Call for Postdoctoral Researcher – Environmental Politics! at University Vacancies Ireland!

Research Centre: Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences

Post Title: Postdoctoral Researcher – Environmental Politics

Level on Framework: Level 1

Post duration: Fixed Term Contract up to 3 years

Dublin City University

Dublin City University (DCU) is a leading innovative European University. It is proud to be one of the world’s leading Young Universities and is among the world’s top 2% globally. DCU is known as Ireland’s University of Impact, with a mission to ‘transform lives and societies’ and focuses on addressing global challenges in collaboration with key national and international partners and stakeholders.

DCU has over 20,000 students in five faculties spread across three academic campuses in the Glasnevin-Drumcondra area of North Dublin. Thanks to its innovative approach to teaching and learning, the University offers a ‘transformative student experience’ that helps to develop highly sought-after graduates. DCU is currently No. 1 in Ireland for Graduate Employment Rate, and for graduate income (CSO).

DCU is a research-intensive University and is home to a number of SFI-funded Research Centres. The University participates in a range of European and international research partnerships. DCU is also the leading Irish university in the area of technology transfer as reflected by licensing of intellectual property.

As a ‘People First’ institution, DCU is committed to Equality, Diversity and Inclusion – a University that helps staff and students to thrive. The University is a leader in terms of its work to increase access to education, and is placed in the world’s Top 10 for reducing inequalities in the Times Higher Education Impact Rankings.

As part of this role the researcher will be required to participate in the DCU Research Career Framework. This framework is designed to provide significant professional development opportunities to Researchers and offer the best opportunities in terms of a wider career path.

Background & Role

The postdoctoral researcher will work across two externally funded research projects (50% of time devoted to each project):

Horizon Europe project RETOOL: Strengthening democratic governance for climate transitions. The goal of the project is to advance our understanding of how to address the twin challenges of responding to the climate imperative while strengthening and reinvigorating democratic governance. The project aims to understand how a variety of democratic institutions across Europe are responding to the climate challenge, including learning lessons from history and studying new and innovative democratic practices. The postdoctoral researcher will contribute to research on the climate challenge and its contestation in democracies, and conceptualizing types of democracy and democratic institutions in a multilevel context. They will also undertake empirical research on the evolving roles of democratic institutions in climate governance, including representative institutions, expert advisory bodies, and institutions for deliberative participation.

Climate + Biodiversity and Water Co-Centre, a major new tri-jurisdictional (Republic of Ireland, Northern Ireland, Great Britain) research centre focused on the interlinked challenges of climate change, biodiversity, and water quality. The postdoctoral researcher will contribute to a project led by DCU entitled “Strengthening policy and governance frameworks for climate, biodiversity and water quality”. The postdoctoral researcher will contribute to analysing trends in land-use regulatory and governance arrangements on the island of Ireland, developing scenario-based analysis of risks associated with policy and governance divergence, and identifying potential approaches to mitigate such risks.

Principal Duties and Responsibilities

The successful candidate will undertake a range of research and associated tasks across the RETOOL and Climate+ projects. The main duties and responsibilities include:

Undertaking comprehensive literature reviews and synthesising existing research across multiple fields of relevance to the projects;
Undertaking primary data collection and analysis, including but not limited to document analysis, interviews, and scenario development and analysis;
Participating in project meetings and working with partners across the project consortia;
Presenting research findings at relevant national and international conferences;
Engaging with relevant stakeholders and overseeing outreach to different audiences;
Overseeing the timely completion of project deliverables;
Contributing to the efficient management of the two projects, including through relevant administrative tasks.

Minimum Criteria

Applicants should have a PhD in environmental politics or a cognate discipline. In addition, it is desirable that the candidate has the following:

Strong research profile on the politics of climate change, biodiversity, and/or water;
Emerging track record of peer reviewed academic publications;
Excellent empirical research, analytical, and writing skills;
Proven ability to work in an interdisciplinary setting;
Strong interpersonal and organisational skills;
Ability to communicate effectively to both academic and practitioner audiences;
Knowledge of the EU and Irish environmental policy landscapes.

Candidates will be assessed on the following abilities:

Discipline knowledge and Research skills – Demonstrates knowledge of a research discipline and the ability to conduct a specific programme of research within that discipline.

Understanding the Research Environment – Demonstrates an awareness of the research environment (for example funding bodies) and the ability to contribute to grant applications.

Communicating Research – Demonstrates the ability to communicate their research with their peers and the wider research community (for example presenting at conferences and publishing research in relevant journals) and the potential to teach and tutor students.

Managing & Leadership skills – Demonstrates the potential to manage a research project including the supervision of undergraduate students.

Essential Training

The postholder will be required to undertake the following essential compliance training: Orientation, Health & Safety, Data Protection (GDPR) and all Cyber Security Awareness Training. Other training may need to be undertaken when required.

Informal Enquiries in relation to this role should be directed to:

Title. Dr Diarmuid Torney, School of Law and Government, Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, Dublin City University.

Email: [email protected]

Please do not send applications to this email address, instead, please see the application instructions section.

For more details, refer here