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I am a human geographer who earned my PhD from Clark University, United States. My dissertation looked at the political ecology and critical resource geographies of Ecuador's palm oil industry with a specific focus on Afro-Ecuadorian, smallholder, and company participation in the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) certification scheme. I received both an MA in geography and a BA (Hons.) in Political Science and International Development Studies from York University, Canada. Before joining Wilfrid Laurier University in 2025, I was an Associate Professor of Environmental Studies at the University of San Francisco, and a 2015-17 Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) of Canada postdoctoral scholar at the Faculty of Environmental Studies, York University.
I specialize in critical approaches to environmental governance and extraction in both Ecuador and Indonesia. I have published in World Development, Geoforum, Development and Change, Journal of Rural Studies, Earth System Governance, Journal of Political Ecology, Environment and Planning E, and other journals. I recently completed a term as an elected Board Member for the Conference of Latin American Geography (CLAG) and I am a member of the Earth System Governance Taskforce on Planetary Justice, Utrecht University.
Chase, M., and Johnson, A. (2024). Oil Extraction and Indigenous Women: Examining the Necropolitics of the Settler State in the Bakken Region. Human Geography. 17(1). (Equal Authors). https://doi.org/10.1177/19427786231190426
Kenney-Lazar, M., Johnson, A., Sultana, F., Rice, J. L., Osborne, T., Himley, M., Bebbington, A. (2023). Relational Environmental Governance: Critical Praxis with the Material World. Journal of Political Ecology. 30(1). (Co-First Author with M. Kenney-Lazar). https://doi.org/10.2458/jpe.5542
Johnson, A., and Sigona, A. (2022). Planetary Justice and ‘Healing’ in the Anthropocene. Earth System Governance, 11, 100128. (First Author). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.esg.2021.100128
Johnson, A. (2022). The Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) and Transnational Hybrid Governance in Ecuador’s Palm oil Industry. World Development, 149, 105710. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.worlddev.2021.105710
Johnson, A., and Zalik, A. (2021). Introduction. In Johnson, A. Zalik, A., Mollett, S., Sultana, F., Havice, E., Osborne, T., Valdivia, G., Lu, F., Billo, E. Extraction, Entanglements, and (Im)Materialities: Reflections on the Methods and Methodologies of Natural Resource Industries Fieldwork. Environment and Planning E: Nature and Space. 4(2). https://doi.org/10.1177/2514848620907470
Johnson, A. (2021). Engaged Research in Oppositional Corporate Spaces. In Johnson, A. Zalik, A., Mollett, S., Sultana, F., Havice, E., Osborne, T., Valdivia, G., Lu, F., Billo, E. Extraction, Entanglements, and (Im)Materialities: Reflections on the Methods and Methodologies of Natural Resource Industries Fieldwork. Environment and Planning E: Nature and Space. 4(2). Published onlinefirst: March 11, 2020. https://doi.org/10.1177/2514848620907470
Johnson, A. (2019). The Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil’s National Interpretation Process in Ecuador: Fitting Global Standards into Local Contexts. Journal of Rural Studies, 71. Special issue on Palm Expansion in Latin America. P. Pacheco, F. de Castro, A. Castellanos (Eds). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jrurstud.2019.02.013
Johnson, A. (2017). Pudrición del Cogollo and the (Post)Neoliberal Ecological Fix in Ecuador’s Palm Oil Industry. Geoforum, 80. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2016.12.016
Johnson, A. (2014). Green-Grabbing Through Green Certification? Ecuador’s National Interpretation of the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO). Journal of Latin American Geography. 13(3). https://doi.org/10.1353/lag.2014.0040
Bebbington, A., Bornschlegl, T., Johnson, A. (2013). Political Economies of Extractive Industry: From Documenting Complexity to Informing Current Debates. An Introduction. Development and Change, (Equal Authorship). https://doi.org/10.1111/dech.12057
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