Associate Professor Ben Cooke
Associate Professor
Details
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College: School of GUSS
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Department: School of GUSS
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Campus: City Campus Australia
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ben.cooke@rmit.edu.au
Open to
- Media enquiries
- Masters Research or PhD student supervision
About
Ben is a passionate teacher in environmental studies and sustainability, with a strong research focus on the social and political dimensions of nature conservation. Ben is an Associate Director of the Centre for Urban Research and theme leader of 'Geographies of Land, Home and Place'.
Ben's research interests in nature conservation are driven by the idea that conservation is a fundamentally social and political process, where justice and equity for people and ecologies is not achieved by simply creating National Parks, for example. How we do conservation, who is involved and who is excluded are all fundamental questions that need to be addressed.
Ben's teaching interests include environmental planning and management, applied socio-environmental research skills and the history of environmental ideas for sustainability and conservation. Ben particularly enjoys working with students in the Bachelor of Environment and Society as they develop their capstone projects, work on applied projects and build their critical knowledge of environmental studies.
Industry experience:
Ben has worked with a range of organisations in his teaching and research capacity at RMIT, including The Department of Environment, Energy and Climate Action (DEECA), The Stockholm Resilience Centre, The Australian Land Conservation Alliance (ALCA), Friends of the Earth (FoE), Land for Wildlife (LfW), Traditional Owner Corporations in Victoria and a host of local government and community organisations.
Awards:
RMIT Award for Excellence - Early Career Teaching category (2017)
Early Career Research Achievement Award - School of Global, Urban and Social Studies (2018)
Ben's research interests in nature conservation are driven by the idea that conservation is a fundamentally social and political process, where justice and equity for people and ecologies is not achieved by simply creating National Parks, for example. How we do conservation, who is involved and who is excluded are all fundamental questions that need to be addressed.
Ben's teaching interests include environmental planning and management, applied socio-environmental research skills and the history of environmental ideas for sustainability and conservation. Ben particularly enjoys working with students in the Bachelor of Environment and Society as they develop their capstone projects, work on applied projects and build their critical knowledge of environmental studies.
Industry experience:
Ben has worked with a range of organisations in his teaching and research capacity at RMIT, including The Department of Environment, Energy and Climate Action (DEECA), The Stockholm Resilience Centre, The Australian Land Conservation Alliance (ALCA), Friends of the Earth (FoE), Land for Wildlife (LfW), Traditional Owner Corporations in Victoria and a host of local government and community organisations.
Awards:
RMIT Award for Excellence - Early Career Teaching category (2017)
Early Career Research Achievement Award - School of Global, Urban and Social Studies (2018)
Research fields
- 4406 Human geography
- 4104 Environmental management
UN sustainable development goals
- 11 Sustainable Cities and Communities
- 15 Life on Land
- 10 Reduced Inequalities
Academic positions
- Senior Lecturer
- RMIT University
- Global, Urban and Social Studies
- Melbourne, Australia
- 2019 – 2023
- Lecturer
- RMIT University
- Melbourne, Australia
- 2015 – 2018
Non-academic positions
- Conservation Officer
- Cardinia Shire Council
- , Australia
- 2007 – 2010
Supervisor projects
- Building Connections : Schools as Community Hubs (PhD associated ARC Linkage Research Project); More Than A School - Researching the Policy, Planning, Design and Operational Dynamics of Schools as Community Hubs (Research Proposal)
- 1 Oct 2024
- More than a reserve? Measuring the benefit of private protected areas.
- 26 Jun 2024
- Navigating harm in the career paths of Natural Resource Management professionals
- 22 Nov 2023
- Vulnerability to climate change impacts and adaptations by the urban poor context: Insights from Cambodias informal settlements
- 8 Jun 2023
- On Floods, (Im)mobilities and Production of Places in Bihar, India
- 1 Feb 2023
- An Investigation of Farmer Adaptation under Multiple Social-ecological Stressors in the Special Region of Yogyakarta, Indonesia
- 14 May 2021
- Exploring the Impacts on Community from Golf-based Tourism in a Peri-urban Village in Vietnam
- 12 May 2021
- Dissolving the Concrete: Reconfiguring Urban Waterscapes Through Grassroots Activism in São Paulo, Brazil
- 2 Aug 2019
Teaching interests
Ben is committed to a praxis-based pedagogy which immerses students in applied, problem solving scenarios. Through experiential learning and authentic assessment tasks, Ben seeks to ensure that students become critically informed environmental practitioners once they leave the classroom.
Ben also recognises that care, support and compassion are vital dimensions of the way we learn about the challenges of addressing issues of sustainability and environment.
Ben is an active postgraduate supervisor, with interests in supervising work that explores:
- Nature conservation policy and practice
- Cultural landscape governance and management
- Urban greening politics
- Social, policy and cultural dimensions of environmental management
- Neoliberal environmental governance
Ben teaches primarily into the following program:
-BP000 - Bachelor of Environment and Society
(https://www.rmit.edu.au/study-with-us/social-science/environment-and-planning)
Ben also recognises that care, support and compassion are vital dimensions of the way we learn about the challenges of addressing issues of sustainability and environment.
Ben is an active postgraduate supervisor, with interests in supervising work that explores:
- Nature conservation policy and practice
- Cultural landscape governance and management
- Urban greening politics
- Social, policy and cultural dimensions of environmental management
- Neoliberal environmental governance
Ben teaches primarily into the following program:
-BP000 - Bachelor of Environment and Society
(https://www.rmit.edu.au/study-with-us/social-science/environment-and-planning)
Research interests
Ben's specific research focuses on a critical examination of nature conservation across a range of contexts. This includes the challenges of fostering and producing nature in cities, the role of private land in protected area conservation, notions of the commons and commoning practices, and justice and equity issues associated with nature and conservation. His current work involves an examination of the rise of private protected area conservation in Australia. Ben is also an editorial board member of the academic journal Australian Geographer.
Research keywords:
Private land conservation, Protected areas, Urban greening, Cultural landscape management and governance; Human-environment relationships, More-than-human, Nature, Conservation policy.
Research keywords:
Private land conservation, Protected areas, Urban greening, Cultural landscape management and governance; Human-environment relationships, More-than-human, Nature, Conservation policy.
