J. Timmons Roberts

Brown University

J. Timmons Roberts is the Ittleson Professor of Environmental Studies and a professor of Environment and Society and Sociology at Brown University. Roberts received his PhD in comparative international development from Johns Hopkins University in 1992 and his BA in biology (with research in tropical and temperate ecology) from Kenyon College. Roberts’ research focuses on climate change and economic development. His core focus is on how inequality affects our ability to address the complex global problem of climate change.

Roberts has worked for many years with students on greening initiatives and with community groups and local, state, and national governments. He is a leader in Rhode Island’s efforts to plan for climate change, and in 2014 he led a group that successfully passed the first comprehensive climate legislation in the state. Roberts serves on the Board on Environmental Change and Society of the National Academy of Sciences.

Roberts’s videos are used in the following Choices Program curriculum units:
Climate Change and Questions of Justice
The U.S. Role in a Changing World