I work at the intersection of environmental justice, land and resource politics and governance, and social‑ecological transformation, with empirical work in South America, Central Europe and Indonesia. My research connects political ecology and critical resource geographies to understand how agribusiness, mining, energy systems and digital technologies reshape territories, livelihoods and human–technology–environment relations.
For a full list of publications, talks and interactions beyond the scientific community, go to Publications.
For interconnections among my research projects, go to Projects.
Environmental justice, soy agribusiness and extractivism
A core strand of my research asks why environmental injustices persist even when all the conditions for open conflict seem to be present. Building on long‑term fieldwork in Argentina’s soy frontier, I developed the Environmental Justice Incommensurabilities Framework (EJIF) to compare actor realities, diagnose pre‑conflict situations and reflect on the strengths and blind spots of different environmental justice approaches. I use this framework to analyse soy agribusiness, land grabbing, agribusiness towns, informal recycling, and more recent debates on lithium and “green” extractivism in South America.
My Routledge monograph Environmental Justice and Soy Agribusiness brings these threads together and has helped to establish this focus internationally. It complements articles such as “Environmental Justice Incommensurabilities Framework”, “Resourcing Salta”, “Re‑primarization revisited”, “Ressourcenboom in Südamerika” and “The soy‑production fair(y) tale?”, as well as my PhD thesis … and justice for all? on environmental justice in the Argentine soy agribusiness.
Selected publications
- Hafner, R. (2020): Environmental Justice Incommensurabilities Framework: monitoring and evaluating environmental justice concepts, thought styles and human-environment relations. DIE ERDE – Journal of the Geographical Society of Berlin 151(2-3): 67-76. https://doi.org/10.12854/erde-2020-486.
- Hafner, R. (2018): Environmental Justice and Soy Agribusiness. Earthscan Food and Agriculture Series. London: Routledge. ISBN: 978-0-815-38535-6.
- Dorn, F.; Hafner, R. (2018): Re-primarization revisited: an analysis of decision-making variables in the Argentine soy agribusiness (1993–2015). Sustentabilidade em Debate 9(2): 14-26.
- Hafner, R.; Rainer, G. (2017): Resourcing Salta. Viticulture, soy farming and the contested commodification of land. DIE ERDE 148(2-3): 121-133.
- Hafner, R.; Rainer, G.; Ruiz-Peyré, F.; Coy, M. (2016): Ressourcenboom in Südamerika: Alte Praktiken – neue Diskurse? Zeitschrift für Wirtschaftsgeographie 60(1-2): 25-39.
- Hafner, R.; Coy, M. (2016): The soy-production fair(y) tale? Latin American perspectives on globalized dynamics, territoriality and environmental justice. In: Fairness and Justice in Natural Resource Politics. Routledge, London/New York: 129‑148.
- Hafner, R. (2016): … and justice for all? Environmental Justice and Soy Agribusiness in the Argentine Soy Boom. PhD thesis, University of Innsbruck.
Social‑ecological transformation and values‑based food systems
A second focus is on social‑ecological transformation and values‑based modes of production and consumption. Together with colleagues, I analyse Community Supported Agriculture and related initiatives as part of a “third food regime” and explore how values‑based practices can reconfigure food systems in Austria and beyond. In an FWF‑funded Young Independent Research Group, we link critical state theory, social capital and territoriality to study values‑based food systems across Austria, Argentina, the Czech Republic and Switzerland.
In this area I co‑authored work on values‑based supply chains, solidarity agriculture and food alternatives, and we increasingly connect these debates to questions of social‑ecological transformation and resource politics.
Selected publications
- Plank, C.; Stotten, R.; Hafner, R. (2024): Values-based modes of production and consumption: Analyzing how food alternatives transform the current food regime. Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems 8. https://doi.org/10.3389/fsufs.2024.1266145.
- Plank, C.; Hafner, R; Stotten, R. (2020): Analyzing values-based modes of production and consumption: Community-supported agriculture in the Austrian Third Food Regime. Österreichische Zeitschrift für Soziologie 45: 49–68. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11614-020-00393-1.
- Plank, C.; Hafner, R.; Stotten, R. (2021): Wertebasierte Produktions- und Konsumweisen im WTO-zentrierten Nahrungsregime. Jahrbuch für Geschichte des ländlichen Raumes 17 (2020): 185-194. https://doi.org/10.25365/rhy–2020-11.
- Stotten, R.; Plank, C.; Hafner, R. (2019): Wertebasierte Produktions- und Konsumweisen am Beispiel Solidarischer Landwirtschaft in Österreich. In: Perspectives on Values-based Supply Chains. 29th Annual Conference of the Austrian Society of Agricultural Economics (Tagungsband). Innsbruck: 9-10.
