Member
Contact by mail
Short Bio
Christian Kerschner started his academic formation with an MA in Business and Economics at the University of Vienna. He read two of this four-year course in England: first at the University of Reading and then at Westminster University. In his master thesis he analysed the strengths and weaknesses of the steady-state economy (SSE) as a policy option for sustainability. In 2006 he received a Masters degree in Ecological Economics at the Institute for Environmental Sciences and Technology (ICTA) of the Autonomous University of Barcelona (UAB), after having spent 7 months at the University of Leeds as a Marie Curie Fellow. In 2012 he completed his PhD in Ecological Economics also at ICTA, followed by two short time project engagements: one at the IRI-THESys of Humboldt University in Berlin and another at the University of Vienna. Recently Christian joined the Environmental Department of Masaryk University in the Czech Republic and teaches as a guest lecturer at the Vienna University of Business and Economics (WU).
Christian’s research covers four main topic areas: Firstly he offers a general energy-systematic conceptualization of the phenomenon of Peak Oil within its quality and quantity dimensions, followed by an extensive impact and vulnerability analysis using an Input-Output methodology. This part of Christian’s work includes his latest article, where he and his colleagues provide a Peak-Oil vulnerability map of the US economy. Thirdly he and his colleague Melf-Hinrich Ehlers, developed a framework for analysing attitudes towards technology, which they supported and improved with the results of an online survey among sustainability researchers. Finally Christian is an active member and researcher in the Degrowth community and authored a widely cited article arguing for the complementarity of the Steady-State Economy with the Degrowth paradigm (Kerschner 2010).
Research Interests: Peak-Oil, Vulnerability, Input-Output Analysis, Steady-State / de-growth economy, ecological economics theory, attitudes towards technology
Selected Publications:
Kerschner, C., Prell, C., Feng, K., Hubacek, K., 2013. Economic vulnerability to Peak Oil. Glob. Environ. Change 23, 1424–1433. doi:10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2013.08.015
Kallis, G., C. Kerschner, et al. (2012). “The economics of degrowth.” Ecological Economics 84(0): 172-180.- download pdf –
Ehlers, M.-H. and C. Kerschner (2010). A framework of attitudes towards technology in sustainability studies, applied to teachers of ecological economics. ISEE Conference 2010: Advancing Sustainability in a Time of Crisis, Oldenburg – Bremen, www.isee2010.org.- download pdf –
Kerschner, C. and I. Arto-Oliazola (2011). “El zenit de l’economia mundial.” La Directa, Quaderns d’Illacrua Directa 214 (Quaderns 47): 1-4.- download pdf –
Kerschner, C. (2010). “Economic de-growth vs. steady-state economy.” Journal of Cleaner Production 18(6): 544-551.- download pdf –
Kerschner, C. and K. Hubacek (2009). “Assessing the suitability of input-output analysis for enhancing our understanding of potential economic effects of Peak Oil.” Energy 34(3): 284-290.- download pdf –