It is a common (aspirational) refrain that climate change “changes everything,” and equally common to note that climate-related transitions seem to be changing very little at all. What climate-related changes are happening now? And how might we grasp emergent trajectories while we’re in the midst of these transitions? With a substantive focus on the city-hinterland relationship and the American West, and based on five years of fieldwork related to renewable energy, conservation, and housing development on public lands in Nevada and Utah, this talk gets purchase on these questions by presenting climate change as a form of macro-social change. I draw on classical and contemporary macro-historical sociology and critical geography to show how this framework provides new insights on climate transitions and describe its implications for understanding contemporary climate politics, policy, and visions of a just transition.

Hillary Angelo is an Associate Professor of Sociology, founding Director of UCSC’s Center for Critical Urban and Environmental Studies, and former member of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. Her work combines historical sociology, critical social theory, and urban political economy and ecology to analyze contemporary urban and environmental culture and politics. She has published widely in leading sociology, geography, and urban studies journals and her first book, How Green Became Good: Urbanized Nature and the Making of Cities and Citizens, was published in 2021 by the University of Chicago Press.

Winter 2026 COLLOQUIUM SERIES

THE CENTER FOR CULTURAL STUDIES hosts a weekly Wednesday colloquium featuring work-in-progress by faculty & visitors. We are pleased to announce our Winter 2026 Series. Sessions begin promptly at 12:15 PM and end at 1:30 PM (PST) in Humanities Building 1, Room 210.

Staff assistance is provided by The Humanities Institute.