Selected Service Learning projects & master’s theses
Please find below a list of selected SEEP Service Learning projects and master theses. Also, you can read more about WU's TALENTA award, which was won by SEEP students in 2022 and 2023!
Service Learning projects
Inclusive education - in cooperation with "Ich bin aktiv"
Eco City Vienna - in cooperation with "Schöpfwerk"
Circular Economy - in cooperation with "Rusz"
Activist network - in cooperation with "System Change not Climate Change"
Housing & Degrowth - in cooperation with "Degrowth Conference", "SchloR", "habiTAT"
TALENTA award
For many years, WU has been awarding the Talenta prize to the authors of the most outstanding academic theses of the year. The award winners receive a certificate and a cash prize provided by the City of Vienna. Each year, a jury selects the three top bachelor’s and master’s theses from all nominations.
We are very proud that in 2022 and 2023 respectively we had a SEEP student’s theses being awarded - in the following section, you can read a blurb from our laureates, Sophia and Carl!
Carl Frederick Luthin, SEEP Cohort 8
EU Investment Protection Policy: Removing Barriers to Climate Policy under the European Green Deal?
The European Union and its Member States have acknowledged that international investment protection agreements (IIAs), such as the Energy Charter Treaty (ECT), hinder their decarbonisation efforts under the European Green Deal (EGD). Investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) provisions in IIAs allow foreign investors to obstruct, weaken or delay policies of their host states that compromise the value of their investments.
This also applies to climate policies aiming to phase out fossil fuels. Hence, ISDS claims by foreign fossil fuel investors may critically weaken climate action. The European Commission and Germany, France, Spain, the Netherlands and Poland have understood this threat and drawn the conclusion to exit the ECT.
However, several hundreds of IIAs between the EU Members States and non-EU countries still pose a risk to climate action around the globe. Most actors in EU investment policy appear to be unaware of this risk, whereas reform options for the Member States’ bilateral investment treaties (BITs) are available.
In my Master thesis, I explored how actors in EU institutions assess the interaction between investment protection and climate policy and how they intend to further develop the EU’s investment protection policy. Based on a literature review, qualitative interviews and policy documents, I compared the policymakers’ assessments and positions to evaluations and reform options discussed in the academic literature.
Master's theses
SEEP theses are generally supervised by persons currently teaching in the SEEP program, but they can also be written under the supervision of other WU professors with a Habilitation. Note that this list of selected theses changes over time as who currently teaches in SEEP fluctuates from semester to semester. Several recent SEEP staff additions who are currently supervising theses do not yet appear as supervisors on this list, for example, and many more SEEP theses have been supervised by persons not listed here.
| Title | Author | Supervisor(s) |
| Social movements and the struggle for environmental justice a case study of coal extraction and conservation in South Africa | Rushby, Conor | Asara, Vivian; Spash, Clive |
| Tourism and conservation: synergies and incompatibilities for sustainable development multi-level potentials and limitations in the case of CapeNature, South Africa | Prantl, Nina Marianne | Bärnthaler, Richard |
| Making radical change affordable a social practice perspective on universal basic services & universal basic income for a degrowth transformation | Pfau, Sven-David | Bärnthaler, Richard; Novy, Andreas |
| Social-ecological infrastructural configurations as satisfiers for human needs a case study of the foundational economy in Vienna-Innerfavoriten | Dersch, Pedram | Bärnthaler, Richard; Novy, Andreas |
| Does volunteering build trust? Geographic variation in social capital in Italian regions | Fulterer, Ruth | Essletzbichler, Jürgen |
| Environmental inequality and neighborhood socioeconomic change in Chicago from 1990-2010 | Rosemeyer, Taylor Leigh | Essletzbichler, Jürgen |
| Free rooms self-governed, non-commercial, open facilities as a way of realising the right to the city an empirical analysis of the situation in Vienna | Steinberger, Andreas | Essletzbichler, Jürgen |
| How deindustrialization and RTW policies account for changes in the US income distribution a social-spatial-institutional kernel-density decomposition study on the US between 1940 and 2000 | Lichtenberger, Andreas | Essletzbichler, Jürgen |
