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Donna Lybecker

Donna L. Lybecker

Professor of Political Science | Graduate Director

Office: Graveley Hall, North Wing, 3rd floor

(208) 282-3331

donnalybecker@isu.edu

Fields: International Relations, Environmental Politics, and Comparative Politics

 

Ph.D. Colorado State University, 2003

Donna L. Lybecker joined the Department of Political Science in 2007. Her teaching and research focus on Comparative Politics and International Relations, emphasizing Environmental Politics, Borders, and Latin America. In particular she looks at the shifting role and perceptions of the US-Mexico border, water issues among the Western states and more recently the role language and narratives play in policy development. 

Courses Recently Taught:

  • Introduction to International Relations
  • Introduction to Comparative Politics
  • Environmental Politics and Policy
  • The Politics of Borders
  • The Politics of Central America
  • Politics of Developing Nations
  • Seminar in Global Politics
  • Seminar in Philosophy of Social Science

Dr. Lybecker has published in academic journals such as Policy Studies Journal, Review of Policy Research, Environmental Politics, and Politics & Policy, and co-authored two books, Great Debates in Environmental History with B. Black (2009), and Cases in International Relations: Pathways to Conflict and Cooperation with G. Hastedt and V. Shannon (2014). She was named the Distinguished Teacher at ISU in 2013 and received the Outstanding Service Award in 2017.

Outside of ISU, Dr. Lybecker is an Associate Editor for the Social Science Journal and an Editorial Board Member for the International Journal for Sustainable Society. In addition, she is the Chair of the Selection Committee for The Bert & Phyllis Lamb Prize in Political Science.

 

Select Publications (* denotes graduate student co-author)

    1. Donna L. Lybecker, Mark K. McBeth, Callie Dance*, and Clint Cooper*. 2024. “Which Fish is a Deviant? The Social Construction of Fish Species in Greater Yellowstone.” Journal of Political Science and Public Opinion. Vol. 2(2): 113. doi: https://doi.org/10.33790/jpspo1100113. 
    2. Francisco Lara-Valencia, Irasema Coronado, Stephen Mumme, Christopher Brown, Paul Ganster, Hilda García, Donna Lybecker, Sharon Megdal, Rosario Sanchez, Alan Sweedler, Robert G. Varady, Adriana Zuñiga-Teran.  2023. “Water Management on the U.S.-Mexico Border: Achieving Water Sustainability and Resilience Through Cross- Border Cooperation.” Journal of Borderlands Studies, Vol 38, Issue 2: 323-334. DOI: 10.1080/08865655.2023.2168294
    3. Mark K. McBeth, Donna L. Lybecker, and Jessica M. Sargent.  2022. “Narrative Empathy: A Narrative Policy Framework Study of Working-Class Climate Change Narratives and Narrators,” World Affairs, Vol 185, Issue 3: 471-499.
    4. Erika Allen Wolters, Donna L. Lybecker, Francis Fahy, and Monica L. Hubbard. (2020). Willingness to support environmental actions and policies: A comparative study. The Social Science Journal, 21(3), 333-338. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.soscij.2019.05.013.
    5. Donna L. Lybecker, Mark K. McBeth, and Jessica M. Sargent*. 2022. “Agreement and Trust: In Narratives or Narrators?” Chapter 4 in Narratives and the Policy Process: Applications of the Narrative Policy Framework. Edited by Michael D. Jones, Elizabeth Shanahan, and Mark K. McBeth. Bozeman, Montana State University. Pp. 90-112. scholarworks.montana.edu
    6. Mark K. McBeth, Donna L. Lybecker, and Jessica M. Sargent*. “Narrative Empathy: A Narrative Policy Framework Stud of Working-Class Climate change Narratives and Narrators,” World Affairs (forthcoming Fall 2022).  Available online first (July 28, 2022) https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/00438200221107018
    7. Donna L. Lybecker. 2020. “Old West, New West, and the Next West,” Chapter 1 in The Environmental Politics and Policy of Western Public Lands, Ericka Wolters and Brent Steel, eds. University of Oregon Press.  3-15.
    8. Wolters, Erika Allen, Donna L. Lybecker, Frances Fahy, and Monica L. Hubbard. 2019. “Willingness to support environmental actions and policies: A comparative study,” Social Science Journal. (Available online 31 May 2019:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.soscij.2019.05.013
    9. Li Huang, Felix Hiefent Liao, Kathleen A. Lohse, Danielle M. Larson, Michail Fragkias, Donna L. Lybecker, Colden V. Baxter. 2019. “Land conservation can mitigate freshwater ecosystem services degradation due to climate change in a semiarid catchment: The case of the Portneuf River catchment, Idaho, USA,” Science of the Total Environment, Vol. 651 (Part 2): 1796-1809.