The researchers of the Centre for Environment, Economy and Energy (C3E) operate at the crossroads of today’s turbulent transitions, which constitute key governance challenges and opportunities in Europe and worldwide. The sustainability imperative requires private and public decision-makers to steer our societies towards decarbonised, resource efficient economies as recognised in the European Green Deal, New Generation Europe, in the 2015 Paris Agreement and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). If governed successfully, this presents the prospect of rejuvenating our socio-economic and political systems, making them fit for a sustainable future.

The Centre analyses and develops innovative legal and policy instruments that can be used to govern the transitions, within the EU and in its external relations. Positioning ourselves at the interface of academia with political, legal and other societal decision-making, we focus in particular on the international and European governance of the environmental, economic and energy transitions and their interactions.

Today’s transitions entail a techno-economic element about how innovation in different sectors of our (market) economies can come about and conquer the marketplace. Our researchers also pay attention to the governance of democratic transitions, and the ensuing reconciliation of diverging societal values.

Key themes

  • The techno-economic transition
  • Democratic transition governance
  • Reconciliation of values
  • Innovative laws, policies and policy frameworks
  • European external relations