Rebecca Neaera Abers

Rebecca Neaera Abers, Ph.D in Urban Planning from U.C.L.A. (1997), is Professor at the Institute of Political Science of the University of Brasília, Brazil. Her research has focused on the politics of institutional change, participatory decision-making, the relations between social movements and the state, and activism inside the policy process. She is the author or editor of four books, including Inventing Local Democracy: Grassroots Politics in Brazil (Lynne Rienner, 2000), and, with Margaret E. Keck, Practical Authority: Agency and Institutional Change in Brazilian Water Politics (Oxford 2013). Her recent research explores social movement responses to the pandemic in Brazil.