Harold Glasser

Environmental Studies Program and

Environmental Institute

Western Michigan University

Kalamazoo, MI 49008

Office: (616) 387-2713

Fax: (616) 387-2272

E-mail: harold.glasser@wmich.edu

Harold Glasser, assistant professor, (Ph.D., University of California, Davis) works at the nexus where environmental science, policy, philosophy, values, business, design, economics, and history meet. He holds degrees in physics, energy systems design (mechanical engineering), and environmental engineering. He was a visiting Senior Fulbright scholar at the Center for Development and Environment, University of Oslo, in 1996, a lecturer at Schumacher College in 1995, and a visiting researcher at the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, Vienna, in 1992. His research focuses on the evaluation of complex environmental problems and the process of making social choices about the environment. A primary interest is the development of a methodology for evaluating environmental problems/policies/projects and product designs, under conditions where limited information, risk, conflict, lack of scientific consensus, and multiple and incommensurable evaluation criteria predominate. Glasser’s approach emphasizes integrating quantitative considerations with qualitative, value-based considerations. His goal is to use this methodology to assist institutions, businesses, and communities in their efforts to promote ecological and cultural sustainability. Most recently, he has focused on evaluating the efficacy of existing policy tools and laying the foundation for developing ethically informed, multicriteria tools for environmental policy analysis and technology assessment that can serve as viable alternatives to benefit-cost analysis. Glasser also works with the Foundation for Deep Ecology, where, as general editor of the Selected Works of Arne Naess, he is responsible for revising and editing an eleven-volume collection of Naess’s works, which will be published by Kluwer Academic in 2001. In addition, he serves on the steering committee of the newly formed, national Higher Education Network for Sustainability and the Environment (HENSE). Glasser has written on environmental policy, environmental economics, planning, multicriteria analysis, green accounting, deep ecology, education for ecocultural sustainability, campus environmental assessments, and environmental values. Some recent and forthcoming publications include: