Campus Directory

Division Social Sciences Division

Department/ College/ Unit Politics Department

Title Ph.D. Candidate

Affiliation Graduate

Other UCSC Campus Affiliation Center for Critical Urban and Environmental Studies

Primary Office Location Merrill College Academic Building
133

Mail Stop Merrill/Crown Faculty Services

Biography, Education and Training

I study urban governance and political economy from a global and comparative perspective. My dissertation examines three oft‑cited and celebrated examples of urban climate governance—Barcelona, San Francisco, and Mexico City—and critically reassesses how the imperatives of growth and the constraints of multi‑level state institutions have shaped each case.

At UC Santa Cruz, I am the founding editor of our graduate Keywords in Political Economy database, a member of the Center for Critical Urban and Environmental Studies, and a contributor to the Farmworker Health and Climate Change project.

MA in Politics, The New School for Social Research

BA in History, Boston University 

Summary of Expertise

Global and Urban Climate Governance
Critical Urban Studies
Political Ecology
Climate Politics
Global Politics

Research Interests

global/urban climate governance, urban political ecology, urbanization, capitalism, state theory, resilience, infrastructure, public works, municipal finance

Teaching Interests

/Experience

Instructor of Record:

• Personal & Community Resilience in the Changing Climate
• Global Health Politics

Teaching Assistant:

• Global Politics
• Theories of International Relations and World Politics
• International Political Economy
• European Politics
• Middle East Politics
• Foundations for Global and Community Health
• Global and Community Health Task Force (Farmworker Families)
• Law and Politics of Memory
• Governing the Golden State
• Classical Social Theory
• Ancient Political Thought

Selected Presentations

"Centering the State in Urban Political Ecology: The Value of Santa Cruz" AAG Annual Meeting in San Francisco, 2026.

Selected Publications

2026, David Gordon and Henry McLaughlin. “Cities and Climate Change.” De Gruyter Handbook of Cities, Infrastructure and International Relations, edited by Michele Acuto et al., vol. 35, De Gruyter, Berlin / Boston, 2026, pp. 1952–1960. De Gruyter Contemporary Social Sciences Handbooks.

2024, Sarah Cheikhali, Ingy Higazy, Mark Howard, Henry McLaughlin, Gabriela Segura, Matthew Sparke & Lucia Vitale, “Alternative Archives:
Researching Politics with Chunks of Reality,” Politics, https://doi.org/10.1177/02633957241292492