Research Areas
The working world is undergoing fundamental change, which is being driven to a large extent by the use of new technologies and has far-reaching consequences. As a result, all fields of employment are changing, as are established structures, models and processes in various labor markets. At the same time, this change is also having an impact on education and training systems and changing the qualification requirements of employees. Sustainability as a driving force as well as a fulfillment criterion for this development has hardly been examined to date. In a digitalized working environment in particular, sustainability plays an important role both in an ecological and economic sense as well as in social terms. This is precisely where the research focus "Work, Digitalization and Sustainability" comes in, making a central contribution to the cross-cutting topic of digital transformation at the University of Hohenheim. It bundles the interdisciplinary cooperation between the departments of the Institute of Education, Work and Society (560). The cooperation is to be continuously expanded with internal and external partners. Synergies in terms of content should profitably complement the research focus.
Objectives are as follows:
- the thematic establishment and interdisciplinary research of sustainability in the digitalized working world
the establishment and expansion of (inter)national research collaborations
- the (inter)national networking of young researchers.
The interplay of disciplines at the University of Hohenheim to research sustainability in a digitalized working world is in this combination unique.
Head: Prof. Dr. Caroline Ruiner
Contact: caroline.ruiner@uni-hohenheim.de
Being one of the most relevant topics in the public discourse and current economic research, the causes and consequences of inequality call for a detailed analysis. The research area aims at developing new theoretical models and using state-of-the-art empirical methods to answer questions such as: Which are the mechanisms that drive economic inequality? What are the consequences of inequality for long-run economic growth and well-being? Which policies can efficiently tackle inequality and address its negative consequences, while not being detrimental to economic growth? The research area INEPA considers these questions from an inter-disciplinary perspective and integrates experts in areas such as economic growth theory, demography, health economics, economic history, innovation economics, international economics, labour economics, public economics, and econometrics.
Head: Prof. Dr. Nadja Dwenger; Prof. Dr. Michael Evers
Contact: inepa@uni-hohenheim.de
The research area “transformation of communication and its role in integration and disintegration of individuals and society” combines current research interests of the six departments at the Institute of Communication. The focus is on intended and unintended results of the digital transformation of media and public communication. This transformation yields functional and dysfunctional phenomena both supporting and endangering our constitutional democracy. Examples include:
- the integration of individuals and societies (e.g. through agenda-setting, political knowledge) or their disintegration (e.g. through targeting, personalization, filter bubbles),
- the facilitation of consensus (e.g. through the public exchange of actors) or dissent (e.g. through polarization and radicalization) in society,
- legitimation and strengthening of established political structures (e.g. by fact-based discussions) or their weakening (e.g. through media scepticism, post-truth-society).
In the intermediate-term, the research area plans to establish third-party funding.
Head: Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Schweiger
Contact: tkid@uni-hohenheim.de
NegoTrans aims to investigate negotiations as business activities. It integrates different research groups which follow an interdisciplinary agenda. The research area will focus on how negotiation processes and outcomes are changed by information technology, digital media, and costs. To this end e.g. negotiation processes in software engineering will be analyzed comparing different media such as text-based communication, video chat, and many more. Besides its research goals, NegoTrans aims to create a large network of national and international researchers and practitioners to enable continuous discourse on this topic and provide structured support for young researchers in this area.
Head: Prof. Dr. Mareike Schoop
Contact: negotrans@uni-hohenheim.de
The research area “Innovation, Entrepreneurship and Finance (INEF)” establishes research collaborations and research projects that deal with questions at the interface of innovation, entrepreneurship and finance. The goal of the research area is to understand the complex interrelationships between innovation policy, education, capital market regulation and venture capital, and how these affect entrepreneurial activities and industry creation processes. The international research partnerships that are part of the network, are funded by the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) as the “Thematic Network Innovation, Entrepreneurship and Finance (INEF)”. The network unites five renowned universities in Belgium, France, Italy, the United States and China under the lead management of the Faculty of Business, Economics and Social Sciences of the University of Hohenheim.
Head: Prof. Dr. Bernd Ebersberger
Contact: inef@uni-hohenheim.de