| Covid-19 community response in the Alemao Favela, Rio de Janeiro | Maia Cardozo Chaves, Bruno | Essletzbichler, Jürgen |
| If you're the principal, who's the agent? a qualitative study on the relationships between stakeholders in U.S. study abroad programs | Heatherman, Christopher | Haas, Barbara |
| The CSR-incentives of MNCs and their perception by employees a case study of Unilever Austria GmbH | Horváth, Júlia | Haas, Barbara |
| Labour flexibility in the Netherlands temporary employment from the worker's perspective | Claringbould, Duco | Haas, Barbara |
| Made in Vietnam the work-life balance of female migrant apparel workers in industrial zone settings within the border theory framework | Lai, Ho Nhat Hoa | Haas, Barbara |
| Gender differences in paid and unpaid work a study based on 2012/13 GGS-Data relating the gendered division of unpaid work to paid working time in Austria | Schredl, Claudia | Haas, Barbara |
| Environmental education programs and educational learning theories a qualitative case study of the 'Umweltbildung' project in Bozen: enquiring the perspective of schoolteachers | Wasserman, Riccardo | Haas, Barbara |
| Green jobs' implications on the employment rate | Kaduku, Emi | Haas, Barbara |
| Microtask crowdworkers' quality of work the impact of digitalisation and the role of alienation analysed from the workers' perspective | Schwärzler, Elisa | Haas, Barbara |
| Local advocacy networks chances and challenges in enhancing a socio-ecological transformation | Bürger, Johanna Marie Charlotte | Haas, Barbara |
| Labor market integration of refugee women a Bourdieusian analysis of the challenges | Eberharter, Anja Silveria | Haas, Barbara |
| Walking the talk chances and risks of operationalizing the corporate purpose through a bottom-up approach = Walking the talk : Chancen und Risiken einer Operationalisierung des Unternehmenszwecks durch einen Bottom-up-Ansatz | Barnert López-Tello, Otto Luis | Haas, Barbara |
| Gendered mental labour and its manageability for non-traditional parental couples with young children in Austria = Geschlechtsspezifische mentale Arbeit und ihre Bewältigbarkeit für nicht-traditionelle Elternpaare mit jungen Kindern in Österreich | Mair, Nadine Vera | Haas, Barbara |
| New forms of precarious employment qualitative insights from expert interviews on high-skilled online platform labour | Hennig, Maybritt | Haas, Barbara |
| Barriers to fully integrating education for sustainable development into Ukrainian higher education a case study | Zhmudska, Dana | Haas, Barbara |
| Inner transformation as a leverage point for social-ecological transformation | Volk, Emily | Haas, Barbara |
| In it for the long haul: factors contributing to long-term climate activism for youth and young adults in Austria | Öker, Selin Cordula | Haas, Barbara |
| Men, unpaid work and the reduction of normal working time what influence does a reduction of normal working time have on men's uptake of unpaid work and why do gender ideologies matter? | Pepper, Katharina Magdalena | Haas, Barbara |
| Social capital of Afghan and Syrian refugees in Austria a gender-sensitive analysis | Heyne, Sophia Veronica | Kohlenberger, Judith; Schneider, Ulrike |
| Ecuador's citizens' revolution: powered by oil extraction? regulationist perspectives on the (neo)extractivist mode of development | Dengler, Corinna | Lang, MiriamNovy, Andreas |
| Not for sale a social ecological economics perspective on cooperative housing as a transformative social innovation in the Netherlands | De Hoop, Mark | Madner, Verena |
| Environmental protection in European trade agreements | Schraml, Pascal | Madner, Verena |
| Visions of peace negotiation, compromise, and synthesis in the Colombian conflict and the 2012-2016 peace process | Villarreal, Andreas | Madner, Verena |
| Strategic selectivity in the CETA negotiations | Elend, Tanja | Madner, Verena |
| Conceptualizing power in the context of climate change a multi-theoretical perspective on structure, agency & power relations | Stör, Lorenz | Novy, Andreas |
| Innovative strategies of Austrian employee representatives towards sustainable energy policies | Theine, Hendrik | Novy, Andreas |
| Assessing the biophysical elements of a 'paradise' a case study on Boracay Island, Philippines applying MuSIASEM and the perspective of Socio-Ecological Economics and Policy | Toledo, Nissa Marie M. | Novy, Andreas |
| Reconceptualizing circular economy? the case of Reparatur- und Servicezentrum (R.U.S.Z.) Vienna | Kiegerl, Elisabeth | Novy, Andreas |
| The cost of climate (in)action critical discourse analysis: the presentation of climate change in Austrian media | Panhuber, Lisa Tamina | Novy, Andreas |
| Economic liberalizations and their effect on individualization processes the case of Abenomics in Japan | Brandt, Yannick | Novy, Andreas |
