Jeasurk Yang's Website

Research Topics

Urban Slums in the Global South

According to UN-HABITAT, a slum is defined as an urban settlement that lacks one or more of the following basic necessities to sustain a healthy and safe livelihood: durable housing materials, sufficient living space, access to safe water, access to adequate sanitation, and security of tenure. Approximately one billion people are known to live in slums at the present, and it will double in size by 2030, a quarter of the planet will live in a slum.

I suggest that a slum is a topic for geographers while urban poverty for social scientists. All slums are not homogeneous but diverse in terms of locations, dwellers, sizes, interests, conditions, and backgrounds. Slums are not only for the poorest class in cities but also for the low-middle and even middle classes who decided to settle down despite escaping from the absolute poverty line. Slums are not a new phenomenon but I believe still a dynamic phenomenon. They have been part of most cities - especially cities of the Global South.

Climate Change Adaptation

In an era defined by unprecedented environmental challenges, I aim to understand strategies to mitigate the impacts of climate change. Through interdisciplinary approaches and a keen appreciation for the interconnectedness of natural and human systems, I explore the intricate dynamics between climate change drivers and their repercussions on politics, societies, and economies. By examining the multifaceted aspects of adaptation, my research contributes to build resilient and sustainable communities (with a special reference to developing countries and the Global South) in the face of a rapidly changing climate. I am deeply interested in exploring innovative solutions, policy frameworks, and socio-political practices that pave the way for a more resilient and adaptable future.

Related work

Yang J. Climate adaptation as a socio-material process: Realigning a flood-prone environment in urban slums of Jakarta. Climate and Development (under revision).

Political Ecology of Waste

I am particularly interested in how waste is produced, managed, and valued through unequal relations of power, economy, and knowledge, rather than as a purely technical problem. It situates overflowing landfills, informal recycling, and hazardous exposures within longer histories of colonial extraction, structural adjustment, and global trade regimes that externalize risks and costs to poorer places. In many cities, privatization and financialization of waste management intersect with uneven infrastructures and rapid urbanization, creating fragmented systems that rely heavily on informal labor by waste pickers, even as policies seek “modernization” via landfills, incineration, or circular economy agendas. By following material flows, this approach highlights the uneven geographies of waste, the co-production of environmental harm and economic opportunity, and the possibilities and limits of more just waste governance.

A Mixed-Methods Approach

I am interested in a mixed-methods approach that crosses the divide between quantitative GIS techniques and critical qualitative analysis. Following the intermingled research area of critical physical geography (Lave et al., 2014) and critical GIS (Thatcher et al., 2016), I find the mixed method valuable as the approach offers the complementing roles of diverse methods. It allows multi-faceted analysis by producing generalizable outcomes from quantified models and creating critical discussions for policy interventions. However, the mixed approach is not merely to use multiple methods at the same time but to bridge different ontological and epistemological assumptions about social research. Obviously, quantitative methods have a firm root of positivist backgrounds which separate themselves from qualitative methods based on realist, constructivist, and other paradigms. Nevertheless, I follow the arguments that the mixed method can construct 'trading zones' between quantitative and critical geography to construct novel solutions for social research (Barnes, 2009).

Particularly, I am working on diverse quantitative methods including spatial regression models, remote sensing, and deep learning techniques to explore the issues of development and poverty in the Global South. Also, I adopt critical qualitative methods to understand the spatial processes that produce socio-ecological inequalities.

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