Justin Farrell is a social scientist and Professor at Yale University, School of the Environment.

Farrell examines how modern cultures interact with the natural world and each other. He focuses on the causes and consequences of climate change, social class, rurality, conservatism, and morality. His studies blend large-scale computational methods with local qualitative fieldwork.

His books and articles have won national awards and regularly appear in major media. He frequently presents findings to policymakers, including the U.S. Senate, the White House, the Vatican, and the United Nations. His research has been published by Science, Princeton University Press, the American Sociological Review, PNAS, Nature Climate Change, Social Problems, among others, and funded by the Environmental Protection Agency and the National Science Foundation. 

Justin is a proud first-generation college graduate and Wyoming native. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Notre Dame. He splits time between rural Wyoming, Denver, and New Haven.

Books

[1] New book in progress, under contract with W.W. Norton

[2] Billionaire Wilderness, Princeton University Press

[3] Battle for Yellowstone, Princeton University Press

Select Articles

[1] Conservatism, the Far-Right, and the Environment Annual Review of Sociology

[2] The Influence of the Nature-Culture Dualism on Morality Sociology of Morality

[3] Effects of land dispossession and forced migration on Indigenous peoples in North America Science

[4] Impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic on rural America PNAS

[5] Corporate Funding and Ideological Polarization about Climate Change PNAS

[6] Network Structure and Influence of the Climate Change Counter-Movement Nature Climate Change 

Research In-Process

[1] Conservative thought and the environment

[2] The effect of temporal orientation on social conflict

[3] The effect of loneliness on responses to environmental change

[4] Native Land Research Initiative

Courses

[1] Modernity, Ecology, and Policy

[2] Rural Field Course

[3] Data Science for Social Research

[4] Nature, Rationality, and Moral Politics

Media & Senate Testimony

[1] U.S. Senate testimony on the network structure of climate change policy

[2] CBS News Episode on Billionaire Wilderness

[3] NYT feature on findings from our Science paper on Tribal land and climate change

[4] NYT Op-ed on declining civic engagement and America’s trails