Paul Almeida

Paul Almeida is a professor of sociology at UC Merced and a member of IGCC’s Steering Committee. Almeida’s research centers on the efficacy of collective action at the local, national and global levels of social and political life.  He has empirically examined the timing, distribution, and outcomes of dozens of large-scale campaigns whereby ordinary citizens and excluded social groups mobilized to protect themselves from the loss of vital necessities such as environmental quality, health care, pensions, water services/utilities, and social citizenship rights.  His recent work focuses on community-based challenges and responses to climate change. Almeida currently serves as the Chair of the Political Sociology Section of the American Sociological Association. He is a founding member of the Civic Capacity Research Initiative (CCRI) and the UC Merced Community and Labor Center.

His articles have appeared in the American Journal of Sociology, Annual Review of Sociology, Social Forces, Social Problems, Mobilization, and other scholarly outlets. Almeida’s books include: Collective Resistance to Neoliberalism (Cambridge University Press, 2022; with Amalia Pérez Martín) Global Struggles and Social Change (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2020; with Chris Chase-Dunn); Social Movements: The Structure of Collective Mobilization (University of California Press, 2019); Mobilizing Democracy: Globalization and Citizen Protest (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2014); Waves of Protest: Popular Struggle in El Salvador, 1925-2005 (University of Minnesota Press, 2008); Handbook of Social Movements across Latin America (co-edited with Allen Cordero, 2015); and Latin American Social Movements: Globalization, Democratization and Transnational Networks (co-edited with Hank Johnston, 2006).  He teaches courses on social movements, political sociology, environmental sociology, organizational behavior, climate justice, globalization, and sociological theory.