Buttel was "born on a dairy farm [in northwestern Illinois] to Heye R. and Marian (Highbarger) Buttel".[1] His father was a farmer, his mother a school teacher.[2]
Buttel earned his B.S. (1970) and M.S. in Sociology (1972) degrees at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, his master's degree in forestry and environmental studies at Yale University and his Ph.D. in sociology at the University of Wisconsin.[2] Prior to returning as a faculty member to Wisconsin, he served as a member of the faculty at Michigan State University and Cornell University. At the latter, he directed the Biology and Society Program.
Buttel was editor of the journal, Research in Rural Sociology and Development,[3] and co-editor of Society & Natural Resources. Buttel was a scholar in rural sociology whose research focused on four major areas of study: the sociology of agriculture, environmental sociology, technological change in agriculture, and national and global activism relating to environmental and agricultural policies.[4][5][6]
After his death, the Research Committee on Environment and Society (RC24) of the International Sociological Association established in his honor the Frederick H. Buttel International Award for Distinguished Scholarship in Environmental Sociology.[7][8]
Recognizing his contributions to the field, the Section on Environment and Technology of the American Sociological Association also renamed its Distinguished Contributions Award for him.
The endowed chair he held at the University of Wisconsin was renamed the Buttel-Sewell Professorship.[9]
^"From the editor". Agriculture and Human Values. 22 (3): 265. 2005. doi:10.1007/s10460-005-6039-z. S2CID207078770.. Includes "Remembering Fred Buttel" by Lawrence Busch, Richard Haynes, Jack R. Kloppenberg Jr, Daniel Lee Kleinman, and Laura B. DeLind.
^(Summer 2005). "Fred Buttel Remembrance" (PDF; requires Adobe Acrobat). Environment, Technology, and Society: Newsletter of the Section on Environment and Technology of the American Sociological Association. p.1.