Social Science Researcher | Ph.D. Candidate

Suman Acharya

I am a PhD candidate in the Department of Anthropology and Climate Change Institute, University of Maine. I am a social science researcher and conduct research in the areas of human dimensions of environmental changes. In particular, my researches focus on the political dimensions of climate change.

I earned my undergraduate degree in the Forestry Science from the Institute of Forestry at Tribhuvan University, Nepal. Professionally, I held the position of the District Climate Change Specialist for the Adaptation for Smallholders in Hilly Areas (ASHA) project for one year in Nepal before I rejoined doctorate studies in the Anthropology and Environmental Policy at the University of Maine.

My academic and professional goals are to understand and examine the interrelationship between human and environment focusing on climate change from the political lens across scales in developing nations. I focus on the power and collective action theories to examine how power and politics in collective action across scales shape adaptation policies in developing countries drawing upon a multilevel governance framework. I believe that my researches support the policy planners and formulators in global south in particular and globally in general. Moreover, I believe that my research benefits the underprivileged communities who are discarded in policy planning, design, and implementation across scales. My academic and professional experiences have trained me to integrate the social, political, and environmental theories based in ethnographic fieldwork to generate extensive and comprehensive knowledge on socio-ecological system.