Fabian Pfeiffer BA MA
Fabian Pfeiffer BA MA
Research associate, pre-doc
Department of Development Studies
Sensengasse 8/18
1090 Vienna
Mail: fabian.pfeiffer@univie.ac.at
Tel.: +43 1 4277 64122
Fabian Pfeiffer works as a research associate in the fields of development economics and international political economy. In his dissertation, he examines power relations in the global fertilizer industry with a focus on geopolitics, decarbonization, and industrial development. He previously completed an MA in International Development at the University of Vienna. His other research interests include industrial policy and international trade, transnational economic policy, socio-ecological transformations, and the impact of digitalization on working conditions.
Research focus
- Development Economics
- International Political Economy
- Corporate Power and Socio-Ecological Transformations
- Global Value Chains and Production Networks
- Geopolitics
- Industrial Policy
- Food Systems
Projects
Resilience and Malleability of Social Metabolisms (REMASS)
Since 02/2026 (as project staff member, pre-doc)
REMASS explores how societies’ resource use systems respond to crises, from geopolitical conflicts and pandemics to economic recessions, climate impacts and other environmental catastrophes. By integrating socio-metabolic research with complexity science and political ecology, the project pioneers a new interdisciplinary field: socio-metabolic malleability and resilience science. The research in this field advances our understanding of the impacts of crises and disruptions on global resource flows and stocks, supply chains, trade and social wellbeing. We investigate how these disruptions influence the malleability of provisioning systems, thus offering critical insights for sustainability transformations. Because access to resource use and its outcomes is highly unevenly distributed, REMASS will link socio-metabolic research with approaches that address actors, institutions and power relations associated with resource use.