Meet the Scientific Advisory Board (SAB) of FRONT research programme
SAB will offer scientific advice, ensure the quality and relevance of the research, and help to steer the programme towards achieving its goals. Here we present our SAB members. We are very happy to have this multidisciplinary board of sustainability research experts supporting our research programme.
Professor Susan L. Cutter
Prof. Susan Cutter is a Carolina Distinguished Professor of Geography at the University of South Carolina and co-director of the Hazards Vulnerability & Resilience Institute (HVRI). Her research focuses on vulnerability and resilience science with specific reference to methods, models, and metrics. Dr. Cutter is an elected fellow of American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), and the recipient of her discipline’s highest awards: American Association of Geographers (AAG) Lifetime Achievement, Presidential Achievement, and the Wilbanks Award for Transformation Research. She is also the foreign member of the Royal Norwegian Society of Sciences and Letters and an elected member of both the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the U.S. National Academy of Sciences.
Professor Carl Folke
Prof. Carl Folke is Director of the Beijer Institute of Ecological Economics of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. He is also founder and Chair of the Board of the Stockholm Resilience Centre at Stockholm University. His research focuses on resilience and sustainability within economic and social-ecological systems. Prof. Folke has produced some three hundred publications and is recognized as a highly cited researcher. He has received several honors and prizes, amongst them the Heineken Prize for environmental sciences (2022), the Grande Médaille Albert I, Science, Institut Océanographique de Monaco (2021); HM The King of Sweden’s Medal 8th size with the ribbon of the Order of the Seraphim (2018). He is member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences (since 2002) and the U.S. National Academy of Sciences (since 2017).
Professor Torger Andreas Olsen
Torger Andreas Olsen is Professor in Indigenous studies, UiT, The Arctic University of Norway. Olsen is the Academic director at the Centre of Sami Studies in UiT. His research interests include Sami and indigenous issues in school and education, gender, power, and positions in Indigenous studies. He has expertized in the history of religions in Sápmi and Northern Norway. He has recently published research on Indigenous Religion representation on film and Exploring Sámi language instruction for young learners, using comparative case studies in Finland and Norway. His expertise aligns with Resilient human-society relations theme that collaborates with Giellagas Institute.
Professor Outi Uusitalo
Outi Uusitalo is Professor of Marketing in University of Jyväskylä, serving as a Head of Marketing discipline and Sustainable Business research group at Jyväskylä University School of Business and Economics. She is currently involved in the BIODIFUL project consortium, which aims to promote biodiversity awareness across society. Her research focuses on sustainability within marketing and consumer research. The objective is to promote a sustainable culture and generate positive impacts on well-being, while also developing strategies to address complex ecological challenges, such as climate change and biodiversity loss.
Professor Arjen Wals
Arjen Wals is Professor of Transformative Learning for Socio-ecological Sustainability at Wageningen University, Netherlands and holds the Unesco Chair of Social Learning and Sustainable Development. He is currently also Guest Professor of Faculty of Science & Technology at Norwegian University of Life Sciences and KINDNow at Western Norway University of Applied Sciences. His recent work focusses on transformative social learning in vital coalitions of multiple stakeholders at the interface of science and society. Teaching and research focus on designing learning processes and learning spaces that enable people to contribute meaningfully sustainability.