Adam Reich

Adam Reich is an Associate Professor of Sociology at Columbia University, and a faculty affiliate at Columbia’s Interdisciplinary Center for Innovative Theory and Empirics (INCITE). He is the author of four books, the most recent of which is Working for Respect: Community and Conflict at Walmart (Columbia, 2018). He is also the author of several peer-reviewed articles, which have appeared in journals such as the American Journal of Sociology, Social Science & Medicine, Socio-Economic Review, and Industrial and Labor Relations Review. His research focuses on three institutions that jointly structure the life chances and permeate the lives of millions of Americans today: the health care system, the criminal justice system, and the low-wage labor market. In particular, he examines how these institutions shape people’s understandings of their social and economic positions, and how such understandings lead to actions that preserve but also, occasionally, unsettle the institutions themselves.