Economics

This includes studying the interlinkages between the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), examining how climate, energy, social, and economic objectives interact, and how science, innovation, financial markets, criminal activity, and institutional quality shape environmental and economic development outcomes.

Energy and behavioral economics form another important pillar. Through field experiments, randomized information interventions, and household surveys, the group studies how behavioral interventions such as real-time social comparisons and descriptive feedback affect electricity consumption and compares household responses across countries in the Baltic Sea region. Moreover, the role of energy efficiency information in property purchases, and the interaction between building standards, retrofit investments, and actual energy savings is studied.

Environmental and natural resource economics represents a third core area. Here, the researchers develop cost-effective strategies for climate change mitigation and ecosystem management, including carbon sequestration in land use, wildlife and biodiversity management, and the management of eutrophicated coastal waters. Work on environmental taxation, plastic-bag policies, eco-innovation drivers, and biofuel production and consumption further enhances the knowledge on policy design nationally and internationally.

Tourism economics and regional resilience form another cohesive stream. Studies investigate how climate variability affects winter tourism, and how the pandemic reshapes domestic travel patterns, and the financial performance of tourism-related sectors. Long-run analyses of tourism demand and sectoral adjustments further enrich this regional perspective.

Other research examines agricultural productivity and subsidy design, public procurement, competition, and corruption with applications in Sweden and Ukraine; the effects of leadership in firms; and the evolution of monetary arrangements.

The research has been funded by for example the Foundation for Baltic Sea and East European Studies, Formas, Horizon EU, the Swedish Research Council, Vinnova, the Swedish Energy Agency, the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency, Marianne & Marcus Wallenberg Foundation, and Länsförsäkringar.