Political scientist Leah Stokes examines interest groups’ power to shape, and resist, progressive energy policy.
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Interest groups play a central role in American politics, and nowhere has their influence been felt more acutely than in the areas of energy and environmental politics. Leah Stokes, assistant professor of political science at the University of California, Santa Barbara, discusses the outsized role of special interests in shaping debate around clean energy and in defining policies to address the environmental and climate impacts of our energy system.

In March, Stokes published her first book, Short Circuiting Policy: Interest Groups and the Battle Over Clean Energy and Climate Policy in the United States, the culmination of six years of research into special interest groups. Stokes shares her findings, including and strategies to overcome opposition to progressive energy policies, in conversation.

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