Mumbi N. Maina

Mumbi Maina is a scholar-practitioner, currently working as a Social Planner with the City of VAncouver. As a lead in the development of the City’s first Equity Framework, she works  to imagine how municipal governments can effectively tackle the challenges of rising social and environmental inequities that are emblematic of many metropolitan cities across the globe. This work uses decolonizing, racial equity, and intersectional approaches to transform City policies, practices and processes.  

Mumbi completed her PhD in Environment and Sustainability from the University of Saskatchewan, with a research focus on the uptake of sustainability in Canadian higher education, examining how various actors, including historically marginalized groups, are involved in the enactment of sustainability in policy and practice. Born and raised in Kenya, Mumbi  has spent the last decade working on grassroots social and environmental justice organizing, including  anti-racist education and cross-cultural collaboration with immigrant and other communities across Turtle Island.

She is currently an organizer with Black CAN, a non-partisan organization working to build Black political power and community support by engaging, encouraging and empowering Black Canadians to get more involved in politics. 

My research curiosity is on how institutional transformation happens in social and environmental justice issues in higher education and in cities. I focus on the role of various actors, particularly historically marginalized groups in the uptake of sustainability in higher education policy and practice; and learning that is needed to tackle intersecting issues of climate emergency, systemic racism and ongoing colonization in cities.

Areas of interest:

• Climate change
• Environmental and climate justice
• Equity
• Intersectionality
• Justice and decolonization
• Sustainability in higher education