Nominees for ESEE President and Vice-Presidents 2022-2024
ESEE President:
- Dan O’Neill
Candidates for 2 ESEE Vice-Presidents
- Alexandra Köves
- Claudio Cattaneo
Dan O’Neill
I am an Associate Professor in Ecological Economics at the University of Leeds. My research focuses on the relationships between resource use and human well-being, and the changes that would be needed to achieve a successful post-growth economy. An example of the former is my research on achieving a good life for all people within planetary boundaries (published in Nature Sustainability), while an example of the latter is my book Enough Is Enough: Building a Sustainable Economy in a World of Finite Resources (co-authored with Rob Dietz). I am also a very active teacher, and in 2015 I created an MSc Ecological Economics degree at the University of Leeds — one of only a handful of ecological economics programmes in the world. My lectures in ecological economics are freely available on my YouTube channel. For more information on my work, please visit my website.
Motivation to serve as ESEE President
I have been a member of the ecological economics community for almost 20 years, and an elected member of the ESEE Board since 2015 (when I also co-organised the Leeds ESEE conference). While there have been some very exciting developments in ecological economics research in recent years, and growing interest from students, the future of ecological economics itself feels a bit uncertain. I would like to work with the new Board to increase the membership of ESEE, and establish stronger connections between ecological economists and other communities. I would also like to build on recent successes, such as the Economics for Rebels podcast created by Szandra Köves, to develop new resources to enable our message to reach a larger audience, and encourage greater scholar activism to help drive change towards a more sustainable society.
Alexandra Köves
I am an associate professor at the Corvinus University of Budapest in Hungary. My research focuses on the different aspects of transition into a Degrowth economy (sustainable business, sustainable employment, sustainable cosmo-local production, sustainable sports, sustainable consumption) using policy-oriented participatory – mainly foresight – research methods. I have been involved in the development and the launch of several ecological economics related courses with novel approaches such as the Ecological Economics debate course; the Limits to Growth course simulating citizens’ juries on Degrowth or the Sustainable Future of Sports using backcasting as the foundational method of the course. I have a popular podcast series in Hungarian called Green Equality with now over 90 episodes covering different ecological economics topics. I am an active member of both the Ecological Economics and the Degrowth research community. I was heavily involved in organising the 5th International Degrowth Conference and the ESEE 2017 Budapest Conference. I have been a Board member to ESEE and a member of the Degrowth Support Group since the beginning of 2019.
For more information please visit https://www.uni-corvinus.hu/download/cv/koves-alexandra?language=en
Motivation to serve as ESEE Vice President
I have been a member to ESEE for a decade now and have been an elected member of the Board for the last three years. While ESEE is undoubtedly a key player in the ecological economics research community, it lacks the momentum to make ecological economics visible and attractive to a wider audience. In May 2021 I was playing a central role in launching the podcast series of ESEE called Economics for Rebels. I believe that with such initiatives it is possible to improve the outreach of the organization not just to more researchers but also to policymakers and to the public. I would like to work with the Board and Dan O’Neill on making ecological economics heard as I believe that the messages of EE need to take a deeper root in society.
Claudio Cattaneo
I am a precarious professor of Ecological Economics at Universitat Autonoma of Barcelona and one of the founding members of the Research and Degrowth association. I am currently working at the implementation of the Donut Economy in the municipality of Barcelona and director of the ICTA-UAB masters in Political Ecology Degrowth and Environmental Justice and the online masters in Degrowth: Ecology Economics and Policy.
My research orientation spans from the development of the degrowth research agenda, to the study of alternative economic practices and the application of social metabolism to environmental history.
I have been a member of the ESEE community since the conference held in Cambridge in 2001.
Motivation
I am standing as vice-president of ESSE because I believe Ecological Economics can maintain a very close alliance with degrowth and post-growth, engaging with a young generation of students and researchers. Moreover, I think the society can benefit a lot if it can integrate the practical vision and approach of the Donut Economy and develop an explicit research and training agenda in this direction.