Contact

Jenny Stenberg is a researcher in urban design and planning and is employed as an associate professor at Chalmers Architecture. Jenny has been a project leader for the Interplace project. Her research, which is action-oriented, deals with social aspects of the vision of sustainable development and, particularly, citizen participation in planning of the physical urban environment. Jenny has a special interest in the buildings of the »million programme« (housing areas built in the 1960s and 70s), as it faces extensive repairs and conversion in terms of energy, and also in the population in the million programme whose energy and knowledge should be an asset to the whole of the urban development – in the suburbs as well as in the renovation of the harbour area in the centre of the city. This interest has led to Jenny’s research being transdisciplinary, which means that she considers all the actors in society – researchers, municipal employees and inhabitants/citizens – as knowledge producers, knowledge carriers and knowledge users. Academics thus do not have the sole right to the role of knowledge producers in research. This also involves seeing the implementation as an integrated part of the research process, not something that is handed to so-called practitioners to deal with after the researchers have put forward their results.

Department of Architecture
Chalmers University of Technology
+46 31-772 2346
+46 730-44 57 90
jenny.stenberg@chalmers.se
chalmers.se/en/Staff/Pages/jenny-stenberg.aspx
urbanempower.se
mellanplats.se
interplace.se
apricus.pro

Hans Abrahamsson is an associate professor in peace and development research at the School of Global Studies at the University of Gothenburg and a guest professor in Global Political Studies at Malmö University. Hans’s research deals with the interaction between globalisation, international migration and urbanisation and how these processes affect the conditions for sustainable societal urban development.

School of Global Studies
University of Gothenburg
+46 31-786 1411
hans.abrahamsson@globalstudies.gu.se

Henric Benesch is an architect and has a PhD in design at the School of Design and Crafts at the University of Gothenburg where he also works as a researcher and lecturer and is responsible for the research in design. In recent years, Henric has worked with artistic and cross-disciplinary research with the focus on the role that design and design processes can take in the dynamic processes of change within rural development, organisations and education. There has been special interest here in how something ‘new’ can come out of something given and how research and research processes can be developed and understood from the perspective of ‘doing’, which does not differentiate between theory and practice. Henric also leads a research cluster that focuses on urbanity and critical cultural heritage in the University of Gothenburg’s investment in cultural heritage and he works as a project developer at the Centre for Healthcare Architecture at Chalmers Architecture.

HDK School of Design and Crafts
University of Gothenburg
+46 730-346 460
henric.benesch@hdk.gu.se

Martin Berg has an MSc in Global Studies focusing on sustainable urban development and cross-disciplinary knowledge production. He has worked as a consultant on different projects and processes that focus on sustainability issues and urban cultivation. Martin is currently participating in a preliminary study on knowledge tourism and capacity building from Angered to Nossebro. In spring 2013, Martin will start a two-year project linked to Mistra Urban Futures that looks at urban cultivation and conditions for new green jobs. Martin also works as a project leader for the Göteborg Region Association of Local Authorities (GR), focusing on youth unemployment and new technology. Martin Berg was an editor on the book Framtiden är redan här (The Future Is Already Here) together with Sara Danielsson.

Private firm Martin Berg
+46 704-454012
kajmartinberg@gmail.com

Pål Castell works as a lecturer and researcher at the Centre for Urban Studies in Hammarkullen and at the Department of Architecture at Chalmers University of Technology. Pål is a landscape architect and has a PhD in sustainable urban development with the thesis Managing yards and togetherness, which is based on participation in the care of residential yards for theory development on social sustainability. As an urban development consultant, Pål has worked with green walks and other forms of citizen participation. He also works on issues of citizens’ influence on rural development and the right to public space, and he is active in Architects Without Borders and other non-profit initiatives.

Department of Architecture

Chalmers University of Technology
Centre for Urban Studies in Hammarkullen
+46 736-200 668
castell@chalmers.se

Emma Corkhill is a cultural geographer, and process and project leader with experience of creating meetings and dialogue in different contexts. In the research project, Emma works partly from the Faculty of Fine, Applied and Performing Arts at the University of Gothenburg and partly from Region Västra Götaland to develop the project Young Energy – a dialogue project on urban planning and climate change in collaboration with municipalities and city districts. In the research project, Emma has worked primarily in Backa, Norra Hisingen, partly with action-based research on the project Videobutiken (video shop) and collaboration with the district council, and partly with interviews and literature analysis on citizen dialogue.

