Rebecca Leigh Rutt

Rebecca Leigh Rutt is an Associate Professor in the Department of Food and Resource Economics at the University of Copenhagen, specializing in the Section for Consumption, Bioethics and Governance. Her academic career spans multiple institutions including the University of East Anglia, University of Michigan, and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.

Her educational background includes a Ph.D. in Development Studies from the University of Copenhagen (2014), an M.Sc. in International Development from Universiteit van Amsterdam (2007), and a B.A. in International Relations from Rollins College (2004).

Rutt identifies as an 'undisciplined' social scientist working in political ecology, with research spanning urban sustainability in Copenhagen, EU forest policy, community forest management in Nepal, and most recently the nexus of industrial animal production and pandemic emergence through the PANDEMEAT project. She is deeply engaged with feminist political ecology, social/environmental/ecological justice, and the degrowth movement, having recently joined the Degrowth journal editorial collective.

Her recent publications focus on the intersection of industrial meat production and pandemic risks, care ethics in agriculture, urban sustainability, and degrowth theory. The publications reveal a consistent thread examining power dynamics, justice issues, and alternative economic paradigms within food systems and environmental governance.

Rutt actively contributes to public debate, having co-authored opinion pieces in Dagbladet Politiken and collaborative works with the Feminist and Degrowth Alliance. She has recently co-organized PhD courses on degrowth and socioecological justice.

She serves as Course Responsible for several graduate courses including Motivation and Pro-Environmental Behaviour, Gender, Environment and Sustainable Development, and Nature and Landscape Policy, while co-teaching Environmental Justice. Her teaching reflects her commitment to education in relation to social and environmental justice.