Devin Stein

Devin Stein is an Assistant Professor of Entrepreneurship at the University of Alabama's Culverhouse College of Business. His research examines how communities and organizations self-organize to address problems of collective action and social impact — from wildfire management to public health — with recent work published in the Academy of Management Journal. His award-winning dissertation on wildfire management in California has been recognized by the Academy of Management and the University of Maryland's Ed Snider Center. He holds a Ph.D. from the Whitman School of Management at Syracuse University.

Devin Stein is an Assistant Professor of Entrepreneurship at the University of Alabama's Culverhouse College of Business and a Fellow with the Institute for an Entrepreneurial Society at Syracuse University. His research sits at the intersection of strategic management, institutional economics, and social impact, asking how decentralized, polycentric organizational structures emerge to address problems — like wildfire risk, water governance, and public health — that no single actor can solve alone. Drawing on institutional economics and Ostrom's work on the commons, his empirical work combines panel econometrics, geospatial analysis, and archival methods to study community organizing, public-private collaboration, and knowledge spillovers. His research has appeared in the Academy of Management Journal. His dissertation on wildfire management in California has received multiple recognitions, including the Academy of Management's Best Dissertation Award (Organizations and the Natural Environment Division, 2024), the Ed Snider Center's Outstanding Dissertation Award at the University of Maryland (2025), and Finalist recognition from the Academy of Management's SIM Division (2025). He has also received multiple teaching awards. He holds a Ph.D. from the Whitman School of Management at Syracuse University and an M.S. in Economics from Utah State University.