My research examines the governance and political economy of climate change adaptation, with a focus on water. I take a mixed methods and participatory research approach, integrating field-based qualitative analysis, household surveying, and computational decision-support modeling.
I am currently a Postdoctoral Scholar at the Stanford Doerr School of Sustainability, collaborating with Sarah Fletcher in the Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering. I received my PhD in environmental social sciences from the Energy & Resources Group at the University of California, Berkeley.
My work has been supported by NASA ROSES, NSF, Fulbright-Hays, and Fulbright, among others.
Research Portfolio
My research lies at the intersection of political economy, institutional governance, and climate adaptation. I study how political economic systems, institutions, and planning processes shape adaptation and adaptive capacity and deepen or disrupt inequalities in resource access. My approach is interdisciplinary, multi-scalar, and participatory. I bridge qualitative and quantitative field-based methods in surveying and interviewing with computational systems modeling. My research portfolio reflects the breadth of my empirical interests, from drought adaptation and water management in the Americas to the evolution of global climate governance. My ongoing and recent projects include:
- Rethinking decision-support models for politically feasible climate adaptation plans (2026–Present)
- Glacier retreat and water reliability in Santiago, Chile (2024–2026)
- Drinking water access and adaptive capacity to megadrought in rural Chile (2023–2026)
- The institutional architecture and evolution of global climate governance (2021–Present)
- Water markets as climate adaptation: pitfalls and tradeoffs (2020–2021)
Publications
Journal Articles
- Cullen, K.A., Hartman, S., Hingst, M., Hossain, M. S., Jorgensen, I., Maurer, T., Mirnasl, N., Oguntade, S. S., Sherif, S., & Sluder, M. K. (2025). Sustainable Development Goal 6 in the era of the Paris Agreement: Changes and trade-offs in tailoring water challenges to global climate goals. Ecology and Society, 30(3). https://doi.org/10.5751/ES-16218-300316
- Cullen, K.A., Ayala, Á., & Spencer, M. (2025). The socio-cultural implications of glacier retreat demand further attention: A case study from Cerro El Plomo in Santiago, Chile. Frontiers in Earth Science, 13. https://doi.org/10.3389/feart.2025.1564881
- Cullen, K.A., Kröll, A. P., Roldan, E. P., Fragkou, M. C., & Ocampo-Melgar, A. (2024). Justicia climática y acceso al agua en San José de Maipo, Chile. Investigaciones Geográficas, 68, Article 68. https://doi.org/10.5354/0719-5370.2024.76698
- Cullen, K.A. (2023). A review of applications of remote sensing for drought studies in the Andes region. Journal of Hydrology: Regional Studies, 49, 101483. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejrh.2023.101483
- Hale, T., Smith, S.M., Black, R., Cullen, K., Fay, B., Lang, J. & Mahmood, S. (2021). Assessing the rapidly-emerging landscape of net zero targets. Climate Policy. https://doi.org/10.1080/14693062.2021.2013155
In Progress
- Navigating power, sustaining access: how community-managed water collectives confront climate change and marketized governance in Chile
- Whose priorities shape climate adaptation? Local collective action and procedural inclusion in the Chilean Andes
- Assessing the impacts of climate change on households through entitlements: evidence from Chile’s megadrought
- Glacier retreat and the future of urban water supply
- Water markets as climate adaptation: pitfalls and tradeoffs in Chile
- Adaptive or maladaptive? A global review of the distributional impacts of water markets
Outreach
2025
- Cullen, K.A., Ayala, Á., & Spencer, M. (2025). Opinión: El retroceso silencioso del glaciar Cerro El Plomo no es solo un problema ambiental y de seguridad hídrica, sino también sociocultural. Ladera Sur. [link]
- Cullen, K.A. (2025). Barriers to climate finance for Pacific Island nations: The case of Palau. Berkeley Public Policy Journal, Spring 2025 Print Edition. [link]
- Cullen, K.A. (2025). Stranded assets, climate litigation, and the role of U.S. federal agencies. Berkeley Public Policy Journal, Spring 2025 Online Edition. [link]
- Cullen, K.A. (2025). Inseguridad hídrica doméstica en la Región Metropolitana de Chile: Informe diagnóstico comunitario (Household water insecurity in the Metropolitan Region of Chile: Community report). Part I: Viluco; Part II: El Llano de Caleu; Part III: Los Maitenes/El Alfalfal.
2024
- Cullen, K.A. (2024, August 27). Siguiendo hacia adelante: El cambio climático y el futuro del agua potable (Flowing forward: Climate change and the future of drinking water) [Public talk]. Caminos de la Ciencia, Oakland Public Library. Cesar Chavez Branch Library, Fruitvale, Oakland, California.
2022
- Cullen, K.A. (2022). In their own words: On the ground at COP26. Breakthroughs, Rausser College of Natural Resources, University of California, Berkeley, Spring 2022. [link]
2021
- Cullen, K.A., Axelsson, K., Lezak, S., Hale, T., Lang, J., & Smith, S. (2021). Leveling up net zero climate leadership in the United States. Smith School Working Paper 21-01, University of Oxford. [link]
- Black, R., Cullen, K.A., Fay, B., Hale, T., Lang, J., Mahmood, S., & Smith, S.M. (2021). Taking stock: A global assessment of net zero targets. Energy & Climate Intelligence Unit and Oxford Net Zero. [link]
- Axelsson, K., Lezak, S., & Cullen, K.A. (2021). US poised and ready for net zero shift. Race to Zero News, UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. [link]
- Axelsson, K., Cullen, K.A., & Lezak, S. (2021). Achieving net-zero climate targets will depend on public lands. The Revelator. [link]
- Lezak, S., Cullen, K.A., & Axelsson, K. (2021). Is it too soon for America to adopt a comprehensive net-zero strategy? The Independent.
2020
- Fay, B., & Cullen, K.A. (2020). Net zero decarbonisation report: Putting net zero at the heart of UK policy. Net Zero All-Party Parliamentary Group, Parliament of the United Kingdom. [link]
- Cullen, K.A. (2020). Hall student reports on the COP25 UN Climate Change Summit. St Edmund Hall News, University of Oxford. [link]
- Cullen, K.A. (2020). Cross-party cooperation on a green recovery in the UK: There’s still hope for the US to do the same. Our Daily Planet.
- Cullen, K.A. (2020). Antarctica: Sustainable tourism in the Anthropocene. In Among the Garbage and the Flowers [Exhibition catalog]. 6B Gallery, Paris, France.
2019
- Cullen, K.A. (2019). How did Chile become a global climate leader? Ensia, University of Minnesota. [link]
- Cullen, K.A. (2019). Dispatch from the cryosphere: Amid the glaciers of Antarctica and Chile. GlacierHub, Columbia University. [link]
2018
- Cullen, K.A. (2018). As Andean glaciers retreat, so does regional security. New Security Beat, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. [link]
- Cullen, K.A. (2018). 4 Andean cities adapting to glacier retreat to preserve water security. TheCityFix, World Resources Institute. [link]
- Cullen, K.A. (2018). Quenching Chile’s thirst: How interdisciplinary science is boosting resilience to climate change in Chile and beyond. LatinAmericanScience.org. [link]
- Cullen, K.A., & Peltier, C. (2018). Glaciology of the Southern Andes. ICE: News Bulletin of the International Glaciological Society, 178. ISSN 0019-1043.