PhD studentship: Modelling social-ecological feedbacks and their role in water governance in stressed river basins: a comparison between the Amudarya (Uzbekistan) and the Tisza (Hungary) rivers

Project description
The Amudarya and the Tisza river basins experienced rapid socio-political and economic change after the break-up of the Soviet Union. This restructuring happened at a time where the river basins were already stressed by increasing environmental degradation and extreme events (floods and droughts).

Water governance as well as stakeholders have reacted in different ways to these pressures, but so far failed to adapt the basin to the new conditions and prepare it for future challenges of climate change and socio-economic transition.

One of the reasons for the lack of adaptation is the lack of horizontal and verti-cal integration of the water management regime and its link to the ecological system that could promote social learning and adaptive governance.

The aim of the PhD is to improve understanding of factors that promote and prevent social and institutional change towards more sustainable water use with the use of simulation modelling.

This PhD project forms part of the project SES-LINK that aims at systematically investi-gating social-ecological linkages in hypothetical and real case studies and assesses their implication for the resilience and governance of social-ecological systems.

Particular emphasis in the river basin cases will be given to the implications of:

1) the structure of actor interactions and nature-related interdependencies between actors

2) informal networks and institutions

3) social-ecological feedbacks such as the use of ecosystem services and the monitoring of ecological status for the co-development of the social-ecological system (SES) and its ecological, social and economic performance and adaptability.

The PhD will map relevant social-ecological linkages and develop an empirically-based simu-lation model representing major interactions to assess the co-development and resilience of the SES using comparative scenario analysis.

The PhD project will use existing data from extensive previous research. Additional data collection, if needed, will be carried out in close collaboration with Uzbek and Hungarian master and/or PhD students.

The integrative analysis of social-ecological linkages re-quires a student with interest, knowledge and ability to learn and apply concepts from the natural and social sciences and experience with applying formal approaches (preferably modelling) to study the behaviour of a system over time.

The PhD Student will be superised by Dr. Maja Schlüter (Stockholm Resilience Centre) and Prof. Claudia Pahl-Wostl (University of Osnabrück, Germany). He/she will be part of an interdisciplinary team of researchers in the SES-LINK project and given the opportunity of research stays at the Institute of Environmental Systems Analysis at the University of Osnabrück.

Qualifications
Applications will be assessed based on the following criteria:
- theoretical knowledge relevant to the research project (institutional analysis, social net-works, ecosystem services, game theory, system dynamics, etc.)

- practical experience and knowledge of relevance for the project

- analytical ability as demonstrated by a scientific report, paper or degree project thesis

- the applicants personal references

- gender equality aspects

An interdisciplinary background in environmental and system science or — in case of a dis-ciplinary background - knowledge/experience in the respective other field is strongly mer-iting as is experience with dynamic modeling (agent-based, system dynamics, ODE).

Nature of positions
A Ph.D position lasts four years and is a full time position. After acceptance of the PhD project plan prepared by the student in cooperation with the supervisor, the student will be employed on a doctoral studentship ("doktorandanställning") of currently 22 600 SEK/month. Up to 20% teaching or other work may be included in the position, which will then be extended accordingly, at most to 5 years. Salary increases follow the relevant salary scale.

More details about the project can be requested from Dr. Maja Schlüter, phone +46 (0)73 460 4910, e-mailmaja.schlueter@stockholmresilience.su.se.

Union representatives are Anqi Lindblom-Ahlm (SACO), Lisbeth Häggberg (Fackför-bundet ST), tfn 08-16 2000 (switch board), Gunnar Stenberg (SEKO), tfn 070-316 43 41.

Application details
The application should contain:

- a letter of intent (one to two pages that explain why you are interested in working on this project why you are interested in studying for a PhD, what you hope to accomplish during your PhD studies, and what skills you can bring to this pro-ject)

- curriculum vitae

- copies of degree certificates and transcripts of academic records (all attested)

- a list of two persons who may act as referees (with phone numbers and email addresses)

- one copy of your undergraduate thesis and articles, if any.

The full application should be labelled 'PhD-studentship Dnr 26/2012 and sent as one pdf-file to dnr26-2012@ecology.su.se no later than 20 November 2012.