I am Senior Lecturer (Associate Professor) in Environmental Politics at the Political Science Department and the strategic research area Biodiversity and Ecosystems in a Changing Climate where I am principal investigator and deputy theme leader of the biodiversity theme.
I want to understand how environmental policies can help societies transition towards a sustainable land use. In particular I am insterested in how different institutions mediate the relation between humans and the natural environment - be those cultural, markets, or state regulation. In my view we need to understand both the functioning of ecosystems as well as the societal processes when analyzing the role and functioning of these mediating institutions. Forest provide a particularly interesting case to study these, given their multifunctionality and the multitude of interests in them.
As a Post-Doc at the Center for Environmental and Climate Research (CEC), Lund University, I worked on insurance values of soil biodiversity.
For my doctoral thesis at the Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research – UFZ, I conducted econometric analyses to infer effects of ecological fiscal transfers on protected area development in Brazil and Portugal. From these empirical studies I have developed policy advice, e.g. for an ecological public finance design of EU and global funds. I hold a Master in Sustainability Economics (Carl von Ossietzky University Oldenburg) and a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science (Uni Bremen).
Also see my publications.