Research talents receive three postdoc grants

Three interesting research projects received about DKK 6 m in funding to study how household consumption is affected by changes in income, whether boards choose new members from social networks and what economists in the international climate change movement actually want to change.

The Danish Council for Independent Research (DFF) awards grants to young researchers to give them the best conditions for delivering research results of a high international calibre. CBS received three grants, with remaining grants in the social sciences and the humanities divided between the University of Copenhagen, Aarhus University, the IT University of Copenhagen and Roskilde University.


3 different projects
DFF, which supports research based on researchers' own initiatives, for and across all major scientific areas, wants to strengthen the internationalisation of Danish research. One objective is to give the best researchers the opportunity to further develop their cooperation across borders.

Find out more about what the three projects cover and how the grants will be used.


Title: Consumption, Excess Sensitivity, and Income Fungibility

Recipient: Arna Vardardóttir (ECON)

Institution: Copenhagen Business School

Amount: DKK 1,981,318

Description:
This project contributes to the academic and political discussion on how household spending responds to income flow and whether the source of the income makes a difference for how the income is spent. Addressing these issues is a crucial matter when building models for household consumption, investment and savings choices, but also a key component in designing public policies. The findings will identify, for example, public cash transfers that most effectively stimulate the economy during recessions and enhance child welfare by directing consumption towards children's goods.  
 

Title: Weak Ties and Corporate Network Power: A Longitudinal Study

Recipient: Lasse Folke Kikkert Henriksen (DBP)

Institution: Copenhagen Business School

Amount: DKK 2,074,928

Description:
This project demonstrates the extent to which corporate boards recruit new board members based on their existing social networks, thus contributing to concentrating power at the top of Danish society. This pioneering project is the first of its kind to use registry databases from Statistics Denmark to construct historical network data over the Danish business elite. The data will be subjected to a social network analysis to examine the extent to which these networks are used in board recruitment. As a result, the project aims to contribute to sociological mobility research, which typically focuses on the importance of education on social mobility between generations.

 
Title: Sustainable Rationalities: The Economic Philosophy of the Sustainability Movement

Recipient: Stefan Gaarsmand Jacobsen (MPP)

Institution: Copenhagen Business School

Amount: DKK 1,974,545

Description:
On 21 September 2014, more than 1,500 organisations and 400,000 people gathered in New York for a demonstration under the slogan "change everything" to demand political action on climate change. For many of the protesters, the most important point was changing the economy. This project investigates what leading outspoken economists in the climate change movement want to change in reality, and how the public debate has received their arguments for comprehensive changes in the global economy over the past 15 years. Since the late 1990s, a number of writers and organisations have produced books and white papers with an economic climate focus, just as they have been involved in demonstrations and formed alliances in academic and political circles. They share the urgent goal of establishing a new economic philosophy. With new economic insight, arguments, theories and policies, they want to support a global transition to an environmentally and socially sustainable society. This project examines the historical, political and cognitive processes behind this goal. The project argues that the notion of economic transition has established a new platform for discussing the economy on both politically and scientifically. The project's research focus is on leading writers and players behind the international organisations 350.org, Great Transition Initiative, New Economics Foundation and Friends of the Earth International.