Dear colleagues,
This week I learned that we have won a PhD training grand from the European Commission to train 12 PhD students in:
Adaptation to a New Economic Reality (AdaptEcon) - with focus on biophysical economics - linking resources to the world economic system - and building on the WORLD systems
model that Harald has been building with colleagues. If you know anyone with a completed master´s degrees (and it can be one of you!) and are interested in these issues, get in touch. The grant agreement is now signed yet, but we anticipate a contract in house by August and starting in the autumn (fall).
I will send out an official advert in a month or so, but this is to let people know about a new opportunity. We need be best students on board that are willing to
think about of the box, learn systems analysis and systems dynamics, learn alternative economics along with conventional economics. All backgrounds will be considered
once we look through the applicants. Below is an abstract:
The
present economic model of permanent growth is unstable and leads to cycles of
growth, peaks and crashes. We propose to
contribute to developing new economic thinking based on knowledge of global
resource availability. The Adaptation to a New Economic Reality (AdaptEconII) project is divided into
three parts: 1. Sustainable resource
management; 2. Integrated economic systems assessment; and 3. Integrating
society and economics. These components
will be combined to form an overarching economic model built on
socio-environmental-technical (SET) system analysis of causal links and
feedback structures and system dynamics.
A simple prototype of such a model (WORLD) has already been built by the
applicants and tested on historical data.
Twelve Early Stage Researchers (ESRs) will be trained to obtain European
Joint Doctorates at three universities: University of Iceland (Reykjavik,
Iceland), Stockholm University (Sweden) and Universite Blaise Pascal,
Clermont-Ferrand (France). The ESRs will have secondments in research
institutes/NGOs/SMEs in Germany (GWS and Wuppertal Institute), UK (New
Economics Foundation and Schumacher Institute) and Sweden (Swedish National
Defense College). All of the ESRs will
have a career plan and be trained in system analysis and system dynamics in
addition to conventional and biophysical economic paradigms. They will be presented
with aspects of resource availability, links between resources and wealth, the
rise of new and/or rediscovered values and realization of our interdependent
world, new development paradigms, political and industrial ecology, as well as
science for sustainable society and transferable skills. AdaptEconII
will train ESRs in new economic thinking and the goal is for them be at the
forefront of innovative economic thinking in the EU and the world.
If you or your students send me an email, please put AdaptEcon into the subject line of the email.
With my best wishes,
Vala
Kristín Vala Ragnarsdóttir
Professor of Sustainability Science
Institutes of Earth Sciences and Sustainable Development Studies
University of Iceland
Askja
Reykjavik 101
Iceland
va...@hi.is+354 525 5886 (office)