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Karin Gustafsson

Position: Senior Lecturer School/office: School of Humanities, Education and Social Sciences

Email: karin.m.gustafsson@oru.se

Phone: +46 19 303184

Room: F3274

Research subject

Sociology

Research environments

Center for Environmental and Sustainability Social Science (CESSS)

About Karin Gustafsson

Karin Gustafsson is an associate professor in sociology. She is an environmental sociologist with a special interest in studying knowledge production and relations between knowledge producers.

Karin Gustafsson’s research is primarily focusing on climate change and biodiversity issues in the fields of environmental sociology, sociology of knowledge, and science and technology studies.

Karin Gustafsson primarily studies these topics by focusing on science's role in international environmental governance, international expert organizations' socialization of young scholars, and the importance and role of social science expertise in creating a sustainable transformation of society as an answer to climate change and biodiversity loss.

Currently, Karin Gustafsson is also studying how different kinds of trust/distrust in climate change science play a role in young people’s identity work and climate change engagement/disengagement, this by exploring how climate-active young people argue around climate change science in social media.

Karin Gustafsson is the director of Center for Environmental and Sustainability Social Science (CESSS).

Karin Gustafsson teaches on both undergraduate- and graduate levels. She teaches on the topics of academic writing, research design, qualitative methods, philosophy of science, sustainable development, and environmental sociology. In addition, Karin supervises both bachelor and master theses.

Karin Gustafsson is the program director of the Bachelor program in social analysis and the course director of the multidisciplinary course Sustainable Development.

Karin Gustafsson has previously been a researcher at:

Centre for the Study of Environmental Change, Lancaster University, England (October- December 2012).
Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology/Science and Technology Studies/Natural Resources, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA (2014, Postdoctoral Associate).
Environmental Policy Group, Wageningen UR, Netherlands (January-June 2018).
Forest and Nature Conservation Policy Group, Wageningen UR, the Netherlands. (January-June 2019)

