Research Vision

Conducting research to create a more sustainable world requires innovative thinking, a long-term programmatic approach, and the ability to work across disciplinary boundaries. This is why the Rudolf Agricola School for Sustainable Development brings together specialist researchers from a wide range of academic disciplines to address the complex and urgent challenges facing our societies today.

Our ambition is to support sustainability research that not only advances academic knowledge but also contributes to real and lasting societal change. We aim to build strong connections between different fields of science, thereby strengthening the connection between science and policy, practice, and citizens.

To boost sustainability research, Agricola employs a combination of bottom-up and top-down approaches. 

Top-down researchers affiliated with the Rudolf Agricola School work within four thematic areas (typically 50-100 researchers) that reflect the diverse dimensions of sustainable development. Fair and just development is at the heart of the Development, Security and Justice theme. The place-based challenges of sustainability are dominant within the theme Sustainable Landscapes and Regions. Making collective decisions and productive public debate is central to the theme of Democracy and Governance. The cross-cutting impact and robustness against crises are the core of the Risk, Crises, and Resilience theme. Each theme has a theme director who supports and stimulates the fellows and groups to boost productivity and impact.

Bottom-up researchers can develop research programmes in smaller research groups (typically 5-15 researchers) on diverse sustainability topics that connect strongly with their expertise. Groups can develop themselves into inter- and transdisciplinary research centres supported by Agricola. Agricola currently hosts approximately 35 research groups, some in the early stages of development and others that are very mature and well-established. Every research group has one or more academic leads. 

In addition to these core themes, the Rudolf Agricola School facilitates a number of inter-thematic research groups and initiatives. These focus on enabling collaboration and innovation across our research community, particularly in the areas of language and communication, circularity and green, and software and data.

For more information about the four themes and the groups that fall within each theme, as well as the interthematic groups and initiatives, please click the menu.