Curriculum Vitae
Vivian E. Thomson

Princeton University, A.B. (Biology)
University of California, Santa Barbara, M.A. (Biology)
University of Virginia, Ph.D. (Government)

Professor Vivian E. Thomson is Assistant Professor in the Departments of Environmental Sciences and Politics at the University of Virginia. Her professional specialty is environmental policy and politics. In 2001 she helped to create--and she now directs--the Environmental Thought and Practice B. A. program, which is one of the University's newest interdisciplinary undergraduate degree programs and which regularly attracts thirty majors. This demanding major is possible because the University of Virginia is home to environmental scholars representing virtually all academic disciplines. Click here to view a Cavalier Daily article featuring the ETP major.

Professor Thomson's recent work includes a completed book manuscript (Garbage In, Garbage Out: Virginia Is for Landfills) that discusses domestic policy debates about interstate trash transport in the United States within an international context. Waste management practices in the European Union and Japan provide points of comparison.

In 2005 while on sabbatical leave Professor Thomson was Guest Scholar at the Pew Center on Global Climate Change. She collaborated with Pew on a fifty-page white paper about the European Union's emissions trading scheme. This research involved interviews conducted in several EU Member States. "Early Observations on the European Union's Greenhouse Gas Emission Trading Scheme" is available here.

During academic year 2001-2002 Professor Thomson was Fulbright Professor of American Studies at the University of Southern Denmark, Odense, where she taught American politics and environmental policy. The University of Virginia's Arts and Sciences magazine profiled Professor Thomson on the subject of her Fulbright appointment and on her daily practice of using a bicycle for commuting and errands, a habit that was acquired in Denmark where cycling is a main form of transportation. The article is available online here.

Professor Thomson has published in political science, botany, air pollution, scientific, and ethics publications. She has written extended technical reports on the air toxics problem in the United States, on air pollution in the Southern Appalachian Mountains, and on global climate change. Her work has been sponsored by the US Environmental Protection Agency, the Pew Center on Global Climate Change, the National Park Service, and the USDA Forest Service. She has presented papers for a wide array of organizations, including the American Political Science Association, the Midwest Political Science Association, the International Political Science Association, the Scandinavian Social Science Association, the American Philosophical Association, the Fondazione per l'Ambiente (Turin, Italy), the Bayerisches Staatsministerium für Landesentwicklung und Umweltfragen (Augsburg, Germany), and the European Consortium for Political Research. Conference paper and guest lecture venues have included Oxford University, the Free University of Berlin, the University of Kent, Goeteborg University, Southern Denmark University, the University of Tampere, the University of Delaware, Emory University, Stanford University, and Auburn University.

Professor Thomson's work extends outside of the University into the realm of environmental policy in practice. Governor Warner appointed her in 2002 to the Virginia Air Pollution Control Board, the five-member body that makes air pollution policy for the Commonwealth of Virginia. In 2006 Governor Kaine re-appointed her to the Air Board, where she now serves as Vice Chair. Prior to returning to academic life Professor Thomson was a senior policy analyst and manager with the United States Environmental Protection Agency in San Francisco, California and in Washington, D. C.

Professor Thomson's c.v. is available upon request.

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