dr. RJ (Robert) Coates
Assistant ProfessorMy research and teaching interests are in political ecology, environmental governance, and disaster studies, with a special focus on urban peripheries. I have undertaken significant field research in Brazil, especially on vulnerability to floods and landslides in the context of rapid urbanisation, and I intersect these themes with the critical geographies of citizenship and the state. I have also written on the governance of extractive development vis-a-vis environmental protection, and am interested in (wild)fire hazards in the context of these debates on environmental governance and territory.
My PhD thesis, The Ecology of Citizenship: understanding vulnerability in urban Brazil, was awarded in 2017 at King's Brazil Institute, King's College London. I also hold degrees in Globalization & Latin American Development (ILAS, University of London, 2011), Postcolonial Politics (Aberystwyth, 2003), and International Relations (Nottingham Trent, 2001). Prior to my PhD I had periods working as a programme officer and trainer for VSO in the UK and Guyana, as a teacher and youth worker in Jamaica, and as a travel writer for Rough Guides.
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