Rob Verchick, author of THE OCTOPUS IN THE PARKING GARAGE, was today named a member of Harvard Radcliffe Institute’s 2023–2024 class of fellows, a cohort whose projects contend with the urgent, the beautiful, and the vast: from reckoning with the challenges of climate change to creating digital models of iconic Italian violins to detecting distant galaxies.
A Radcliffe fellowship offers scholars in the humanities, sciences, social sciences, and arts—as well as writers, journalists, and other distinguished professionals—a rare chance to pursue ambitious projects for a full year in a vibrant interdisciplinary setting amid the resources of Harvard. The 2023–2024 fellows represent only 3.3 percent of the many applications that Radcliffe received.
At Radcliffe, he will be writing a book for nonexperts about how we can harness the power of government, science, and local wisdom to rescue the oceans from climate breakdown.
Verchick is among a cadre of fellows who will spend the year at Harvard Radcliffe exploring a large variety of topics across disciplines.
“This year’s cohort promises, once again, to accomplish incredible things,” said Tomiko Brown-Nagin, dean of the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, Daniel P.S. Paul Professor of Constitutional Law at Harvard Law School, and professor of history in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. “As ever, we have outstanding fellows with expertise in a wide range of fields. Many are grappling with some of the most urgent challenges facing humanity, including seven exemplary scholars working at the forefront of research into climate change and issues of climate justice.”
The Octopus in the Parking Garage: A Call for Climate Resilience by Rob Verchick is published by Columbia University Press. Rob Verchick is a leading climate law scholar who designed and implemented climate-resilience policies in the Obama administration. He holds the Gauthier-St. Martin Chair in Environmental Law at Loyola University New Orleans, is a senior fellow in disaster resilience at Tulane University, and serves as president of the Center for Progressive Reform. Verchick is the author of four books and host of the podcast Connect the Dots.