Active projects

Completed projects

Research groups

Publications

Articles in journals

Gustafsson, K. M. (2023). Expert organizations as a space for early-career development: Engaging in service while balancing expectations on research and teaching. Environmental Sociology, 9 (2), 190-199.
Gustafsson, K. M. & Lidskog, R. (2023). Expertise for policy-relevant knowledge: IPBES’s epistemic infrastructure and guidance to make environmental assessment. Journal of Integrative Environmental Sciences, 20 (1).
Gustafsson, K. M. & Hysing, E. (2023). IPBES as a transformative agent: opportunities and risks. Environmental Conservation, 50 (1), 7-11.
Benulic, K. , Edberg, K. & Gustafsson, K. M. (2023). Klimatkrisens sociologi: Gästredaktörernas introduktion: [The sociology of the climate crisis: Guest editors’ introduction]. Sociologisk forskning, 60 (3-4), 219-228.
Asayama, S. , De Pryck, K. , Beck, S. , Cointe, B. , Edwards, P. N. , Guillemot, H. , Gustafsson, K. M. , Hartz, F. & et al. (2023). Three institutional pathways to envision the future of the IPCC. Nature Climate Change, 13 (9), 877-880.
Gustafsson, K. M. (2021). Expert organizations’ institutional understanding of expertise and responsibility for the creation of the next generation of experts: comparing IPCC and IPBES. Ecosystems and People, 17 (1), 47-56.
Gustafsson, K. M. , Díaz-Reviriego, I. & Turnhout, E. (2020). Building capacity for the science-policy interface on biodiversity and ecosystem services: Activities, fellows, outcomes, and neglected capacity building needs. Earth System Governance, 4 (June).
Lidskog, R. , Berg, M. , Gustafsson, K. M. & Löfmarck, E. (2020). Cold Science Meets Hot Weather: Environmental Threats, Emotional Messages and Scientific Storytelling. Media and Communication, 8 (1), 118-128.
Gustafsson, K. M. & Berg, M. (2020). Early-career scientists in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change: A moderate or radical path towards a deliberative future?. Environmental Sociology, 6 (3), 242-253.
Borie, M. , Gustafsson, K. M. , Obermeister, N. , Turnhout, E. & Bridgewater, P. (2020). Institutionalising reflexivity? Transformative learning and the Intergovernmental science-policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES). Environmental Science and Policy, 110, 71-76.
Balvandera, P. , Jacobs, S. , Nagendra, H. , O'Farrell, P. , Bridgewater, P. , Crouzat, E. , Dendoncker, N. , Goodwin, S. & et al. (2020). The science-policy interface on ecosystems and people: challenges and opportunities. Ecosystems and People, 16 (1), 345-353.
Gustafsson, K. M. , Berg, M. , Lidskog, R. & Löfmarck, E. (2019). Intersectional boundary work in socializing new experts: The case of IPBES. Ecosystems and People, 15 (1), 181-191.
Gustafsson, K. M. (2019). Learning from the Experiences of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change: Balancing Science and Policy to Enable Trustworthy Knowledge. Sustainability, 11 (23), 1-14.
Gustafsson, K. M. & Lidskog, R. (2018). Boundary organizations and environmental governance: Performance, institutional design, and conceptual development. Climate Risk Management, 19, 1-11.
Boström, M. , Andersson, E. , Berg, M. , Gustafsson, K. M. , Gustavsson, E. , Hysing, E. , Lidskog, R. , Löfmarck, E. & et al. (2018). Conditions for Transformative Learning for Sustainable Development: A Theoretical Review and Approach. Sustainability, 10 (12).
Gustafsson, K. M. & Lidskog, R. (2018). Organizing international experts: IPBES’s efforts to gain epistemic authority. Environmental Sociology, 4 (4), 445-456.
Gustafsson, K. M. (2018). Producing expertise: the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity & Ecosystem Services’ socialisation of young scholars. Journal of Integrative Environmental Sciences, 15 (1), 21-39.
Gustafsson, K. M. (2017). Narrating the Monarch Butterfly: Managing Knowledge Complexity and Uncertainty in Coproduction of a Collective Narrative and Public Discourse. Science communication, 39 (4), 492-519.
Gustafsson, K. M. , Wolf, S. A. & Agrawal, A. A. (2017). Science-Policy-Practice Interfaces: Emergent knowledge and monarch butterﬂy conservation. Environmental Policy and Governance, 27 (6), 521-533.
Gustafsson, K. M. , Agrawal, A. A. , Lewenstein, B. V. & Wolf, S. A. (2015). The Monarch Butterfly through Time and Space: The Social Construction of an Icon. BioScience, 65 (6), 612-622.
Gustafsson, K. M. (2014). Biological diversity under development: a study of the co-production that is biological diversity. Journal of Integrative Environmental Sciences, 11 (2), 109-124.
Gustafsson, K. & Lidskog, R. (2013). Boundary work, hybrid practices and portable representations: an analysis of global and national co-productions of Red Lists. Nature and Culture, 8 (1), 30-52.
Gustafsson, K. M. (2013). Environmental discourses and biodiversity: the construction of a storyline in understanding and managing an environmental issue. Journal of Integrative Environmental Sciences, 10 (1), 39-54.
Gustafsson, K. & Lidskog, R. (2012). Acknowledging risk, trusting expertise, and coping with uncertainty: citizens' deliberations on spraying an insect population. Society & Natural Resources, 25 (6), 587-601.
Gustafsson, K. (2011). Made in conflict: local residents' construction of a local environmental problem. Local Environment: the International Journal of Justice and Sustainability, 16 (7), 655-670.

Articles, book reviews

Gustafsson, K. M. (2015). Latest News on the Monarch Butterfly. BioScience, 65 (12), 1190-1192.

Chapters in books

Gustafsson, K. M. (2024). Biodiversity (loss) and society. In: Christine Overdevest, Elgar Encyclopedia of Environmental Sociology (pp. 17-23). . Edward Elgar Publishing.
Gustafsson, K. M. (2022). Early Career Researchers. In: Karl De Pryck; Mike Hulme, A Critical Assessment of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (pp. 71-78). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Gustafsson, K. M. (2022). (Miljö)representation inom miljösociologin: Om förebilders betydelse för naturens och disciplinens utveckling. In: Rolf Lidskog; Erik Löfmarck, En mänsklig natur: Risker, reglering och representationer (pp. 155-168). Örebro: Örebro universitet, sociologiämnet.

Collections (editor)

Benulic, K. (ed.) , Edberg, K. (ed.) & Gustafsson, K. M. (ed.) (2023). Sociologisk Forskning: Klimatkris.. Sveriges sociologförbund (Sociologisk forskning Vol. 60:3-4).

Doctoral theses, comprehensive summaries

Gustafsson, K. M. (2013). The importance of trust.: a study of knowledge production of biodiversity.. (Doctoral dissertation). (Comprehensive summary) Örebro: Örebro University.

Reports

Gustafsson, K. M. , Löfmarck, E. , Salmonsson, L. & Uggla, Y. (2019). Skrivutveckling i stora studentgrupper: Erfarenheter från ett pedagogiskt utvecklingsprojekt. Örebro: Örebro University (Arbetsrapporter från Högskolepedagogiskt centrum 1).