Åsa Knaggård

PhD | Associate professor

Political Science

Main Research and Teaching Areas

1. Science-politics relations
2. Environmental policy
3. Public policy

Current Research and Teaching

My research is about the relation between science and politics. Firstly, I study the role of ideas and scientific knowledge (and uncertainty) in how political problems are defined and decisions are made. I am involved in several research projects on this theme, including on carbon pricing, green infrastructure, and biodiversity offsetting. Secondly, I study decision-making under risk and uncertainty from a more conceptual perspective, including a focus on robust decision-making. Thirdly, I do research on the scientific side of the relation, more specifically on how scientists understand and approach the relation. My research also concerns environmental and climate politics more broadly. For example, I am involved in a project on the division of responsibility over climate adaptation in a Swedish context, dealing with issues about public/private and the state/local level.

My research is partly interdisciplinary and is conducted together with researchers from different disciplines, at the moment Ecology, Philosophy and Engineering.

I teach courses at the Department of Political Science, including a master course on Policy processes, and give a course on Environmental Politics and Administration to environmental science students. I am at the moment involved in two PhD courses: one on Risk, uncertainty and decisionmaking, and one on Science communication. Both are interdisciplinary.