I am currently head of the Working Group POLISES which uses agent-based models to study the impact of policies on land user behavior and consequences on the social-ecological system. This includes agri-environmental schemes for European agriculture and climate related policies such as insurance. In prior projects we investigated intended and unintended effects of global policy instruments on the social-ecological resilience of smallholders. We focused on the impact of policies targeting climate risk in common property regimes of pastoralists in Africa (Morocco and Kenya/Ethiopia).
On a conceptual level, I work in an international team of modellers, psychologists, agroeconomists and natural scientists on adequate representations of human behaviour in agent-based models. Furthermore, I am interested in how to describe models in an appropriate and standardised manner to increase their comprehensibility and comparison and how to foster model reuse and building up on each others work.