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Adjunct Fellow Adjunct Fellow
Wendy Miles Wendy Miles
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Staff office/program
Area of Expertise

Climate adaptation and resilience planning; Evaluative research on climate change policies and programs; Social equity in the context of climate change; Societal dimensions of environmental change

Contact
808.944.7423

Dr. Wendy Miles specializes in the human dimensions of climate change and the ways in which public programs can be improved to support ecosystem health through such change. She is the Science Collaboration Coordinator for the US Fish and Wildlife Service’s Science Applications program in the Pacific Islands, and an Adjunct Fellow at the East-West Center.

Dr. Miles comes to the East-West Center with two decades of experience spanning the socio-economic, political, and ecological dimensions of environmental change. For the past decade, her work has focused on climate change planning and policies in the Indo-Pacific. She previously served as the Program Manager for the Pacific RISA program at the East-West Center, working to build adaptive capacity to climate variability and change in Hawaiʻi and the US Affiliated Pacific Islands. From 2016-2018, she was the Adaptation Initiatives Manager for the Pacific Islands Climate Change Cooperative, where she coordinated climate adaptation initiatives and associated projects, consultancies, and research grants in the US Affiliated Pacific Islands and Hawaiʻi. More recently she was contracted by the Department of the Interior as a “Community Resilience Planner and Social-Environmental Scientist” for the Resilient Hawaiian Communities Initiative, co-led by the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, Office of Native Hawaiian Relations, National Park Service, and University of Hawaiʻi William S. Richardson School of Law Ka Huli Ao Center for Excellence in Native Hawaiian Law. For her doctoral dissertation, Miles investigated how the Paris Agreement’s forest carbon offsetting mechanism, REDD+ (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation), was influencing environmental governance and local livelihoods through a case study of the Indonesia-Australia Forest Carbon Partnership.

As a “pracademic” – part academic and part practitioner – Dr. Miles designs her research to address the informational needs of policy makers, community leaders, and natural/cultural resource managers. She has publications in the social and environmental sciences, including peer-reviewed journal articles, co-edited books, book chapters, professional reports, and newspaper commentaries. She is a former Fulbright Fellow, Environmental Protection Agency STAR Fellow, and East-West Center Graduate Fellow. Dr. Miles holds a PhD in Geography from the University of Hawaiʻi, and an MSc in Biodiversity, Conservation, and Management from the University of Oxford.

Dr. Miles’ curriculum vitae is available in PDF format.

Dr. Wendy Miles specializes in the human dimensions of climate change and the ways in which public programs can be improved to support ecosystem health through such change. She is the Science Collaboration Coordinator for the US Fish and Wildlife Service’s Science Applications program in the Pacific Islands, and an Adjunct Fellow at the East-West Center.

Dr. Miles comes to the East-West Center with two decades of experience spanning the socio-economic, political, and ecological dimensions of environmental change. For the past decade, her work has focused on climate change planning and policies in the Indo-Pacific. She previously served as the Program Manager for the Pacific RISA program at the East-West Center, working to build adaptive capacity to climate variability and change in Hawaiʻi and the US Affiliated Pacific Islands. From 2016-2018, she was the Adaptation Initiatives Manager for the Pacific Islands Climate Change Cooperative, where she coordinated climate adaptation initiatives and associated projects, consultancies, and research grants in the US Affiliated Pacific Islands and Hawaiʻi. More recently she was contracted by the Department of the Interior as a “Community Resilience Planner and Social-Environmental Scientist” for the Resilient Hawaiian Communities Initiative, co-led by the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, Office of Native Hawaiian Relations, National Park Service, and University of Hawaiʻi William S. Richardson School of Law Ka Huli Ao Center for Excellence in Native Hawaiian Law. For her doctoral dissertation, Miles investigated how the Paris Agreement’s forest carbon offsetting mechanism, REDD+ (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation), was influencing environmental governance and local livelihoods through a case study of the Indonesia-Australia Forest Carbon Partnership.

As a “pracademic” – part academic and part practitioner – Dr. Miles designs her research to address the informational needs of policy makers, community leaders, and natural/cultural resource managers. She has publications in the social and environmental sciences, including peer-reviewed journal articles, co-edited books, book chapters, professional reports, and newspaper commentaries. She is a former Fulbright Fellow, Environmental Protection Agency STAR Fellow, and East-West Center Graduate Fellow. Dr. Miles holds a PhD in Geography from the University of Hawaiʻi, and an MSc in Biodiversity, Conservation, and Management from the University of Oxford.

Dr. Miles’ curriculum vitae is available in PDF format.