Chair of Environment and Economics
Chair ofEnvironment and Economics
Environmental issues such as climate change and resource scarcity are gaining increasing importance in society, political decisions and for business. A forward-looking understanding of future requirements for a sustainable economy offers opportunities for innovation and the ability of market leadership in the environmental sector.
The ESCP Chair of Environment and Economics - founded in the summer of 2011 - picks up these topics in innovative ways. Current environmental problems are discussed jointly with their economic analysis and behavioural foundations of economic decisions.
In research, the chair focusses on Agent-Based-Modelling and Behavioural Economic approaches in Ecological Economics. Simulation models are used to understand why decisions often lead to an unsustainable behaviour and to analyse how politics could change that. A further area of interest is the Circular Economy.
The chair holder Prof. Dr. Sylvie Geisendorf is Scientific Director of the Research Center SustBusy: Business and Society - Towards a Sustainable World and European Academic Director of the Master in International Sustainability Management.
- Prof. Dr. Sylvie Geisendorf
The team
Teaching
We offer the following courses:
Bachelor in
Management(BSc)
- Human Behaviour: Theories and Applications
Prof. Dr. Robert Wilken / Prof. Dr. Sylvie Geisendorf
MSc in
International Sustainability Management
- Environmental and Resource Economics
- Ecosystems Theory
- Elective: Agent-Based Modelling with NETLOGO
Research
Research approach
Agent-Based-Modelling on the basis of Behavioural and Evolutionary Economics with application in Ecological Economics
Topics
- Climate-economic models on a behavioural basis
- Behavioural aspects of environmental problems
- Resource scarcity
- Sustainable development
- Circular economy
Methods
- Agent-based modelling
- Evolutionary economics
- Behavioural economics
- Complexity theory
- Genetic algorithms
Research topics
Climate-Economic Multi-Agent Modelling
Several papers on an update and further development of a multi-agent model on climate change, the “battle of perspectives” investigate the effect of bounded rationality and learning on climate policy.
Multi-Agent Analysis of Sustainability Policy
A recent project models the link between an evolving, innovating economy, based on a Nelson-Winter approach with a renewable natural resource. Both systems are modelled considering more complexity than traditional environmental or resource economic models do. The model is used to analyse if and how a sustainable path can be reached in this coupled system.
Circular Economy
The 3 year EU funded Horizon 2020 project “R2 π: Transition from Linear to Circular: Policy and Innovation” conducts case studies and develops teaching material on the Circular Economy. A recent publication, “The circular economy and circular economic concepts–a literature analysis and redefinition”, provides key insights on the circular economy and redefines the concept in light of the other similar concepts such as cradle-to-cradle or the blue economy.
Current project applications
- Horizon 2020 call: H2020-SwafS-2016-17 (Science with and for Society) “iOPENER”
- Horizon 2020 call: H2020-MG-2016-2017, RIA, MG-7-2-2017 „Pipe§Net“
Research center
SUST BUSY: Business and Society - Towards a Sustainable World
Scientific Director: Prof. Dr. Sylvie Geisendorf, ESCP Berlin
The research center “Business and Society – Towards a Sustainable World” (SustBusy), whose office is located at the Department of Environment and Economics in Berlin provides a common roof for these related activities. The individual and group-related research projects cover a wide area of research issues. Company-specific issues, development of a sustainability culture, implementation of a sustainability strategy or sustainable supply chains are covered as well as CSR reporting, socially responsible investment, social issues of an anti-consumption lifestyle and a behavioural economics based analysis of environmental policy. The special feature of the research center is the broadly-based position of its members and its high potential for synergies. There are two main links between our approaches where individual projects might benefit from each other. First there are several projects on the company and reporting level which could exchange information on a sustainability culture or strategy as well as CSR reporting. Second, the projects on company, consumer and financial market level would benefit from a link to the political/regulation side as well as this research could profit from empirical results on the behaviour of the respective agents.
Publications
Find an overview
Academic Articles
2022
Integrated sustainability policy assessment – an agent‑based ecological‑economic model
JOURNAL OF EVOLUTIONARY ECONOMICS
Academic Articles
2022
Valuing ecosystem services of sustainable urban drainage systems: A discrete choice experiment to elicit preferences and willingness to pay
JOURNAL OF ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT, 307
Academic Articles
2022
Why change does (not) happen: Understanding and overcoming status quo biases in climate change mitigation
ZEITSCHRIFT FUR UMWELTPOLITIK UND UMWELTRECHT, 2022(1), 100-134
Academic Articles
2021
The Potential of Stormwater Management in Addressing the Urban Heat Island Effect: An Economic Valuation
SUSTAINABILITY, 13, 8685, 19
Academic Articles
2019
Are Neighborhood-level SUDS Worth it? An Assessment of the Economic Value of Sustainable Urban Drainage System Scenarios Using Cost-Benefit Analyses
ECOLOGICAL ECONOMICS, 158, 194-205
Academic Articles
2019
Using Consumer Empowerment to Increase the Effectiveness of Price Discounts
MARKETING ZFP - JOURNAL OF RESEARCH AND MANAGEMENT, 41(2), 48-63
Academic Articles
2019
The Effectiveness of Promotional Cues for Organic Products in the German Retail Market
SUSTAINABILITY, 11, 6986, 15
Academic Articles
2018
Evolutionary Climate-Change Modelling. A Multi-Agent Climate-Economic Model
COMPUTATIONAL ECONOMICS, 52: 3, 921-951
Academic Articles
2018
The circular economy and circular economic concepts - a literature analysis and redefinition
THUNDERBIRD INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS REVIEW, 60: 5, 771-782
Academic Articles
2017
The Effect of Green Investments in an Agent-Based Climate-Economic Model
ENVIRONMENTAL MODELING & ASSESSMENT, Vol. 22, Issue 4, pp 323–343
Team and contact
Prof. Dr. Sylvie Geisendorf
Master in International Sustainability Management
