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Sustainability Governance - Team

Chair

MichaelPregernig-TeambildProf. Dr. Michael Pregernig

Professor für Sustainability Governance

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Michael's research is at the nexus of sustainability, science and society. Educated and socialized in multidisciplinary settings, he draws and strives to integrate approaches from Sustainability Science and Science and Technology Studies (STS). His current research, inter alia, focuses on the role of science and expertise in sustainability governance and on causes, manifestation, and resolution of environmental conflicts.

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Administration

Clarissa StranskyClarissa Stransky

Team coordinator, administrator

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Seirra Römmermann

MEG study program coordinator

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Scientific staff

BletaArifi-TeamBild

Dr. Bleta Arifi

Research Associate

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Bleta is an environmental social scientist with a background in philology and environmental governance. Her research is on energy politics, focusing on the intersection of socio-environmental conflicts, resistance movements, and knowledge politics in the governance of energy infrastructure projects. Her research builds on Governmentality and Poststructural Policy Studies. In her current research project (ReSET), she studies how renewable energy transitions can be rendered more equitable.

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CristinaEspinosa-TeambildCristina Espinosa, PhD

Assistant Professor

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Cristina has an interdisciplinary training in the Environmental Social Sciences. Her current research focuses on counter-knowledge practices challenging the social and political structures underpinned by science, technology and expertise that enhance the expansion of extractive industries and thus produce environmental injustices. At the intersection of Political Ecology, Feminist Science and Technology Studies and Decolonial Thinking, she deploys critical interpretivist perspectives. She is interested in environmental and sustainability governance discourses, the political representation of non-human nature, and transnational activism.

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Robert John IIRobert John

Research Associate

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Robert John’s main research interests revolve around the political economy and ecology of natural resource markets and their societal contestation. He has been analysing the establishment of sand markets and the conflicts evolving around them since 2016.

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PhilippSpath-TeambildProf. Dr. Philipp Späth

Assoc. Professor, Head of research group on Urban Sustainability Governance

ycoeyKe9i.png+49 761 203 3725,

Philipp combines his backgrounds in the Political Sciences, Human Geography and Science and Technology Studies (STS) to explore how unsustainability and injustices can be addressed more effectively. His current research, inter alia, focuses on governance approaches for sustainable and just cities (UrbanA project) and on ways in which contemporary energy transitions can be 're-coded' in order to allow for greater social equity (ReSET project).

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Dr. Nina KulawikDr. Nina Kulawik

Research Associate

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Nina holds a doctorate in human geography. Her task is to network and coordinate sustainability-oriented research in the university's key research area 'Pathways to Sustainability'. The position is funded by the Eva Mayr Stihl Foundation until June 2024.
Her research interests are in the field of sustainable regional development and renewable energies.

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Moritz LauserMoritz Lauser

Research Associate

ycoeyKe9i.png+49 761 203 96853, , Room 2020b

Moritz studied physics (B.Sc.) and (human) geography (M.Sc.) at the University of Freiburg. This unusual combination results from his strong interest in natural processes as such, as well as in the complex interactions between nature(s) and society(ies). In his master's thesis, he used qualitative social science methods to investigate the concept of 'NaturenKulturen' (see Gesing et al. 2019) using the example of bees and people in the city (Freiburg). He is now focusing his doctoral research on processes of knowledge generation and translation. To this end, he will investigate integration practices and translation processes at various interfaces between policy, management and science in the context of the biodiversity of multifunctional forests using a Science and Technology Studies (STS) approach.

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Doctoral candidates

DesireeSchwindenhammer-TeamBildDésirée Schwindenhammer

Doctoral Candidate

Désirée has a background in Sociology, Social Psychology, and Environmental Governance, with a methodological focus on qualitative interviews and content analyses. In her doctoral project, she aims to investigate institutions and power dynamics in the context of coastal governance, focusing on marine protected areas in Tanzania. This ensues her previous research, which involved an institutional analysis of marine biodiversity data sharing practices in Kenya and Tanzania, with reference to the concept of knowledge commons. In her current project, she would like to increasingly engage with social and environmental justice concepts.

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SimonFuncke-TeambildSimon Funcke

Doctoral Candidate

Simon is an external PhD candidate at University of Freiburg and he currently works at Forschungszentrum Jülich (funding agency PtJ). His background in environmental sciences and management of renewable energies contribute to his work and research on, inter alia, renewable energies, digitalisation and decentralisation of the energy system, and social-ecological economy.