- Dorn, F.M.; Hafner, R.; Ruiz Peyré, F.; Krapovickas, J. (2022): Counter-Imperial Mode of Living and Surviving – Contextualizations from South America. DIE ERDE 153(2): 97–108. https://doi.org/10.12854/erde-2022-620.
Human–technology–environment relations and the Anthropocene
I am interested in how technologies mediate human–technology–environment relations, from remote‑controlled “online farms” to more‑than‑human perspectives on the Anthropocene. Empirically, this includes work on smart farming enterprises, territoriality in global production networks, and the socio‑ecological dynamics of urban and rural agribusiness hubs in Argentina and Brazil. I also analyse how different actors frame social‑ecological transformation as a geographical concept in ongoing work with colleagues.
Conceptually, I engage with Anthropocene thought styles, showing how different epistemic communities frame global change, responsibility and possible futures. This feeds into broader debates on social‑ecological transformation and on the role of geography in navigating contested trajectories of change.
Selected publications
- Kister, J.; Dorn. F.M.; Hafner, R. (2024): Framing social–ecological transformation as a geographical concept. Geography Compass, e12744. https://doi.org/10.1111/gec3.12744.
- Dorn, F.M.; Hafner, R. (2023): Territory, territoriality and territorialization in global production networks. Población & Sociedad 30(1), 27-47. https://dx.doi.org/10.19137/pys–2023–300102.
- Obermayr, C.; Coy, M.; Hafner, R.; Töpfer, T. (2023): Lessons from Brasília: Reasoning and (Un)intended Consequences of a Capital City Relocation. In: Assembling Nusantara. Mimicry, Friction, and Resonance in the New Capital Development (Springer). https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-981-99-3533-8_12.
- Hafner, R. (2022): The Anthropocene: Thought styles, controversies and their expansions. A review. DIE ERDE 153(3), 149-161. https://doi.org/10.12854/erde-2022-619.
- Coy, M.; Hafner, R. (2022): Thinking the Anthropocene. DIE ERDE 153(3), 133-137. https://doi.org/10.12854/erde-2022-638.
- Preininger, E.; Hafner, R. (2021): I have a garden on the Internet! Searching for the farmer in a remotely controlled farming enterprise. Geographica Helvetica 76(2): 249-260. https://dx.doi.org/10.5194/gh-76-249-2021.
Meta‑theory, Q-methodology and visceral methods
My Habilitation develops a meta‑theoretical framework for doing geography, drawing on Ludwik Fleck’s concepts of thought styles and thought collectives. I use this to map “thought‑style traffic” within and between scientific communities, identify incommensurabilities, and position research outputs between frontier science and more consolidated forms such as handbook and textbook science. This framework is informed by and applied to my work on land‑resource conflicts, environmental justice, food systems and human–technology–environment relations.
Methodologically, I work with Q methodology and visceral methods to bring more‑than‑rational dimensions into environmental and transformation research. In my projects on climate‑ and energy‑related conflicts and food alternatives, I use Q methodology to capture diverse subjectivities and thought styles, and combine Q with more‑than‑rational, embodied and sensory approaches inspired by jazz methodology and visceral geography. This includes sensory and sonic techniques, auto‑visceral writing and participatory formats that explicitly engage with emotions, positionalities and the body in human–environment research.
Selected publications
- Hafner, R. (2023): Von Denkstilen und kontextbasierenden Tatsachen. Zur Koexistenz divergierender Realitäten von Mensch-Technik-Umwelt-Beziehungen in Argentinien. In: Kulturen im Anthropozän. Eine interdisziplinäre Herausforderung. Oekom, München: 339-356. https://www.oekom.de/buch/kulturen-im-anthropozaen-9783962384135.
- Hafner, R. (2022): Viszerale Methoden. In: Mehr-als-menschliche Geographien. Schlüsselkonzepte, Beziehungen und Methodiken. Steiner: 297-316. https://elibrary.steiner-verlag.de/content/chapter/99.105010/9783515132305/298-317/1.
- Hafner, R. (2020): Environmental Justice Incommensurabilities Framework. DIE ERDE 151(2-3): 67-76. https://doi.org/10.12854/erde-2020-486.
- Hafner, R. (2018): handlung | macht | raum : Urbane Materialsammler-Kooperativen und ihre Livelihoods-Strategien in Buenos Aires. In: Obrecht, A.J. (ed.): Wissen und Entwicklung III. Studien Verlag: 126-138.
- Kister, J.; Hafner, R. (2017): Fairness und Wissenstransfer: Ein Experiment durch die Blume. In: Innsbrucker Jahresbericht 2016-2017: 239-253.
- Coy, M.; Hafner, R.; Rainer, G. (2017): Im Griff der Globalisierung – Rahmenbedingungen des Sojabooms und neue Raumkonfigurationen in Südamerika. In: Die Amerikas – Brücken und Brüche. Bayreuther Kontaktstudium Geographie 9: 127-150.