René Kusdian

PhD Student

Research interests/regions

  • Environmental and Disaster Risks in regard  to human security, vulnerability and resilience
  • Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) and Climate Change Adaptation (CCA)
  • Risk Management Systems
  • (International) Risk Governance, including multi-lateral frameworks, UN- and affiliated organizations and structures
  • Risk-related Policy- and Decision-making, stakeholder engagement
  • Political Ecology / Ecosystem Services

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René Kusdian

Office hours: only by arrangement


PhD Project

PhD-Thesis: "Approaches towards a more resilient Environmental and Disaster-related Risk Management"

Disasters and its associated risks are prevalent in all human societies and changing their characterisitics even more dramatically in the light of current climate and global changes. For coping successfully with these risks a well functioning Disaster Risk Management System (DRM) addressing the risks contineously and comprehensively is imperative. This needs the involvment of multiple actors and stakeholders, which are in the focus of my empirical research.

My dissertation aims to investigate the implementation of DRM into practice, highlighting current challenges and deriving potential approaches to improve DRM and make it more resilient towards disruptions and malfunctioning.  Hereby my empirical research makes use of online stakeholder survey, expert interviews and literature with examples from different countries (Germany, Switzerland and UK). To ensure a holistic view multi-dimensions of hazards and governance levels are considered. Finally multiple perspectives on DRM should indicate possibilties for adaptation to make DRM better and safer for future developments.

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