Iza Ding
Courtesy izading.com

Associate Professor of Political Science, Northwestern University

Ellen Maria Gorrissen Fellow - Class of Fall 2024

Iza Ding is Associate Professor of Political Science at Northwestern University. She holds a BA in political science and Russian and Eastern European studies from the University of Michigan and a PhD in government from Harvard University. Her research explores modernity and its discontents, especially in relation to the environment, climate change, nationalism, and ideology. Ding is the author of The Performative State: Public Scrutiny and Environmental Governance in China (Cornell University Press, 2022), in which she examines China’s street-level environmental bureaucracy through the notion of “performative governance.” She is a member of the Mansfield-Luce Asia Scholars Network and the National Committee on US-China Relations Public Intellectual Program, among others.

Project Description

Green Waves

Ding’s new project, “Green Waves,” explores the global histories of modern environmentalism, drawing on the cases of Germany, the US, and Mongolia. From its birth in conservative politics inspired by romanticist reactions against industrialization, to the liberal movement galvanized by labor activists and anti-war protesters, environmentalism has proven to be a malleable political idea up to the present day, when conservatives are gradually confronting the political limits of climate-change skepticism and denial. In particular, she is interested in understanding why and documenting how environmental beliefs sometimes fuse with various right-wing ideologies.

Academy Activities

07 Nov 24
Climate Change and the Global South Environment

Ellen Maria Gorrissen Lecture

Climate Change and the Global South

People in the developing world use vernaculars, heuristics, and practices to process climate change.

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