| Participation and empowerment for social cohesion the case of Vielfalter = Partizipation und Empowerment für Soziale Kohäsion : Fallstudie Vielfalter | Weinzierl, Carla | Novy, Andreas |
| Is social empowerment through the European energy transition a pipe dream? | Szabo, John | Novy, Andreas |
| Reconceptualizing urban agriculture exploring D-Town Farm's relations to racialized capital accumulation | Aigner, Ernest | Novy, Andreas |
| Climate change communication a critical discourse analysis using Chinese language newspapers | Luo, Anran | Novy, Andreas |
| Fuel poverty in Vienna developing a framework for interpreting different dimensions of environmental justice | Werner, Andrea Johanna | Novy, Andreas |
| Buen Vivir in Ecuador exploring the self-understanding of competing discourses | Linder, Sebastian | Novy, Andreas |
| The transformation of forms and modes of living a power sensitive comparative analysis | Reiß, Michael | Novy, Andreas |
| "Just transition" or obliteration? The struggle of trade unions in the United Kingdom to respond to the need for long-term socio-ecological development | Kreinin, Halliki | Novy, Andreas |
| The myth of political reason the moral and emotional foundations of political cognition and US politics | Wilson, Ryan | Novy, Andreas |
| Betting on shelter the political economy of financialised housing provision in Vienna | Stadelmann, Basil | Novy, Andreas |
| Potentials of the foundational economy at the Untere Fußgängerzone der Favoritenstraße | Kamtner, Verena | Novy, Andreas |
| Transformative economics on both sides of the Atlantic new economy movement and degrowth movement | Barlow, Nathaniel | Novy, Andreas |
| Potentials of the foundational economy in Vienna the case of Johann-Nepomuk-Vogl-Platz | Frey, Iris | Novy, Andreas |
| Karl Polanyi and housing elements of a new research program for foundational provisioning in cities | Volmary, Hans Heinrich | Novy, Andreas |
| Cognitive processes of higher-order in higher education evaluating assessment methods, learning outcomes and students' perception of "Sustainable economics and business 1", a bachelor course at WU | Prieler, Magdalena | Novy, Andreas |
| Contested just transition strategies a case study of the Austrian Airlines workforce | Chmel, Philipp Manuel | Novy, Andreas |
| A socio-ecological proposal for the economic interventions after the pandemic contemporary issues, resulting challenges and the contribution of foundational economy to face them while building a better future | Lipparini, Matteo | Novy, Andreas |
| Affordable housing in the city of Munich a historical analysis of achievements and limitations | Braun, Sebastian Karl | Novy, Andreas |
| Who raises land prices? An analysis of institutions and ownership structures impacting residential building land in Vienna | Müller, Hannah Lucia | Novy, Andreas |
| An emergency for democracy - a case study on the democratic backsliding amid the COVID-19 crisis in Hungary | Vankó, Lili | Novy, Andreas; Asara, Viviana |
| Towards a public policy strategy for social-ecological transformation | Schulken, Merle Camilla | Novy, Andreas; Cahen-Fourot, Louison |
| Inequalities in the access to healthcare in Bulgaria | Dimitrova, Asya | Österle, August |
| Waiting times for non-emergency medical interventions in Austria on the causes and potenial solutions for inadequate waiting times | Hüttenbrenner, Denise | Österle, August |
| Stratified membership healthcare access for urban refugees in Turkey | Spahl, Wanda Anita | Österle, August |
| The impact of austerity policies in the European Union on the privatization of health care provision the case of Greece | Dokova, Mariya Stoyanova | Österle, August |
| Care allowances in the Taiwanese long-term care system | Ding, Tz-Chian | Österle, August |
| Homo sovieticus: the lost generation of homeless Polish in Vienna | Kowalska vel Kowalczyk, Nina | Österle, August |
| Working conditions in residential long-term care facilities in Austria, Germany and Sweden: a capability approach towards health implications for care workers and residents | Dallinger, Franziska Luzie | Österle, August |
| Assessing the implementation of the Vienna drug strategy in prevention, treatment and rehabilitation of adolescents and young adults according to the international standards | Uhl, Alice | Österle, August |
| Environmental concern and medium-distance transport mode choice in Europe the use of overnight trains | Buh, Brian Matthew | Peer, Stefanie |
| Promoting pedalling a comparative case study of cycling policies in Amsterdam, Copenhagen and Vienna | Dausendschön, Alina | Peer, Stefanie |
| Exploring a social innovation for solidarity, social inclusion, civil empowerment, and conviviality | Reitberger, Hannes | Rammel, Christian |
| Stakeholder inclusion in decision-making processes with sustainability aspects | Schwarz, Anna | Rammel, Christian |
