PhD. 1985, Pennsylvania State University

Environmental sociology with emphasis on environmental conflicts and environmental justice; environmental policy; food and agriculture. social movements and social control; political economy.

I teach undergraduate courses in environmental issues, food and agriculture, social justice (a service learning course) and graduate courses in environmental policy and the built environment.

My primary research interests are in environmental sociology, a subfield that examines the cultural and institutional influences on human decisions about environmental use. I am particularly interested in environmental conflict, environmental movements, and the linkages between economic imperatives and environmental degradation. I’m currently working on two book projects. In one project, I’m applying a sociological perspective in an examination of environmental policy to assess the social structural constraints that pose obstacles to formulating, implementing, and enforcing sustainable environmental policies. In the other book project, Tom Shriver (a graduate of our doctoral program) and I are examining environmental protest in the Czech Republic. We’re examining changes in the state’s response to environmental protest as the nation moved from being a Soviet satellite state to a neoliberal democracy. Other works-in-progress include articles on: environmental racism in Oak Ridge, Tennessee; intra-movement conflict in grassroots environmental organizations; grassroots environmental activists’ collaborative experiences with professional environmental organizations; access to swimming instruction as a social justice issue in less developed nations/regions.

I’m an environmental sociologist with research interests in environmental conflict, environmental inequalities, environmental policy, and the linkages between economic imperatives and environmental degradation. Recent articles examine the suppression of environmental activism in post-Communist Czech Republic, neoliberal reforms and corruption in developing nations, and contested illnesses of nuclear weapons workers. My book, Sustainable Failures: Environmental Policy and Democracy in a Petro-dependent World (Temple University Press, 2012) is a critical, interdisciplinary analysis of unsustainable petro-dependent environmental policy. I was honored to receive the 2011 Allan Schnaiberg Outstanding Publication Award from the American Sociological Association.

I’m currently launching a new research project on ‘fracking,’ the hydraulic fracturing technique for natural gas extraction. I have three main purposes: to understand the lived experiences of people in fracking communities; to explore the determinants and outcomes of community mobilization in opposition to fracking; and to gauge the US energy future – the oil and gas industry’s lobbying efforts, the spread of fracking, oil supplies and prices, and research and development of alternative energy sources.

• 2013 Thomas E. Shriver, Alison E. Adams, Sherry Cable. Forthcoming. Discursive obstruction and the repression of dissent: The social control of environmental activism in the Czech Republic. Social Forces.
• 2012 Sustainable Failures: Environmental Policy and Democracy in a Petro-dependent World. Sherry Cable. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press.
• 2011 Hussein Soliman and Sherry Cable. Sinking under the weight of corruption: neoliberal reform, political accountability, and justice. Current Sociology 59(6): 735-753.
• 2010 Thomas E. Shriver, Sherry Cable, and Chris Messer. Oppositional forces and the suppression of dissent: the case of environmental activism in post-communist Czech Republic. International Journal of Sociology
• 2010 Sherry Cable and Thomas E. Shriver. Wounded by friendly fire: policy palliatives and internal conflict in the Gulf War illness movement. Current Sociology 58(1)