Profile on ResearchGate

 

 

 

 

 


ManuelJohn-TeamBild Manuel John

Doctoral Candidate

ycoeyKe9i.png+49 761 203 67941,

Manuel is a sociologist by training, more recently specializing in Science & Technology Studies (STS). His methods of choice are qualitative interviews and interpretative and discourse analysis. In his work, he focuses on social aspects of nature conservation in forests, both in protected areas and in managed forests. He is particularly fascinated by the different ways in which nature is ‘known’, both by professionals in science, conservation and forestry, and by the general public.

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RonjaMikoleit-TeamBild

Ronja Mikoleit

Doctoral Candidate

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In her research, Ronja focuses on professional knowledge practices and how we socially generate, transmit and employ knowledge and expertise on the environment in different social worlds, such as forestry. With her background in Sociology, she likes to focus on the challenges and developments of qualitative methodologies, such as ethnography. Engaging with debates in the fields of practice theories and (feminist) science and technology studies, she developed a particular interest in the role of bodies, materialities and affects in social theory and (research) practice.

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MelaniePelaez-TeambildMelani Pelaez Jara

Doctoral Candidate

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Currently on parental leave

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chiara.jpgZabrina Welter

Doctoral Candidate

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Zabrina’s research focuses on the interlinkages between natural resource governance, conflict and peace, with special attention on Latin America. Her background is in Political Science with a focus on conflict resolution and peacebuilding and environmental governance studies. Her dissertation project deals with the political dynamics of resource control in post-conflict small-scale extractive resource governance, especially those emerging from the formalization of artisanal and small-scale mining in Colombia. Conceptually she works with approaches from Political Ecology, Environmental Peacebuilding as well as Peace and Conflict Studies.

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Romane JolyRomane Joly

Doctoral Candidate

Romane Joly is a junior researcher in food studies pursuing a bi-national PhD degree in human geography at the University of Freiburg (DE) and in sociology at the University Strasbourg (FR). Her research interest lies in city-region food system. She focuses on dairy food supply chains located in the hinterland of two regional cities in France and Germany. Using critical approaches such as urban political ecology and theories of space, she examines multi-scalar forces – such as agri-food policies, trade agreements etc. – and personal agencies that govern dairy food flows in peri-urban settings.

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Student assistants

  • Nadia Ali
  • Nicole Holstein
  • Sofie Hovmand
  • Anne Joost
  • Jakob Kramer
  • Sophia McRae
  • Jannis Niethammer
  • Kassia Rudd
  • Sophia Silverton

 

Former staff and PhD students

JuliaGorricho-TeambildDr. Julia Gorricho

Doctoral candidate (2012-2018)

Currently: Project Manager South America, WWF Germany

 

 

 

 

 

 


BenjaminHennchen-TeambildDr. Benjamin Hennchen

Doctoral candidate and researcher in the project KERNiG (2016-2020)

Currently: Research associate at the Center for Technology and Society (ZTG), TU Berlin

 

 

 

 

 

 


EmmanuelLoeffler-TeamBildEmmanuel Löffler

Research associate in the Projekt KNOWING (2017 - 2019)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


PaulOsei-TeamBildDr. Paul Osei-Tutu

Doctoral candidate (2011–2015)

Currently: Lecturer at Kwame Nkrumah University of Science & Technology (KNUST, Ghana)

 

 

 

 

 

 


LenaPartzsch-TeamBildProf. Dr. Lena Partzsch

Research associate and project leader (2014 – 2019)

Currently: Professor of Comparative Politics with a Focus on Environmental and Climate Policy at Freie Universität Berlin

 

 

 

 

 

 


Doerte_PetersDr. Dörte Marie Peters

Research associate (2015 – 2019)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


ConradKunze-TeamBildDr. Conrad Kunze

Research associate (2013 – 2015)

Currently: Research associate at Environmental Policy Research Centre, FU Berlin

 

 

 

 

 

 


Dr. Chelsea Tschoerner-Budde

Doctoral candidate (2012–2015)

Currently: Officer for mobility, logistics and inland navigation at the Ministry of Economics, Energy, Transport, and Housing in Hessen


Dr. Sabine Reinecke

Doctoral candidate and research associate (2011–2015)

Currently: Research associate at the Chair Group of Silviculture at University of Freiburg

 

 

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