PhD on Nature-based Living Lab Outcomes and Learning

Would you like to undertake research on learning from nature-based living labs? Do you want to contribute to a resilient climate-proof future for the Dutch sandy soil landscapes? Then you could be the ideal candidate to join our team!

In the CASTOR (Catchment Strategies Towards Resilience): Dutch Pleistocene Landscapes in the Anthropocene’ project, we seek nature-based approaches for pathways towards climate-resilient land and water systems together with stakeholders. A key innovation is combining complex adaptive systems approaches with living lab arrangements. Your research will evaluate and map the outcomes of nature-based living labs in the sandy landscapes in the east of The Netherlands. You will adopt a pilot project lens, complemented by policy analysis evaluation frameworks and theory on innovation, knowledge development and learning in transdisciplinary environments, to determine the effects of the living labs. Your research will be guided by two questions:

Your methods will include interviewing stakeholders involved in the living labs, as well as the formulation of a systems model on learning from such living labs. The model will be tested and validated with stakeholders and researchers involved in the community of practice associated with past and ongoing living labs. You will not be responsible for initiating living labs, but will participate within existing multidisciplinary, multi-stakeholder living lab communities. Strategies to strengthen the learning effects will be sought and may be trialed. A particular focus will be how learning effects can be scaled up to enhance landscape management and climate resilience.

Your PhD project forms part of the ‘CASTOR (Catchment Strategies Towards Resilience): Dutch Pleistocene Landscapes in the Anthropocene’ project, which is funded through the NWA program of the Dutch Research council NWO. CASTOR is a collaborative and interdisciplinary project in which the Delft University of Technology works with other universities (WUR, UTwente), research institutes (Deltares, WENR, KWR), water boards, drinking water company Vitens and the ministry of Infrastructure and Water management. Six researchers will be employed for the project (two post-doc, four PhD candidates), supported by a diverse team of academic staff members (ranging from policy analysis, modelling and governance, to integrated water management and soil geography).