Faculty of Fine, Applied and Performing Arts
University of Gothenburg
Young Energy
Region Västra Götaland
emma.corkhill@konst.gu.se
emma@ungenergi.se

Sara Danielsson has a master’s in interior design from the School of Design and Crafts and runs the design studio Design Stories in Gothenburg. Sara’s project focuses on sustainable development, and she is interested in how a designer can create conditions for people to take part in shaping environments and products – design as a social process rather than a ready solution to a formulated problem. Sara has published several handbooks to help citizens become more involved in shaping public places, for example, Tre steg för nytt stadsliv (Three Steps for a New City Life), Så här påverkar du din stadsmiljö (How to Influence Your Urban Environment) and Konsten att Odla Staden – en handbok för stadsodling (The Art of Urban Cultivating – A Handbook for Urban Cultivation). Sara started a two-year project in 2013 for Mistra Urban Futures on urban cultivation and conditions for new green jobs. In the research project, Sara works from the School of Design and Crafts. The book Framtiden är redan här (The Future is Already Here) was written together with Sara Danielsson and Martin Berg as editors.

Design Stories
+46 737-004363
sara@designstories.se
www.saradanielsson.se

Anna Fridén is process leader and conflict handler with long experience of creating meetings and dialogue in different contexts. Anna is employed by Region Västra Götaland’s Environment Secretariat where she has worked primarily on the project Young Energy – a dialogue project for youth on urban planning and climate change in collaboration with municipalities. For the last two years, the work in the region has involved bringing in and developing the experiences from the dialogue Young Energy in this research project.

Young Energy
Region Västra Götaland
annafriden@gmail.com
www.pussla.se

Rakel Heed Styffe is an artist, and process and project leader. Rakel has worked for about four years for Region Västra Götaland’s Environment Secretariat on the project Young Energy, which is a dialogue project focusing on involvement by youth in climate policy. Over the years, the Interplace project work in the region has allowed the practical experiences from the dialogue with Young Energy to be brought into the Interplace research project. Rakel also works as a youth culture consultant at the association KulturUngdom (Culture Youth) to support culture creation by youth. She also runs her own artistic projects. For the book Framtiden är redan här (The Future Is Already Here), Rakel has designed the cover and contributed illustrations.

Young Energy
Region Västra Götaland
+46 739-127043
rakel@ungenergi.se

Lars Jadelius is an associate professor in architecture and a researcher in cultural studies focusing on design theory, modernity, cultural heritage, knowledge development and learning processes. Lars works as a consultant and chairman of the Society of World Village. An important basis for the work is Lars’s thesis Folk, form och funktionalism (People, Form and Functionalism) and its discussions on how abstract universalism and closed communities have developed historically. Lars has then proceeded to studies of principle on institutions and their buildings, which are considered cultural investments. Lars now works on the interplay between democratic change processes and tradition, with inspiration from, among other things, pattern language (Alexander), institutionalism (Hodgson) and Actor Network Theory (Latour, Law et al.). The idea is that we need to develop a conscious balance between strategies for change and what could be called ‘making use’ strategies. The approach is pragmatic research work that tests theories and methods in real learning processes.

Pilotprojektkontoret AB
+46 31-82 85 19
+46 76-12 57 189
lars.jadelius@telia.com

Vanja Larberg is an architect, educated at Chalmers Architecture, artist and pedagogue. Vanja has worked as an architect-pedagogue in schools and pre-schools in Gothenburg, a guide and critic at Chalmers Architecture and a freelance writer. Vanja has illustrated a children’s book and a poetry book, both of which are based on movements in the city. Since 2009, Vanja has been employed as a planning leader at S2020, which is the City of Gothenburg’s mission for social sustainability. Vanja has also taken part in the Mistra Urban Futures pilot project Den lärande staden (The Learning City).

S2020, Social Resource Management
City of Gothenburg
+46 31-3679068
+46 76-7700854
vanja.larberg@socialresurs.goteborg.se
www.kunskapsmatris-s2020.se

Nazem Tahvilzadeh has a PhD in public administration from the University of Gothenburg and he researches democracy and public organisations. Nazem works at the Royal Institute of Technology at the Division of Urban and Regional Studies where he researches urban policy and sustainable development. Nazem’s areas of interest span issues of sustainability, the multi-ethnic society, organisation of the administration, roles of officials and the power of local democracy.

The Division of Urban and Regional studies
Department of Urban Planning and Environment
KTH Royal Institute of Technology
+46 707-913658
nazem.tahvilzadeh@abe.kth.se