Matthew Desmond

Rigorous sociological fieldwork and data-driven analysis of urban housing insecurity transformed contemporary understandings of American poverty through the landmark book Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City. Sociologist Matthew Desmond combined immersive ethnography with extensive quantitative research to demonstrate how housing loss serves as a driver, rather than merely a symptom, of economic deprivation across the United States.

His work provides an influential examination of how low-income rental markets, systemic eviction, and public policy intersect to shape the daily survival strategies of vulnerable households.

Career & Background

Desmond completed his undergraduate studies at Arizona State University before earning his Master of Arts and his Ph.D. in 2010 from the University of Wisconsin at Madison, where he studied under sociologist Mustafa Emirbayer. Following his doctoral studies, he joined the Harvard Society of Fellows as a Junior Fellow and later served as the John L. Loeb Associate Professor of the Social Sciences at Harvard University. He subsequently joined the faculty at Princeton University, where he serves as the Maurice P. During Professor of Sociology. At Princeton, he founded and acts as the principal investigator for The Eviction Lab, a research initiative devoted to building nationwide data on eviction and housing hardship. His academic distinctions include receiving a MacArthur "Genius" grant in 2015 and election to the American Philosophical Society in 2022.

Writing Style & Themes

Desmond's research and writing focus heavily on urban sociology, social theory, ethnography, race and ethnicity, and the dynamics of organizations and work. His methodological approach pairs deeply personal human narratives from direct field observation with empirical analysis of broader social structures. Across his scholarship, he explores topics ranging from extreme workplace hazards and educational inequality to network-based survival strategies among urban residents and the consequences of new crime control policies on inner-city women. His academic writing has appeared in major publications including the American Journal of Sociology, American Sociological Review, Social Forces, and Demography.

Major Works

• Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City — Published in 2016, this study of low-income housing in Milwaukee won the Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction, the National Book Critics Circle Award, the Carnegie Medal, and the PEN / John Kenneth Galbraith Award for Nonfiction.
• On the Fireline: Living and Dying with Wildland Firefighters — Published in 2007, this ethnographic study draws on Desmond's experience working on a wildland firefighting crew to examine dangerous work, organizational culture, and risk.
• The Racial Order — Co-authored with Mustafa Emirbayer in 2015, this sociological volume provides a theoretical framework for analyzing race, power, and social hierarchy in modern society.
• Race in America — Co-authored with Mustafa Emirbayer and published in 2015, this book examines historical and contemporary racial inequality across American social institutions.
• Poverty, by America — Published in 2023, this nonfiction work analyzes why poverty persists in the United States and offers an argument for collective responsibility and policy intervention.
• Severe Deprivation in America — Desmond served as editor for this inaugural two-volume special issue of RSF: The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences in 2015.