Ass.-Prof. Dr. Nina Klimburg-Witjes, MA

Tenure Track Professorship: Infrastructures, Innovation and Global Politics

FUTURESPACE

Tel.:+43-1-4277-49610

eMail: nina.witjes@univie.ac.at 

Consultation Hours:

to be arranged by email


Teaching: Link ufind

Biography

Nina's work centres on the complex and dynamic relationships between infrastructures, innovation, and shifting geopolitical landscapes. Her research employs qualitative, empirical methods to develop a grounded understanding of the interplay between global politics and technological transformations. Particularly, her work focuses on outer space governance, exploring topics such as cooperation, militarization, and environmental justice, as well as the nexus between security infrastructures, (digital) technologies and innovation discourses.

In 2022, Nina Klimburg-Witjes was awarded an ERC Starting Grant for her project "FUTURESPACE" The project uses the European Ariane 6 rocket as a case study to investigate the complex connections between large-scale infrastructures, European integration practices, and envisioned space futures in the new space race. Methodologically, Nina and her team will conduct an interdisciplinary ethnography, linking social science and aerospace engineering to explore the material, political, and imaginative dimensions of space infrastructures and their politics.

Nina is an active member of the international STS community. She regularly organizes panels at leading STS conferences and participates in various international academic networks and societies. She holds elected positions on the Council of the European Association for the Study of Science and Technology (EASST) and the Austrian Academy of Science (ÖAW) Young Academy, co-founded the international network for the Social Studies of Outer Space (SSOS) and is a member of the International Network on Security and Technology in Outer Space.

Nina Klimburg-Witjes received her PhD in Science and Technology Studies (STS) from the Technical University of Munich in 2017 (MCTS) and was co-leader of the research group "Science, Technology and Security" of the Engineering Responsibility Lab. She was a visiting researcher at the European Space Policy Institute (ESPI) in Vienna, a research fellow at the Austrian Research Foundation for International Development (OEFSE) as well as the Austrian Institute for International Policy (OIIP), and a research fellow at the Institute of Sociology at the Albert Ludwig University Freiburg.

Main Research Interests

  •  Imaginaries and Politics Outer Space
  • Infrastructures of In/Security
  • Technology, innovation and Securitization 
  • Social studies of outer space and future visions of Earth-Space relations,
  • Science, technology and international relations 
  • Fieldwork in contexts of secrecy 

 

 

Recent Publications

Sensing In/Security

Autor(en)
Nina Klimburg-Witjes, Nikolaus Pöchhacker, Geoffrey C. Bowker
Abstrakt

Sensing In/Security is a book project that investigates how sensors and sensing practices enact regimes of security and insecurity. It extends long standing concerns with infrastructuring and emergent modes of surveillance and securitization by investigating how digitally networked sensors shape practices of securitization. Contributions in this volume engage with the ways in which sensing devices gain political and epistemic relevance in various forms of security, from border security and migration control to drone regulation, epidemiological tracking, aerial surveillance and hacking practices.
Using infrastructure and infrastructuring as a conceptual lens, these studies explore the conditions of possibility of sensing threats and in/security, rendering multiple worlds tangible and (sometimes even more importantly) intangible. Instead of solely focusing on the specific sensory devices and their consequences, this collection engages with the emergence of sensor infrastructures and networks and the shaping of such ‘macro entities’ as international organizations, states and the European Union.

Organisation(en)
Institut für Wissenschafts- und Technikforschung
DOI
https://doi.org/10.28938/9781912729050
Publikationsdatum
2021
Peer-reviewed
Ja
ÖFOS 2012
509025 Technikforschung, 509024 Sicherheitsforschung, 509017 Wissenschaftsforschung
Schlagwörter
Link zum Portal
https://ucrisportal.univie.ac.at/de/publications/5cf2917c-08cf-4cca-b982-582ee36938c8