student headshot

PhD Student

Education
Bachelor of Social Sciences in Psychology, minor in Ecology & Biodiversity, University of Hong Kong (2015; graduated with first class honors)

Master of Science in Conservation Ecology and Environmental Informatics, School of Environment and Sustainability, University of Michigan (2017)

Bio
Yifan (Flora) He is an environmental social scientist and doctoral student at the Bren School. She studies rural land governance in the Global South using a combination of political science theory, causal inference methods, and geospatial tools. Her current projects examine the interaction between rural out-migration and land governance in South America, and the social and environmental impacts of collective tenure regimes in Brazil. 

Prior to UCSB, she worked as a social scientist at Conservation International, where she studied the diversity and dynamics of global area-based conservation governance systems. Flora received a Bachelor of Social Sciences from the University of Hong Kong and a Master of Science in conservation ecology and environmental informatics from the University of Michigan. She speaks Mandarin, Hakka, English, and Spanish, and is learning Portuguese.

Year Admitted
2020

Faculty Advisor
Mark Buntaine and Robert Heilmayr (Social Science Group)

Awards
UCSB Chancellor’s Fellowship 

Research Areas
Environmental politics, land system science, biodiversity conservation, land governance, land use change