Joint Research Projects

DFG Research Training Group 1613 "Risk and East Asia"

The Research Training Group (or Graduiertenkolleg) Risk and East Asia was established in October 2009 as an international and English language doctoral college within the Institute of East Asian Studies (IN-EAST) at the University of Duisburg-Essen, with generous support from the German Science Foundation (DFG) and the University of Duisburg-Essen. The Research Training Group cooperates closely with the White Rose East Asia Centre at the Universities of Leeds and Sheffield in the UK.

IN-EAST School of Advanced Studies

The IN-EAST School of Advanced Studies constitutes a joint enterprise of researchers at the IN-EAST and colleagues in various faculties and research networks at the University of Duisburg-Essen. It has been founded in order to explore the issue of innovation in East Asia from a multidisciplinary perspective that allows for the generation of new knowledge and the advancement of new methodological approaches.

The IN-EAST School of Advanced Studies’ research agenda takes the embeddedness of processes of innovation in society as a whole as its general interest. In this context the focus lies on the interdependent topics of electro-mobility and urban systems. All research activities take East Asia (China, Japan, Korea) as subject of their analysis, but provide interfaces for international comparisons and comparative research agendas.

Käte Hamburger Kolleg / Centre for Global Cooperation Research

The Käte Hamburger Kolleg/Centre for Global Cooperation Research (KHK/GCR21) is an interdisciplinary research institute of the University of Duisburg-Essen. Funded for an initial six-year period by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research, the Centre is the newest addition to a list of ten Käte Hamburger centres engaged in international research in the humanities.

The Centre regards global cooperation as the key to solving urgent transnational problems. It offers a broad framework within which to consider how the cultural premises and dynamics of emerging global governance might be translated into global cooperation. We encourage the exchange of knowledge not only amongst the Centre’s own international research fellows, but also with practitioners in the field and interested members of the general public.

Research training group “Precaution, prevision, prediction: managing contingency”

How can contingency be managed through action, and what do people think about the relationship between present thought and action and their uncertain (or believed to be certain) future? The historical dimension of these highly topical questions is the subject of research by the historians at the University of Duisburg-Essen. In their work, they explore and expand on theoretical thinking that is based on a fundamentally new view of contingency as one of the characteristics of modernity. This approach is novel in that it shifts the level of analysis away from the beliefs about the future to the level of the active attitudes of actors towards the future and of the options for action these active attitudes make possible. By comparing different cultures and different epochs, the aim is thus to explore the plurality of social horizons of possibility in order to make a meaningful contribution to contemporary discourse on modernity. In keeping with the main areas of research at the Historical Institute in Essen, the doctoral projects will deal with the cultures of Greco-Roman antiquity, medieval and early modern Europe, and the globalized world since the 18^th century.

Through its innovative theoretical approach and diachronic, cross-cultural research design, the research group is able to offer its doctoral candidates training on a high methodological and theoretical level. The specially tailored programme and structured supervision ensure that candidates are successfully guided towards relevant themes and desiderata of research and equally that they achieve their academic qualification and are prepared for the employment market.

Cross-Border Labor Markets

Since 2011 the main research area funds coordinated applications to the German Research Fund (DFG) of UDE scientists, which focus their research on “Transnational Labout Markets”. Peers from different faculties of the university have conceived projects from the angle of their own field of research, focusing however on the mentioned topic. Currently three research projects benefit of DFG-funding, others are in the drafting phase or are headed for assessement.

The conglomerate of the main research area and the project "Transnational Labor Markets" aims to assess and examine phenomenon of transnationalisation of labor in three respects: 1. the regard of transnational mobility of labor force, 2. the aspect of transnationalisation of production sites and place of employment and lastly 3. the respect of mobility of labor activity. The approved and planned research projects focus on one of these key topics in respect to the overall questions on formation of transnational institutions or the continuity of regionally diverse forms of labor.

Within the scope of the main research area “Transformation of Contemporary Societies” this emerging research focus benefits not only from the expertise in labor and labor market research but also by receiving access to profound experiences with regional scientists and research of comparative societies. This profound knowledge is found in the different institutes, faculties and central reesearch institutions.

Project Management
Prof. Dr. Ingo Schulz-Schaeffer, Institute of Sociology, University of Duisburg-Essen
Prof. Karen Shire, PhD, Institute of Sociology, University of Duisburg-Essen
Prof. Dr. Petra Stein, Institute of Sociology, University of Duisburg-Essen