Abler, Ronald (1939–)

Ronald F. Abler, president of the International Geographical Union (IGU) during 2008–2012, former president of the Association of American Geographers (AAG) (1985–1986), and executive director of the AAG (1989–2002), contributed to the geographical study of communication while fostering collaborative geographical research through communication among geographers and between geographers and the wider academy.

Abler received his geography degrees from the University of Minnesota (PhD, 1968) and served on the faculty (1967–1995) and as head of the geography department (1976–1982) at the Pennsylvania State University, where he is professor emeritus. His research explored how societies use communication technologies, most recently with respect to telecommunications and cyberspace, to shape space and place. In addition to numerous research publications, Abler coauthored a groundbreaking 1971 textbook on spatial organization and led two atlas projects significant for their scale and scholarly importance, one on America's major metropolitan regions and the other a state atlas on Pennsylvania.

As director of the Geography and Regional Science Program at the National Science Foundation (1984–1988), Abler helped build important research capacity in universities, expanded funding for physical geography, and championed the National Center for Geographic Information and Analysis (NCGIA). As president and executive director of the AAG, he led a substantial increase in the scale of the organization's activities and outreach, bolstered the development of geographic information systems (GIS), and was scientific administrator (1994–2002) for the AAG's Global Change and Local Places project.

Abler has worked to ensure geography's visibility by serving on the boards of the American Council of Learned Societies, the Consortium of Social Science Associations, the National Humanities Alliance, the International Geographic Information Foundation, the NCGIA, the Renewable Natural Resources Foundation, and the University Consortium for Geographic Information Sciences, among others. He was a member of the IGU's Commission on Geography of Communications and Telecommunications (1984–1992), and he organized the IGU's Columbian Quincentenary meeting in Washington, D.C. (1992), for which he also coedited a critical overview of contemporary American geography. After serving as IGU vice president (1996–2000 and 2006–2008) and IGU secretary general (2000–2006), he was elected IGU president in 2008 for a 4-year term.

Among Abler's many awards and honors are Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (1985), Centenary Medal of the Royal Scottish Geographical Society (1990), Association of American Geographers Honors (1995), Victoria Medal of the Royal Geographical [Page 2]Society/Institute of British Geographers (1996), and the American Geographical Society's Samuel F. B. Morse Medal (2004) for encouragement of geographical research. The AAG also named its Distinguished Service Honors Award in honor of Abler's service to the profession.