Bachelor’s Thesis

Bachelor’s degree students interested in our research groups are invited to write their bachelor’s thesis on a current topic in the field of ecological economics. For an overview of the Institute’s research groups, please click here.

Requirements

There are three requirements for writing a bachelor’s thesis at the Institute for Ecological Economics:

• First, successful completion of the course “Grundlagen wissenschaftlichen Arbeitens” (GWA, Academic Research Techniques).

• Second, successful completion of at least one of the two ZuWi (Future-Oriented Business) courses and one of the two courses from the elective module “Umwelt und Wirtschaft” (Environmental Economics).

• Third, the topic of the bachelor’s thesis has to relate to one of the Institute’s current research groups.

Research Proposal

If a student fulfills all of the three requirements mentioned above, he or she may submit a research proposal to the Institute’s bachelor’s theses coordinator, Simon Sturn. The proposal should be 3-5 pages long and cover the following elements:

• Working title

• Theoretical framework

• Research question

• Research design

• Suggested paper outline

• Bibliography

The research proposal has to be submitted via email to Simon Sturn. Once the research proposal is accepted by the coordinator, the student will be allocated to a supervisor. Acceptance and allocation also depend on the free capacities of the available supervisors.

Bachelor’s theses may be written in English or German.

General information on writing bachelor’s theses at WU can be found here.

For further information about bachelor programs at WU, please visit the WU bachelor’s programs info page.

Current bachelor’s degree courses

Suggested Subjects

Prof. Dr. Sigrid Stagl, MS.   

• food & sustainability (environmental and social impacts of food, international trade, innovative food initiatives, etc.)   

• Energy & sustainability (renewable energy, climate change, etc.)   

• Work in a sustainable economy   

• Sustainable behaviours, incl. pioneers of change, tipping points

Irene Monasterolo, Ph.D.

• Climate change impact on the growth-finance-inequality nexus

• Indicators of financial portfolios’ exposure to carbon stranded assets

• Alignment of investments’ flows to the 1.5 degrees target and the Sustainable Development Goals

• Stock-Flow Consistent macroecological models

• Climate stress test of the financial system and macro-financial networks

• Climate change adaptation through the food-water-energy nexus

Liesbeth de Schutter, Dipl.-Ing.

• How do we see the farm? (WS 2016, international research cooperation with NL and HU)

• Policies affecting food consumption in western societies

• Participative management of common pool resources

• Social networks in agricultureEnvironmental inequality

Simon Sturn, MSc.

• Effects of environmental policy on pollution, health, growth, and/or employment

• Determinants of consumerism 

• Effects of working time reductionson employment, well-being, and/or the environment 

• Effects of labor market policies or institutions (e.g. minimum wages, unions) on unemployment, wages, incomes, and/or inequality  Determinants of differentials in earnings and labor market participation by gender 

• Effects of rising income inequality on well-being of societies

• Effects of financial development or liberalization on growth, output volatility, crisis and/or employment

You can find more information about the issues here.