Michaela Pixová
Affiliated researcher
Social Sciences
I am a critical human geographer engaged in research, activism, teaching, and public writing. I am currently working on the project SustainAction External link. and is an affiliate research fellow at Södertörn University, as well as an assistant professor at the Institute of Ethnology and Central European and Balkan Studies, Faculty of Arts, Charles University in Czechia.
My main areas of interest include social movements and civic activism, various aspects of social-ecological transformation, especially sustainable and socially just transformations of the contemporary city and food system, climate and environmental policy, and feminist topics. In the past, I focused mainly on the right to the city, alternative spaces, squatting, and youth subcultures in Czechia.
Between 2022 and 2026 I worked at BOKU University in Vienna as part of a research project focused on food alternatives within the contemporary food regime. I primarily use qualitative research methods, and I am interested in applying activist, decolonial and feminist approaches in working with the communities which are in the foci of the research.
Key research areas
- social movements and civic activism, particularly with a focus on political intersectionality, feminism and efforts to overcome polarization
- social-ecological transformation, climate change, environmental politics, just transition and degrowth
- urban change, governance, and right to the city struggles, primarily using critical urban theory
- food alternatives, sustainable food systems, urban gardening and agriculture, food movements, drawing on food regime theory and critical agrarian studies
Ongoing research projects I am a co-investigator in the international research program www.sustainaction.org focused on analyzing and comparing the resilience and resourcefulness of the civil society in Poland, Hungary, Romania, Serbia, Czechia and Sweden in the context of multiple crisis. Together, we examine the genealogies of the existing crises related to the economy, housing, climate, food, and gender equality, and explore how people respond to these crises collectively. Within the project, I primarily focus on the climate movement in Czechia.