Dr. Paul Sabin

Biography

Paul Sabin teaches United States environmental history, energy politics, and political, legal, and economic history. He coordinates the Yale Environmental History working group and the Yale Environmental Humanities Program, and helps lead Yale’s undergraduate Environmental Studies major. He is the author of 'Public Citizens: Attack Big Government Remaking American Liberalism' (W.W. Norton, 2021), which examines the evolution and impact of public interest environmental movements in the United States since the 1960s. His book, 'The Bet: Paul Ehrlich, Julian Simon, and Our Gamble Over Earth’s Future' (Yale University Press, 2013), explores the clash between environmentalists and critics in the contentious debates surrounding population growth and resource scarcity. Additionally, his book 'Crude Politics: California Oil Market, 1900-1940' (University of California Press, 2005), illustrates how politics and law shaped California's growing dependence on petroleum at the national level. Sabin has also written about international resource frontiers, U.S. overseas expansion, and energy legal history. He received his Ph.D. in American History in 2000 from the University of California, Berkeley, and spent a postdoctoral year as a Harvard-Newcomen Fellow in business history at Harvard Business School. Furthermore, he served for nine years as the founding executive director of the Environmental Leadership Program, training and supporting a collaborative network of more than 1,300 talented public leaders across higher education, government, businesses, and non-profit organizations.

Research Interests

Experience