Publications

The institute’s joint project, Solidarity Economics, has released a report focused on the intersection between public health and building a more inclusive economy. The report highlights the ways the status quo of health inequality undermines economic prosperity, resulting in worse health and economic outcomes. These inequalities disproportionately affect the well-being and prosperity of racial minority groups and low-income communities. The report recommends improving public health by promoting healthy communities, rather than just treating illness.

Solidarity Economics Series: Public Health in the Monterey Bay AreaRead More

New research reveals steps California must take to capture more jobs from lithium battery boom. California is capturing only 2.4% of projected jobs in planned operations in the nation’s lithium battery supply chain, with most going to states that are ranked low in terms of labor protection, worker health and safety, and wage laws.

Powering Prosperity: Building an Inclusive Lithium Supply Chain in California’s Salton Sea RegionRead More

The student-run, institute-supported Journal of International Society and Culture has released its Winter 2024 edition. The journal features undergraduate students’ discourse about global topics, offering a platform to author and publish articles with diverse perspectives across academic disciplines. This issue focuses on Russia’s philosophical and political theories over time, Haiti’s political violence and its origins, and the economics of Critical Race Theory.

UCSC Journal of International Society and Culture: Vol. IVRead More

In this report, researchers from the Institute for Social Transformation, in partnership with the Monterey Bay Economic Partnership, aim to help community and business leaders throughout the Monterey Bay Area (Monterey, San Benito and Santa Cruz Counties) better understand the progress they are making towards a more inclusive economy. 

Building an Inclusive Economy in the Monterey Bay Region: A Progress ReportRead More

Funded in part by the institute’s Building Belonging program research fellowships, this study explores the social relationships, economic factors, and emotional experiences that surround COVID-19 deaths among the members of Spanish-speaking Latinx communities in the United States, as retold in user-written posts on the GoFundMe crowdfunding platform.

Pandemic retelling: What GoFundMe posts reveal about the socioeconomic context of COVID-19 death and bereavement among Latinx and Spanish-speaking communities in the United States Read More

Funded in part by the institute’s Building Belonging program research fellowships, this edited volume calls for higher education leaders to revamp programming, pedagogy, and research that problematically reproduce dominant techno-scientific and managerial conceptualizations of sustainability.

Critical Campus Sustainabilities: Bridging Social Justice and the Environment in Higher EducationRead More

The Monterey Bay Area has some of the least affordable housing of any region in the U.S. This is part of a series on how Solidarity Economics principles of mutuality and movements can be applied to help promote inclusive economic development in the Monterey Bay region.

Solidarity Economics Series: Housing in the Monterey Bay AreaRead More

Funded in part by the institute’s Building Belonging program research fellowships, this article examines the ways policymakers develop bio-pharma development strategies to manage the trade-offs between economic value capture and securing value for health.

Bio-pharma hub development in global production networks: contrasting state policies and conjunctural value strategiesRead More

In this article, the authors reflect on the 15-year research collaboration they have sustained with particular attention to the “how” of building trust, maintaining communications, and learning together. Co-authored by Rebecca A. London (UCSC) and Jennette Claassen (Playworks).

Playing for Keeps: A Long-Term Community-Engaged Research Partnership to Support Safe and Healthy Elementary School RecessRead More

The Our Salton Sea initiative launched in 2021 to provide a more inclusive vision for remediation of the Salton Sea. More than a diminishing body of water requiring environmental mitigation, the revitalization of the Salton Sea creates an opportunity to provide a healthy and economically resilient future for the tens of thousands of people who live within the immediate area. A partnership of Alianza Coachella Valley; the Assembly Committee on Jobs, Economic Development, and the Economy; the UCR Center for Social Innovation; and the Institute for Social Transformation at UC Santa Cruz.

Our Salton Sea: Investing in People for a Thriving RegionRead More

Black farmers face multiple intersecting threats to their land tenure, including the lack of legal protections for the collective landownership form known as heirs’ property and the harmful legacy of government discrimination in farm lending. Policy action is needed to ensure that investor demand does not compound these existing injustices so that a diverse and vibrant small farm sector can thrive across the Southeast. Co-authored by Madeleine Fairbairn (UCSC), Elsa Calderon (UCSC), and Jordan Treakle (NFFC).

Selling Out the Delta: Farmland Investment and Small Farmer Land Access in MississippiRead More

In May 2021, the State of California Salton Sea Management Program (SSMP) awarded a contract to UC Santa Cruz to evaluate water importation concepts to refill the Salton Sea. An Independent Review Panel was established, with the charge to evaluate public submissions describing ways to import water to the Salton Sea basin to restore the Sea. Report prepared by Brent M. Haddad Ph.D. (UC Santa Cruz).

Salton Sea Independent Review Panel Summary Report: Evaluation of Water Importation Concepts for Long-Term Salton Sea RestorationRead More