Matthew Hoffmann

Biography

Matthew Hoffmann is a Professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Toronto Scarborough and co-director of the Environmental Governance Lab. He teaches classes on international relations, global governance, and environmental and sustainability politics. His research on decarbonization, climate change and environmental politics has been published in 4 books and over 50 journal articles and book chapters. Professor Hoffmann is a lead faculty member for the Earlth Systems Governanace network, was co-editor of the journal Global Environmental Politics from 2017-2022 and is the chair of the board of directors for the environmental NGO, Green Economy Canada. 

You can follow Professor Hoffman @HoffmannMatt on Twitter

Research Field: International Relations

Research Interests

Hoffman pursues research on climate change politics, global governance, multilateral treaty-making, complex systems and international organization. In addition to a number of articles and book chapters, he is the author of Ozone Depletion and Climate Change: Constructing a Global Response (SUNY Press 2005) and coeditor with Alice Ba of Contending Perspectives on Global Governance (Routledge 2005). His most recent book is Climate Governance at the Crossroads: Experimenting with a Global Response after Kyoto (Oxford University Press, 2011). He is also one of multiple co-authors on a 2014 book, Transnational Climate Change Governance (Cambridge University Press).

Awards and Grants

• 2020 SSHRC Insight Grant “The 100 Resilient Cities Initiative: A Natural Experiment in the Politics of Creating a Sustainable World,”  Principal Investigator
• 2017 SSHRC Partnership Grant “Greening Growth Partnership" Co-Investigator
• 2014 SSHRC Insight Grant “Cultural Politics of Climate Change” Collaborator
• 2013 SSHRC Insight Grant “Transformative Policy Pathways Towards Decarbonization” Principal Investigator
• 2009 SSHRC "Governance and Legitimacy in Carbon Markets" co-investigator .
• 2008 Leverhulme Trust International Networks Grant "Transnational Climate Change Governance" Partner in network of 16 scholars..
• 2007 Univerisy of Toronto Connaught New Faculty Matching Grant "Contesting Climate Change: NGOs, Norms, and Governance"

Publications

Selected Recent Publications:

• 2021 Heather Millar, Eve Bourgeois, Steven Bernstein, Matthew Hoffmann “Self-reinforcing and self-undermining feedbacks in subnational climate policy implementation” Environmental Politics.
• 2020 Sara Hughes and Matthew Hoffmann (2020) “Just urban transitions: Toward a research agenda” WIREs Climate Change 11(3)
• 2019 Steven Bernstein and Matthew Hoffmann  “Climate politics, metaphors and the fractal carbon trap” Nature Climate Change 9: 919–92
• 2018 Steven Bernstein and Matthew Hoffmann “The Politics of Decarbonization and the Catalytic Impact of Subnational Climate Experiments” Policy Sciences 51 (2): 189-211.
• 2018 James Patterson, Thomas Thaler, Matthew Hoffmann, Sara Hughes, Angela Oels, Eric Chu, Asyem Mert, Dave Huitema, Sarah Burch, Andrew Jordan  “Political feasibility of 1.5°C societal transformations: the role of social justice.” Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability 31: 1-9. 
• 2018 Aarie Glas, Clifton van der Linden, Robert Denemark, Matthew Hoffmann “Understanding Multilateral Treaty-Making as Constitutive Practice” Journal of Global Security Studies 3(1): 339-357.
• 2017 Hamish van der Ven, Steven Bernstein, Matthew Hoffmann “Valuing the Contributions of Non-State and Subnational Actors to Climate Governance” Global Environmental Politics 17 (1): 1-20.

Teaching Interests

• International Relations
• Global Environmental Politics
• International Organization