I am an expert in environmental change and governance.
This website offers a platform to learn about my research, publications, and ongoing projects. I am passionate about fostering connections between academic research, policy, and broader public conversations on environmental issues.
Feel free to browse my website and reach out for inquiries or collaborations.
About
I am a political scientist with expertise in environmental change and governance, especially:
Human adaptation to environmental change
Asian Pacific and South Pacific climate change
Ocean governance
Extreme climate change
Environmental justice
I conduct academic research on these topics. I work with policymakers to develop evidence-led environmental policy. I also teach these and other topics at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels.
Current Projects
Adaptation Work: A Climate-Forced Labour Regime (2025-)
Despite the immense effort invested in adapting to climate change, most adaptation labour is not yet recognised as work. This project aims to formally recognise adaptation work and advocate for its inclusion within national and international labour law and policy frameworks
Adaptation and Indigenous Labour: Colonial Extraction on the Climate Frontier (2021 - 2024)
Using historical, ethnographic and collaborative qualitative methods, Vanessa Burns establishes new bases in geographical research for the decolonisation of environmental governance.
Education and Career
Dr Burns is a Teaching Fellow at the Institute for Technology and Humanity at the University of Cambridge, and an Honorary Research Fellow at the School of Sociological Studies, Politics, and International Relations, at the University of Sheffield.
Before joining the University of Cambridge, Dr Burns was a Lecturer in the School of Sociological Studies, Politics and International Relations, and a Leverhulme ECR Fellow in the School of Geography and Planning, at the University of Sheffield. Prior to this she held a position as Social Scientist in Governance at The James Hutton Institute, where she collaborated on various environmental research projects funded by the European Commission and the Scottish Government. Vanessa holds a DPhil in Geography and the Environment from the University of Oxford, an MA from the University of New South Wales, and a BA (1st Class Hons and University Medal) from the University of Technology Sydney.
Research
Vanessa's work is broadly interested in how ontologies of nature inform the production of environmental knowledge, especially knowledge of environmental change. She is interested in the project of reforming environmental law and governance frameworks, by asking how the ontological foundations of environmental law and governance frameworks obstruct good governance.
She is especially interested in how European ontologies produce international environmental frameworks that are maladapted to alternative (e.g. Indigenous) land and sea management in postcolonial regions, and the problem of how to decolonise these frameworks.
Research Interests:
Politics of climate change
Extreme climate change
Adaptation justice
Pacific geographies
Decolonial thought
Ocean governance