Dr Brian Garvey

Reader

Work, Employment and Organisation

Contact

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Personal statement

My current research investigates local and global tensions regarding labour, land use and commodification of natural resources.  I have a particular interest in Scottish land reform, mineral prospecting in Ireland and the territorial demarcations and resistance by agrarian, traditional and indigenous communities in the Global South.  I currently work closely with academics and civil society organisations in Scotland, Europe, Africa, Brazil and Latin America and share an ambition to challenge Eurocentric and colonial paradigms in our collective research. I am co-founder of the Centre for the Political Economy of Labour, which seeks to reflect this ambition in its praxis. 

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Teaching

At the Department of Work, Employment and Organisation, I teach on several undergraduate and MSc courses and focus on labour, migration, organisational strategies and collective resistance linked to globalised commodity chains and extractive industries. I have supervised PhD and post doctoral studies on south-south migration, pesticide harm, forestry and land reform, labour organisation and gender, and community repsonses to dispoessession and deindustrialisation.  I welcome interest from potential PhD candidates on any of the broad themes of my research.

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Professional Activities

The materiality of the supposed energy transition II
Organiser
31/5/2026
30 Years of The Centre for the Study of Geography of Labour, Sao Paulo (CEGeT)
Keynote/plenary speaker
21/5/2026
The materiality of the supposed energy transition
Organiser
2/5/2026
Soraya Conde
Host
30/4/2026
The materiality of the supposed energy transition
Organiser
23/3/2026
SBS and HASS Funder Spotlight series
Speaker
11/3/2026

More professional activities

Projects

Fostering Inclusive Academic Cultures: Interdisciplinary Collaboration, Wellbeing, Teaching and Research Culture
Vasquez Pistorio, Bianca (Project Lead) Baracho Wanderley, Barbara Evelyn (Co-investigator) Gherghina, Gabriela Loredana (Co-investigator) Rani, Misbah (Co-investigator) Fergus-Allen, Cameron (Co-investigator) Garvey, Brian (Academic) Remnant, Jennifer (Academic) Werkmeister, Astrid (Academic) Taylor, Yvette (Academic)
This project seeks to co-produce an inclusive, interdisciplinary network that strengthens a supportive teaching and research culture, bridges gaps between postgraduate researchers and academic staff across SBS, Engineering, and HASS to address the challenges of navigating academic culture.
16-Jan-2026 - 31-Jan-2026
Porous boundaries of forest system governance: territory and tribulation in the Amazon
Garvey, Brian (Principal Investigator)
20-Jan-2026 - 19-Jan-2028
Accelerating the protection of territory and rights in the Amazon
Garvey, Brian (Principal Investigator) Owens, Steven Robert (Co-investigator) Torres, Mauricio (Co-investigator) Loures, Rosamaria (Co-investigator)
This project addresses illegal gold mining and deforestation in Brazil’s Crepori National Forest and the territories of Munduruku and Montanha & Mangabal communities. Integrating geospatial data, legal timelines, and community narratives from previous field visits and recent workshops, we expose unlicensed operations on Indigenous lands: constitutionally prohibited yet aided by municipal-level licensing loopholes
01-Jan-2025 - 31-Jan-3026
Conservation as an extractive industry? Timber, territory and the trouble with new regulations
Garvey, Brian (Principal Investigator) Owens, Steven Robert (Co-investigator)
The main aim of this project is to (i) map the existence of areas traditionally used and occupied by Amazonian indigenous and riverine communities in an area destined for commercial timber extraction; (ii) locate zones and corridors of illegal timber extraction beneath the forest canopy; and (iii), make this data available for the Brazilian Federal Public Ministry to inform legal procedures towards safeguarding traditional peoples.
08-Jan-2024 - 01-Jan-2025
Forest concessions, land , labour and climate change
Garvey, Brian (Co-investigator) Sambajee, Pratima (Principal Investigator)
Research Excellence Award studentship
01-Jan-2024
Climate change and the rise of precarious work among agriculture and construction workers in a small island developing state.
Sambajee, Pratima (Academic) Garvey, Brian (Academic)
Small island developing states (SIDS) are among the first and worst affected by climate change despite making a very small contribution to the overall global emissions that cause climate change.. For over 20 years, the World Health Organization (WHO) has played a key role in raising awareness of and implementing actions to manage the health risks of climate change, particularly global warming within SIDS (WHO, 2018) but the challenges remain. Risks can arise from direct exposures, indirect exposures and via economic and social disruptions (Smith et al., 2014). In this proposed research we focus on direct exposures to high atmospheric temperature extremes that are increasing in frequency and intensity in SIDS and are projected to continue along this trend (Hoegh-Guldberg, 2018). Specifically, we focus on Mauritius, an Indian Ocean-African SIDS, where there is an increasing trend of reported heat stress and heat-related injuries in the construction and agricultural sectors (ILO, 2019). We situate precarious work in the context of climate change, in this case extreme temperatures associated with global warming. We will examine climate change as a potential factor exacerbating experiences of precariousness among agriculture and construction workers, often migrants from global south countries like India, Nepal and Bangladesh. The study will collect evidence to (a) explore the relevance of climate change as a contributor and multiplier of precarity at work, and (b) produce occupational health policy-relevant evidence for workers in the two sectors. Both outcomes are timely for improving the climate change preparedness of relevant sectors in SIDS.
01-Jan-2023 - 30-Jan-2027

More projects

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Contact

Dr Brian Garvey
Reader
Work, Employment and Organisation

Email: brian.garvey@strath.ac.uk
Tel: 548 3999