(Sociology, November 2000)
Thesis Title: Five Smooth Stones: Strategic Capacity in the Unionization of California Agriculture
Committee: Theda Skocpol (Chair), Kenneth T. Andrews, J. Richard Hackman, Mark H. Moore
Initial Placement: Assistant Professor, Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University
Current Position: Rita E. Hauser Senior Lecturer in Leadership, Organization, and Civil Society, Harvard Kennedy School

Marshall Ganz grew up in Bakersfield, California, where his father was a Rabbi and his mother, a teacher. He entered Harvard College in the fall of 1960. He left a year before graduating to volunteer with the 1964 Mississippi Summer Project. He found a “calling” as an organizer for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, and, in the fall of 1965, joined Cesar Chavez in his effort to unionize California farm workers. During 16 years with the United Farm Workers he gained experience in union, political, and community organizing, became Director of Organizing, and was elected to the national executive board on which he served for 8 years. During the 1980s, he worked with grassroots groups to develop new organizing programs and designed innovative voter mobilization strategies for local, state, and national electoral campaigns. In 1991, in order to deepen his intellectual understanding of his work, he returned to Harvard College and, after a 28-year "leave of absence," completed his undergraduate degree in history and government. He was awarded an MPA by the Kennedy School in 1993 and completed his PhD in sociology in 2000.