| Addressing livestock-related climate change through institutional changes to dining areas sequential mixed-methods frame analysis of student thought for communication strategies | Lewitus, Evan Charles | Rammel, Christian |
| Human well-being and the valuation of natural capital | Miranda de Melo Franco, Fabiano | Rammel, Christian |
| Community currencies in Austria motivations and potential to induce change | Faulkner, Fiona | Rammel, Christian |
| Design thinking for sustainability-driven entrepreneurship | Lindermuth, Alina Maria | Rammel, Christian |
| Will blocks do good? Potential blockchain contributions toward the sustainable development goals | Takada, Kota Thomas | Rammel, Christian |
| Social entrepreneurship in Hungary a tool to facilitate the social and labor market integration of youths leaving the state care system | Györi, Dorottya Irén | Rammel, Christian |
| Examining the role of intrapreneurship in reaching corporate sustainability | Schumacher, Maria | Rammel, Christian |
| Künstliche Intelligenz und Bildung für nachhaltige Entwicklung: ein Paradoxon? Potentiale und Risiken des Einsatzes von KI-Systemen in der Hochschulbildung und die Bedeutung für Bildung für nachhaltige Entwicklung | Birkelbach, Laura | Rammel, Christian |
| Does neighborhood ethnic diversity affect collective efficacy among residents? a case study for selected neighborhoods in Phoenix, Arizona | Weiss, Sabine | Schneider, Ulrike |
| An explorative analysis of asylum seekers' attitudes towards gender equality using an intersectional perspective | Hörtner, Cornelia | Schneider, Ulrike |
| Ethnic and religious discrimination in the Austrian labor market: a field experiment approach the case of female job applicants with Turkish ethnicity in the Viennese gastronomy sector | Riedler, Kathrin | Schneider, Ulrike |
| What are the driving factors of business expansion through franchising for the U.S.-based senior home care companies? case study: the U.S.-based senior home care franchisors | Zenina, Liliya Vladimirovna | Schneider, Ulrike |
| Ethnic discrimination on the Viennese private rental market evidence from a field experiment on the internet | Scherbaum, Christin | Schneider, Ulrike |
| Age discrimination within Austrian private recruitment agencies | Jensen, Line Møller | Schneider, Ulrike |
| Accessibility to internships at international, non-profit, and/or non-governmental organizations: experiences and perspectives of young professionals and employers | Avanessian, Ella | Schneider, Ulrike |
| Reconceptualising global public goods in the context of biodiversity a transformation perspective on the global political economy of public goods provision | Bettin, Steffen | Scholz-Wäckerle, Manuel |
| Building a generic framework for global land use modelling combining agent-based and cellular-automaton modelling techniques | Yowargana, Ping | Scholz-Wäckerle, Manuel |
| Sustainability in practice reassembling the behaviour of companies | Halla, Pekka Jaakko | Scholz-Wäckerle, Manuel |
| The political economy of sustainable palm oil the institutional impact of the european union's renewable energy directive on the governance of palm oil in Indonesia | Korpar, Niko | Scholz-Wäckerle, Manuel |
| Transitioning towards sustainable food waste systems the role of every-day food-waste practices for a successful implementation of Vermont's Universal Recycling and Composting law | Kasa, Timea | Scholz-Wäckerle, Manuel |
| Political-economic analysis of agent-based multi-regional models extractivism and implications for work, capital and the environment | Gerdes, Lena | Scholz-Wäckerle, Manuel |
| Homeownership and the U.S. housing market theory, empirics and an agent-based model | Sentinella, Richard | Scholz-Wäckerle, Manuel |
| Agent-based macroeconomics reconstructing, disaggregating and extending the stock-flow consistent approach with focus on monetary aspects | Ellmeyer, David | Scholz-Wäckerle, Manuel |
| Blockchain and value an analysis of blockchain technology and its value implications for society | Engel, Thijs <van den>></van> | Scholz-Wäckerle, Manuel |
| The myth of the autonomous consumer | Spinner, Marcel | Scholz-Wäckerle, Manuel |
| Technological revelations: the evolution of technology with a case study of space technologies | Patil, Pratik | Scholz-Wäckerle, Manuel |
| 21st century water withdrawal decoupling a pathway to a more water-wise world? | Dalstein, Felix | Scholz-Wäckerle, Manuel |
| Overcoming the carbon lock-in review and analysis of existing models and policies for the energy transition | Laa, Elisabeth | Scholz-Wäckerle, Manuel |
| The role of energy regimes in capitalist development an evolutionary political economy approach | Koller, Theo | Scholz-Wäckerle, Manuel |
