Media Contact:
Carrie Conko
Director of Communications
Mercatus Center at George Mason University
Office: 703-993-4899
Email: cconko@gmu.edu
Robert Nelson
Affiliated Senior ScholarProfessor, University of Maryland School of Public Policy
nelsonr@umd.edu
Biography
Robert Nelson is an affiliated senior scholar at the Mercatus Center and a professor at the University of Maryland's School of Public Policy.
Dr. Nelson is the author of many journal articles and seven books: Zoning and Property Rights (MIT Press, 1977), The Making of Federal Coal Policy (Duke University Press, 1983), Reaching for Heaven on Earth: The Theological Meaning of Economics (1991), Public Lands and Private Rights: The Failure of Scientific Management (1995), A Burning Issue: A Case for Abolishing the U.S. Forest Service (2000), Economics as Religion: From Samuelson to Chicago and Beyond (Penn State Press, 2001), and Private Neighborhoods and the Transformation of Local Government (Urban Institute Press, 2005). He has written widely in publications for broader audiences, including the Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, Forbes, The Weekly Standard, Reason, Society, and Technology Review.
Dr. Nelson worked in the Office of Policy Analysis of the Office of the Secretary of the Interior from 1975 to 1993. He has served as the senior economist of the Congressionally chartered Commission on Fair Market Value Policy for Federal Coal Leasing (Linowes Commission) and as senior research manager of the President's Commission on Privatization. He has been a visiting scholar at the Brookings Institution, visiting senior fellow at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, visiting scholar at the Political Economy Research Center, and visiting research associate at the Center for Applied Social Sciences of The University of Zimbabwe.
Dr. Nelson earned his PhD in economics from Princeton University.
