I am head of the research group “Transformation and Sustainability Governance in South American Bioeconomies” at the Institute of Political Science at the University of Münster. My research focusses on the politics of sustainable development, natural resource governance in the global political economy and regionalism, with a geographical focus on South America. My current work examines to what extent and in which ways the development of bioeconomies in the Southern Cone of South America may support a transition to inclusive and sustainable development. A second strand of my research focusses on the relationship between natural resource governance and regionalisation processes and examines which actors are able to shape regional cooperation on environmental concerns and access regional-level decision-making processes on natural resource governance.
I received my PhD in Politics from the University of Glasgow in 2014. Before moving to the University of Münster in 2020, I was a Lord Kelvin Adam Smith Fellow at the University of Glasgow. My other previous work experience includes lecturing at Edinburgh Napier University where I led courses on global environmental politics, qualitative research methods and British politics in Edinburgh and Hong Kong in cooperation with Hong Kong University School of Professional and Continuing Education as well as two years in Brussels working with the European Commission and the consultancy Bernard Brunhes International and a year in Quito, Ecuador where I worked as an English teacher at the Centro de Educación Continua de la Escuela Politécnica Nacional.
If you would like more information about my research please contact me by e-mail: karen.siegel[at]uni-muenster.de
Related Publications
- Siegel, K.M. (2021) “Pulp friction in the La Plata basin: The importance of natural resource governance for South American regionalism”, Journal of Environment and Development, 30(2): 172-190, doi/10.1177/1070496521998734
- Siegel, K.M. and Bastos Lima, M.G. (2020) “When international sustainability frameworks encounter domestic politics: The Sustainable Development Goals and agri-food governance in South America”, World Development, Volume 135, November 2020, 105053.
- Siegel, Karen M. (2017) “Regional Environmental Cooperation in South America: Processes, Drivers and Constraints“. Palgrave Macmillan UK.
- Siegel, K.M. (2016) “Fulfilling promises of more substantive democracy? Post-neoliberalism and natural resource governance in South America” Development and Change, 47(3): 495-516; republished in virtual special issue Facing the Future: The Legacies of Post-Neoliberalism in Latin America edited by Jean Grugel and Pia Riggirozzi, April 2019.
- Siegel, K.M. (2016) “Environment, politics and governance in Latin America” European Review of Latin American and Caribbean Studies – Revista Europea de Estudios Latinoamericanos y del Caribe (102): 109-117.