| The spatio-temporal organization of digital labor in the platform economy | Schneider, Justus Frederik Florentin | Scholz-Wäckerle, Manuel |
| The web of commons theorising towards non-modern realities | Dörrie, Hans Lukas | Scholz-Wäckerle, Manuel |
| Digital degrowth technology: an analysis of blockchain technology | Pérez Delgado, Victor Daniel | Scholz-Wäckerle, Manuel |
| Exploring the foundations underpinning the economisation and securitisation of climate change a critical realist perspective on the Paris Agreement of UNFCCC COP21 | West, Stuart | Spash, Clive |
| Critical assessment of 'new conservationism' an Austrian case study | Schneider, Nina | Spash, Clive |
| The role of altruism in the market economy are social businesses a new manifestation of a polanyian double movement? | Wagner, Gerhard | Spash, Clive |
| Resonance and sufficiency: the cultural conditions for a social-ecological transformation towards a post-growth society an empirical case study of pioneering organizations | Koch, Florian | Spash, Clive |
| Questioning the status quo how non-growing companies succeed in a growth-driven economy | Juschten, Maria | Spash, Clive L. |
| Governance of marine plastic pollution a critical appraisal of policy responses from a social ecological economics perspective | Gattringer, Clemens W. | Spash, Clive L. |
| Working time reduction and sustainable lifestyle a critical realist perspective | Langsenlehner, Maria | Spash, Clive L. |
| Understanding the gender-environment interface using a critical realist approach an Austrian case study | Deutsch, Lisa | Spash, Clive L. |
| The potenitalities for and barriers to eco-social shipping enterprises a critical and realist approach to social ecological transformation | Mayer, Gottfried Franz | Spash, Clive L. |
| Rethinking freedom in the age of neoliberalism a critical and realist analysis | Windegger, Felix | Spash, Clive L. |
| Airport expansion and social ecological conflicts a critical realist analysis of the third runway at Vienna airport | Austaller, Monika | Spash, Clive L. |
| The transformative potential of ecovillages as a counter-hegemonic narrative to the imperial mode of living | Hausmann, Roman | Spash, Clive L. |
| The transformative potential of social enterprises under a critical realist approach | Economou, Iliana Paraskevi | Spash, Clive L. |
| Sustainable work in the United Kingdom does the UK provide a role model for the transition to a sustainable economy? = Nachhaltige Arbeit im Vereinigten Königreich | Curnow, Ben | Stagl, Sigird |
| What are the factors for diffusion of photovoltaic panel systems among Austrian households a market and behavioural analysis of photovoltaic panels distribution in Austria | Pavlov, Andon | Stagl, Sigrid |
| Vienna's GHG emissions from a production vs. consumption-based accounting perspective a comparative analysis = Wiens Treibhausgasemissionen aus zwei Perspektiven : ein Vergleich der produktions- und konsumbasierten Bilanzierungsmethode | Schmid, Florian | Stagl, Sigrid |
| Rainwater capturing in Mexico City the adoption of the social practice | Swenson, Anteo Nacxit | Stagl, Sigrid |
| Understanding sustainable food consumption through a lens of social practice a case study in Vienna's 16th district, Ottakring | Scheller, Helene | Stagl, Sigrid |
| Electricity access & sustainable livelihoods a mixed-method study of agrarian households in Kisii County, Kenya | Boucher, Daniel J. | Stagl, Sigrid |
| The role of community energy in the transition towards renewables in the UK a multi-level perspective | Oberascher, Teresa | Stagl, Sigrid |
| Scaling up initiatives: how initiatives can contribute to transformational change a qualitative study using the example of UrbanFoodSpots: food for thought | Hendrich, Aline | Stagl, Sigrid |
| The Swiss people's initiative for food sovereignty and its underlying discourse | Brun, Martina | Stagl, Sigrid |
| Sustainable consumption and the practice of food acqusition a participatory approach to envisioning new futures of food acquisition | Ware, Sarah | Stagl, Sigrid |
| Designing an effective carbon tax a socio-ecological economic evaluation of the carbon tax policy in France | Schuchardt, Marcel Frédéric | Stagl, Sigrid |
| Integrated assessment of the belt and road initiative projects in the South Caucasus | Mitrofanenko, Alexander | Stagl, Sigrid |
| The impact of public food procurement on sustainable food production a case study of Vienna | Grohs, Julia Dorit | Stagl, Sigrid |
| Intention of the Viennese population to consume mainly organic food | Kunz, Julian Jacob | Stagl, Sigrid |
| Cut the carbon, strengthen the community governance structures in Austrian mobility projects | Lindemann, Tobias Kurt | Stagl, Sigrid |
| Recovery from mayhem implementing capabilities approach in rebuilding damaged economies and societies | Sadeq, Ayham | Stagl, Sigrid |