Prof. Dr Melanie Jaeger-Erben (Head of Department)
Melanie Jaeger-Erben has been Professor of Technical and Environmental Sociology at BTU Cottbus - Senftenberg since 1 October 2021. She was previously head of the Chair of Transdisciplinary Sustainability Research in Electronics at TU Berlin.
www.researchgate.net/profile/Melanie-Jaeger-Erben
Main campus, LG 10, Room 238
T +49 (0) 0355 69 2973
melanie.jaeger-erben(at)b-tu.de
Stations
- Studied Psychology and Sociology at the Universities of Göttingen and Uppsala (Sweden).
- Postgraduate course in 'Qualitative Social and Educational Research' at the Centre for Educational, Counselling and Social Research in Magdeburg (graduated in 2009).
- Doctoral studies in sociology (2010) at the University of Technology Berlin (TUB) (title of thesis: "Between routine, reflection and transformation - the change of everyday consumption through life events and the role of sustainability").
- 2004 to 2008 research assistant in the Environmental Psychology teaching and research unit at the University of Magdeburg
- 2008 to 2013 and from 2016 to the beginning of 2019 research assistant at the Centre for Technology and Society at TUB
- 2013-2016 she worked as an external consultant for the German Advisory Council on Global Change (WBGU)
- Winter semester 2018/2019 Representation of the W3 professorship "Anthropogeography with a focus on human-environment relations" at the LMU Munich
Functions and other activities
- Member of the expert commission for the German government's fourth gender equality report
- Co-leader of the ESYS working group "Energy Transition of the Built Environment" in the academy project "Energy Systems of the Future - ESYS"
- Member of the Federal Environment Agency's Resources Commission (until 2024)
- Member of the Board of Trustees of the Hans Sauer Foundation (since 2022)
- Member of the selection committee for scholarships of the German Federal Environmental Foundation (until 2024)
- Liaison lecturer at the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation
- Board member of the Institute for Social Innovation e. V. (ISInova)
- Partner of the Institute for Social Innovation Consulting UG (ISIconsult)
- Associate Editor at Sociology and Sustainability
- Associate Editor at GAIA
- Member of scientific working groups: Working Group "Circular Economy" and Working Group "Social Change" in the Future Earth Knowledge-Action Network Systems of Sustainable Consumption and Production, Member of Working Group 1 "Circular Business Models" of the Circular Economy Initiative Germany (CEID) of acatech - German Academy of Science and Engineering
Publications of the last 10 years (selection)
Beyeler, L. & Jaeger-Erben, M. (2025) Sufficiency as a matter of care: practices to provide for needs. Ecological Economics, 238(108737), 1-15. doi. org/10.1016/j.ecolecon.2025.108737
Schwickert, Samantha; Strikker, Paul; Lautermann, Christian; Jaeger-Erben, Melanie; Preis, Astrid; Hirschl, Bernd (2025). Success conditions for a just and inclusive "energy transition from below". Intersectional and feminist perspectives on citizen energy. Published in: IÖW publication series 231/25
Molnár, M., & Jaeger-Erben, M. (2025). Supporting consumer engagement in electronics repair: effects of financial incentives and voucher schemes.Journal of Responsible Production and Consumption, 2(1), 191-234.
Jaeger-Erben, M., Gram-Hanssen, K., Hansen, A. R., Frąckowiak, M., Guilbert, A., Pluciński, P., ... & Wertheim-Heck, D. S. (2025) Policies for Times of Disruptions: How Households in Europe Dealt with the Energy Crisis in the Winter 2022/2023. Available at SSRN 5092424.
Jaeger-Erben, Melanie/ Wagner, Andreas/ Bastian, Marco/ Bolln, Stefan/ Dütschke, Elisabeth/ Eiden, Benedikte/ Gierds, Jörn/ Grobler, Frederic/ Großmann, Katrin/ Hirschl, Bernd/ Holm, Andreas/ Menges, Roland/ Messerschmidt, Burkhard/ Reusswig, Fritz/ Schumacher, Jörg/ Streblow, Rita/ Weismann, Benjamin: "Wie gelingt die Energiewende im Gebäudebereich? Fields of action for a socially acceptable transformation" (Impulse), publication series "Energy Systems of the Future" (ESYS), 2025, doi.org/10.48669/esys_2025-3 .
Yalçın, N. G., Paredis, E., & Jaeger-Erben, M. (2025). Packaged science? Incumbent strategies of science capture from a power perspective. Environmental Innovation and Societal Transitions, 54, 100931.
Jaeger-Erben, M. (2024). No quick answers: Transformation research must "remain restless"!GAIA-Ecological Perspectives for Science and Society, 33(3), 289-289
Haase, L. M., Mugge, R., Mosgaard, M. A., Bocken, N., Jaeger-Erben, M., Pizzol, M., & Jørgensen, M. S. (2024). Who are the value transformers, value co-operators and value gatekeepers? New routes to value preservation in a sufficiency-based circular economy. Resources, conservation and recycling, 204, 107502.
Yalçın, N. G., Paredis, E., & Jaeger-Erben, M. (2024). Contested discourses of a circular plastics economy in Europe: prioritising material, economy, or society?Environmental Politics, 33(2), 219-239.
Rabiu, M. K., & Jaeger-Erben, M. (2024). Reducing single-use plastic in everyday social practices: Insights from a living lab experiment. resources, Conservation and Recycling, 200, 107303.
Weber, H. & Jaeger-Erben, M. (2023). Circular Economy - The turn to closed cycles as a constant fiction. Baden-Baden: Nomos.
