Email
krueger@wpi.edu
Office
SL 315
Phone
+1 (508) 8315000 x5110
Affiliated Department or Office
Social Science and Policy Studies
Institute of Science & Technology for Development
Development Design Lab
Education
BS Oklahoma State University 1991
MSL Vermont Law School 1992
MA Clark University 1998
PhD Clark University 2001

Robert Krueger is a human geographer whose scholarship and teaching focus on creating sustainable, socially just, improvements to development projects in the global north and south. His work has taken him around the world. He has worked in countries in North America, Europe, Asia, and Africa, on issues of economic development and institutional change. His scholarship and teaching challenge conventional notions of economic development, economy-environment relationships, and social change. In his book, Adventures in Sustainable Urbanism (2019, SUNY Press, Krueger, Freytag and Mössner (eds)), Krueger challenges students of sustainable urbanism to visualize new sustainable futures, beyond green technology, energy efficiency, and smart growth. In doing so, his work provides a clear and powerful entry point for reimagining social change.

In addition, to his books, Krueger is the author of dozens of publications on issues of urban sustainability, cities, development, and economy-environment relations. Krueger was also a chapter co-author of the Cities chapter in the Second State of the Carbon Cycle Report (SOCCR). Krueger has guest edited several journal issues, including a recent one on diverse economies for the journal Local Environment. Krueger’s research has been funded by the US Environmental Protection Agency, the Fonds National de la Researche, Luxembourg, the Regional Studies Association, and the Engineering Information Foundation.

Krueger has been at WPI for nearly 20 years. The first half of this career were spent working on community-based research projects in Worcester, Massachusetts and around the world. He was director of the Worcester Community Project Center and has advised award winning projects in Thailand and Namibia. Most recently, Krueger started the Development Design Lab (DDL) to support his work in Ghana and West Africa. The DDL has a wide ranging remit that includes development, environmental, and education concerns in the Eastern Region of Ghana, in particular, and West Africa, in general. The goal of the Lab is to work with individuals and communities to overcome sustainable livelihood challenges.

Scholarly Work

Analysing the governance of land grabbing from a combined political ecology and environmental justice perspective 2019

Art, Social Change, and the Green City: A rebuke of green metropolitianization 2018

Diverse and Alternative Economies: Empirical Evidence from German-Speaking Scholarship 2018

The Post-Politics of Participation in the European City 2018

Institutionalizing alternative economic spaces? An interpretivist perspective on diverse economies 2017

Greening the US Economy? 2017

Professional Highlights & Honors
Green Game Changer, 2014

Denise Nicoletti Board of Trustees' Award for Service to Community, 2011

William Meinhofer Award for Faculty Excellence, 2008

Alden Award for Excellence in Higher Education, 2007

News

SEE MORE NEWS ABOUT Robert Krueger
The Washington Post
What does it mean for a hotel to be carbon neutral?

The Washington Post spoke with Social Science & Policy Studies Department Head Rob Krueger about what the term “carbon neutral” means for hotels, and how people using a sustainable building can change the way it functions. Krueger also gave recommendations on how to travel in an environmentally-friendly way.