Pastor is a professor of Sociology and American Studies & Ethnicity at the University of Southern California, where he directs the Program for Environmental and Regional Equity (PERE) and the Center for the Study of Immigrant Integration (CSII). Pastor has co-authored many books, including his latest volume with Chris Benner, Equity, Growth, and Community: What the Nation Can Learn from America’s Metro Areas (UC Press 2015). Pastor is the inaugural holder of the Turpanjian Chair in Civil Society and Social Change at USC and was awarded the Wally Marks Changemaker of the Year in 2012 from the Liberty Hill Foundation in recognition of his many research partnerships with social justice organizations.