, and in 1999 was elected Director of the Stockholm Environment Institute, a post he held through 2004. He now serves on the Human Dimensions of Global Change Committee and the Committee on Strategic Advice for the Climate Change Program of the U.S. National Research Council, is co-chair of the scientific advisory committee of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Change, and is on the Executive Steering Committee of the START Programme of the IGBH. He is Research Professor and Distinguished Scientist at Clark University.

Current Research and Teaching

1. International project to develop new means to bridge the worlds of science and practice in issues associated with vulnerability and resilience to global environmental change

2. A conceptual framework for initiatives to integrate sustainability approaches to mainstream environmental policies in the European Union

3. Improved approaches for the assessment and management of high uncertainty risks.

Awards and Memberships

Member of the National Academy of Sciences and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences

Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the Society for Risk Analysis

Honored for his scholarship by the Association of American Geographers

Recipient of the 2006 Distinguished Achievement Award of the Society for Risk Analysis

Selected Publications

Recent Books

J.X. Kasperson and R.E. Kasperson. The Social Contours of Risk. London: Earthscan, 2005.

N. Pidgeon, R.E. Kasperson, and P. Slovic. The Social Amplification of Risk. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003.

J. Flynn, J. Chalmers, D. Easterling, R. Kasperson, H. Kunreuther, C.K. Mertz, A. Mushkatel, K.D. Pijawkal, and P. Slovic, with L.K. Dotto. One Hundred Centuries of Solitude: Redirecting America's High-Level Nuclear Waste Policy. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1995.

J.X. Kasperson, R.E. Kasperson, and B. L. Turner, II (eds.). Regions at Risk: Comparisons of Threatened Environments. Tokyo: United Nations University Press, 1995.

D. Golding, J. X. Kasperson, and R.E. Kasperson (eds.). Preparing for Nuclear Power Plant Accidents. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1995.

Recent Articles and Chapters

B.L. Turner, R.E. Kasperson, et al. "A framework for vulnerability analysis in sustainability science." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 100, no. 14 (2003): 8074-8079.

J.X. Kasperson and R.E. Kasperson. "Border Crossings," in Joanne Linnerooth-Bayer, Ragnar E. Lofstedt, and Gunnar Sjostedt (eds.) Transboundary risk management,, 2001, pp. 297-243. London: Earthscan.

J.X. Kasperson, R.E. Kasperson, and B.L. Turner II. Environmentally Threatened Regions: International Perspectives. Human Environment 7 no. 1 (Winter, 2000): 2-5.

R.E. Kasperson, D. Golding, and J.X. Kasperson. "Trust, risk, and democratic theory," in G. Cvetkovich and R. Lofstedt (eds.), Social Trust and the Management of Risk, (1999): 22-44. London: Earthscan.

R.E. Kasperson, J.X. Kasperson, and B.L. Turner II. "Risk and Criticality: Trajectories of Regional Environmental Degradation." Ambio 28, no. 6 (1999): 562-568.

R.E. Kasperson and J.X. Kasperson."The Social Amplification and Attenuation of Risk," Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Sciences 545 (May, 1996): 95-105.