FORMER SENIOR FELLOW
From 2005 until his passing in 2024, R.J. Smith was a senior fellow in environmental policy at The National Center for Public Policy Research. He also served as director of the Center for Private Conservation, a group that researches and publicizes private conservation and stewardship on private lands in the U.S. and abroad.
Mr. Smith studied under renowned Austrian economist Ludwig Von Mises while attending New York University.
Once president of a local Audubon Society chapter, Mr. Smith studied environmental policy for nearly forty years and coined the term “free market environmentalism.”
Mr. Smith served as a consultant to the U.S. Department of the Interior, a consultant to the President’s Council on Environmental Quality, and as a special assistant at the EPA. He also served as director of environmental studies at the Cato Institute and as an Adjunct Analyst at the Competitive Enterprise Institute.
A popular speaker, Mr. Smith lectured throughout the United States. He also lectured abroad, including in Mexico, New Zealand, France, Japan, Australia, and the United Kingdom, among other countries.
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