Greene, M., Hobson, K., & Jaeger-Erben, M. (2023). Bringing the circular economy home-Insights from socio-technical perspectives on everyday consumption. Cleaner and Responsible Consumption, 100157.
Jaeger-Erben, M. (2023). Planned obsolescence - an environmental sociological deconstruction. In: Sonnberger, M., Bleicher, A., Groß, M. (eds) Handbook of Environmental Sociology. Springer VS, Wiesbaden. https://doi. org/10.1007/978-3-658-37222-4_51-1
Hipp, T., Jaeger-Erben, M. (2023). "Doing Value: How Practices of Assigning Meaning Influence the Usetime of Devices. In: Jonas, M., Nessel, S., Tröger, N. (eds) Repair, Do-It-Yourself and Circular Economy. Springer VS, Wiesbaden. https://doi. org/10.1007/978-3-658-40150-4_6
Jaeger-Erben, M., Poppe, E., Wagner, E., Schaefer, A., Druschke, J., Gröger, J., Behrens, F. (2023). Analysis of the software-based influence on a shortened useful life of products. Federal Environment Agency, Texts 13/ 2023.
Yalçın, N. G., Paredis, E., & Jaeger-Erben, M. (2023). Contested discourses of a circular plastics economy in Europe: prioritising material, economy, or society? Environmental Politics, 1-21. https://doi. org/10.1080/09644016.2023.2192145
Jaeger-Erben, M., Wieser, H., Marwede, M. & Hofmann, F. (2023). Durable Economies - Organising the Material Foundations of Society. transcript Verlag.
Jaeger-Erben, M. & Rigamonti. N. (2023). Citizen Science. In: Sonnberger, M., Bleicher, A., & Groß, M. (2023). Handbook of environmental sociology. Wiesbaden: Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden.
Jaeger-Erben, M., & Hielscher, S. (2022). Repairing conditions: How repairing and do-it-yourself changes our relationship to the world. transcript Verlag.
Barth, T., Jaeger-Erben, M., Jochum, G. & Lorenz, S. (eds.) (2022): Creating sustainable value? Labour and technology in the socio-ecological transformation (= Arbeitsgesellschaft im Wandel), Weinheim: Juventa Verlag an imprint of Julius Beltz GmbH & Co KG.
Rabiu, M. K., & Jaeger-Erben, M. (2022). Appropriation and routinisation of circular consumer practices: A review of current knowledge in the circular economy literature. Cleaner and Responsible Consumption, 100081.
Beyeler, L. & Jaeger-Erben, M. (2022): How to make more of less: Characteristics of sufficiency in business practices, in: Frontiers in Sustainability 3.
Jaeger-Erben, M., Jensen, C., Hofmann, F., Zwiers, J. (2021). There is no sustainable circular economy without a circular society. Resources, Conservation and Recycling 168, 105476. DOI: 10.1016/j.resconrec.2021.105476.
Jaeger-Erben, M., Frick, V. & Hipp, T. (2021). Why do users (not) repair their devices? A study of the predictors of repair practices. Journal of Cleaner Production, 286, 125382.10.1016/j.jclepro.2020.125382
Hielscher, S. & Jaeger-Erben, M. (2020). From quick fixes to repair projects: Insights from a citizen science project. Journal of Cleaner Production, 278, 123875. 10.1016/j.jclepro.2020.123875
Jaeger-Erben, M. (2020). Bought today - gone tomorrow. From linear to circular consumption. In: Tudor, T., & Dutra, C. J. (Eds.). (2020). The Routledge Handbook of Waste, Resources and the Circular Economy. Routledge. ISBN 9780367364649
Augenstein, K., Bachmann, B., Egermann, M., Hermelingmeier, V., Hilger, A., Jaeger-Erben, M., et al. (2020). From niche to mainstream: The dilemmas of scaling up sustainable alternatives. GAIA, 29 (3), pp. 143-147. 10.14512/gaia.29.3.3
Zwiers, J., Jaeger-Erben, M. & Hofmann, F. (2020). Circular literacy. A knowledge-based approach to the circular economy. Culture and Organisation, 26:2, 121-141. 10.1080/14759551.2019.1709065
Jaeger-Erben, M., Kramm, J., Sonnberger, M., Völker, C., et al. (2018). Building Capacities for Transdisciplinary Research: Challenges and Recommendations for Early-Career Researchers. GAIA (4/2018), 379-386. 10.14512/gaia.27.4.10
John, R., Jaeger-Erben, M. & Rückert-John, J. (2016): Elusive Practices: Considerations on limits and possibilities of environmental policy for sustainable consumption. Journal of Environmental Policy and Governance. 26 (2): 129-140. 10.1002/eet.1706
Jaeger-Erben, M.; Rückert-John, J. (2015). Researching transitions to sustainable consumption: A practice-theory approach to innovation in consumption. In: Putting Sustainability into Practice: Advances and Applications of Social Practice Theories, Edited by Emily Huddart Kennedy, Maurie J. Cohen, and Naomi Krogman. Edward Elgar. pp. 159-184. 10.4337/9781784710606
Jaeger-Erben, M., Rückert-John, J. & M. Schäfer (2015). Sustainable consumption through social innovation: A typology of innovations for sustainable consumption practices. Journal of Cleaner Production, 108, 784-798. 10.1016/j.jclepro.2015.07.042
Current research projects
Click here for an overview of all current research projects of the chair
Main research areas
- Social science technology research
- Sustainable consumption and production systems
- Social innovation and social change
- Qualitative research methods, mixed methods and participatory procedures