Carrie Seay-Fleming, PhD

I am a critical social scientist using fine-grain qualitative research to better understand food system transformations and sustainability transitions in rural geographies across the Americas. My work asks: who wins and who loses from efforts to govern the environment and from specific proposals to improve human-environment relationships? I have particular expertise in food security, sustainable development, biotechnology, energy transitions, and land-use conflict. I focus regionally on Latin America and the Western United States.

I am currently a postdoctoral researcher at the School of Geography, Development, and Environment at the University of Arizona where I am researching land conflict and community opposition to solar development in the arid Southwest as well as the colocation of PV and agriculture (agrivoltaics) as a mechanism for mitigating land-use conflict.

Through 2023, my dissertation research was funded by the National Science Foundation to study food security politics in Guatemala. My work in Guatemala focuses on recent changes in USAID food security programming, which stem from decades of failed efforts, the increasing challenges of climate change, and staggering malnutrition rates. I have written about both positive trends in food security politics as well as the limitations of ‘climate-smart’ agriculture.

I regularly serve as a subject-matter expert in major media including The Daily Beast, VICE News, and the Wilson Center.