Bryan Leonard
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Bryan Leonard

Associate Professor & SER Chair of Environment & Natural Resources
University of Wyoming

Links

bryan.leonard@uwyo.edu
Google Scholar
Haub School

About

I am an Associate Professor and SER Chair of Environment and Natural Resources at the Haub School of Environment and Natural Resources at the University of Wyoming. I study the implications of different institutional responses to environmental and natural resource problems, focusing on land, water, and other resources.

Much of my research can be parsed into three cross-cutting themes: i) tradeoffs between economic efficiency and other goals (such as equity) when designing policy; ii) the relationship between property rights and collective action problems; and iii) the modern challenges and historical foundations of public resource management in the American West. By studying the contemporary legacy of past policies, my research informs the design of institutions to solve pressing resource challenges today.

Selected Publications

  • Property Rights without Transfer Rights: A Study of Indian Land Allotment, Journal of Political Economy: Microeconomics, Forthcoming 2027
  • Late Homesteading: Indigenous Land Dispossession Through Strategic Occupation, American Political Science Review, 2025
  • Economic Potential of Wind and Solar Resources in American Indian Communities, Nature Energy, 2024
  • Paper Water, Wet Water, and the Recognition of Indigenous Property Rights, JAERE, 2023
  • The Distributional Outcomes of Rights-Based Management in Fisheries, PNAS, 2022
  • Allow “Non-Use” Rights to Conserve Natural Resources, Science, 2021
  • Individualistic Culture Increases Economic Mobility in the United States, PNAS, 2021
  • Ownership Fragmentation and Natural Resource Use: Evidence from the Bakken, Economic Journal, 2021
  • Property Right Acquisition and Path Dependence: Nineteenth-Century Land Policy and Modern Economic Outcomes, Economic Journal, 2021
  • Land Quality, Land Rights, and Indigenous Poverty, Journal of Development Economics, 2020

See all publications →

Affiliations

  • Property and Environment Research Center, Senior Fellow
  • Environmental Markets Lab, Affiliate
  • Ostrom Workshop, Affiliate
  • Land Economics, Editorial Board
 

Bryan Leonard | University of Wyoming