Lynn D. Nelson (Ph.D., Ohio State University, 1972)

Lafayette Hall, room 106
Tel.: (804) 827-0160
E-mail: ldnelson@vcu.edu
Personal Web: http://www.people.vcu.edu/~lnelson/

Specialty Areas: Russian studies, political sociology, social change

Joint Appointment: School of World Studies

Biographical Sketch

Lynn Nelson began studying economic reform in the Soviet Union at the time that landmark changes were accelerating under Mikhail Gorbachev, and his ongoing research since that period has centered on the subject of Russian political and economic change. Nelson's publications include Radical Reform in Yeltsin's Russia: Political, Economic and Social Dimensions, with Irina Y. Kuzes (M.E. Sharpe, 1995); Property to the People: The Struggle for Radical Economic Reform in Russia, with Irina Kuzes (M.E. Sharpe, 1994); and articles in Western and Russian journals. He is currently writing The Politics of Interests in Post-Soviet Russia.

Nelson's work has been featured in a variety of news reports, including interviews with Cable News Network, PBS, National Public Radio, ABC Television, Russian Public Television (ORT), CBS Radio, the Voice of America, The New York Times, The Washington Post, Financial Times, Newsweek, the Associated Press and ITAR-TASS.

Lynn Nelson's research has been funded by the United States Information Agency (1986), the Council for International Exchange of Scholars (1990), the International Research and Exchanges Board (1987, 1991, 2001, 2002), the Project on Institutional Reform and the Informal Sector (1992-93), and grants from the National Council for Soviet and East European Research (1993-94, 1995-96). He has also been awarded additional external grants from several agencies, including the National Science Foundation, the United States Department of Energy and the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities and Public Policy.

Nelson was appointed visiting fellow at Harvard University's Russian Research Center in 1987, and in 1990 he was awarded a Fulbright scholarship to the USSR. From 1991 to 1993, he worked as a visiting senior researcher at the Institute of Sociology in Moscow (USSR/Russian Academy of Sciences). Since that time, he has collaborated extensively with research teams from a variety of universities and institutes in Moscow and several other regions in Russia. Nelson was awarded a Fulbright lectureship to the Russian Federation and taught at Moscow State University in the spring 2004.

He is also involved in teaching innovations that make use of Internet technologies. This work has been a focus of articles in The New York Times and the Chronicle of Higher Education devoted to the significance of new information technologies for university instruction. In 2005, Nelson received the VCU Award for Innovative Excellence in Teaching, Learning and Technology.

Nelson joined the faculty of Virginia Commonwealth University in 1972, after having earned the Ph.D. at The Ohio State University. He holds appointments as professor in the International Studies Program and the Department of Sociology.