Nitsan Shakked is a PhD researcher at the Hertie School. She holds an Master of Arts in Global Affairs from Yale University, a Master of Science in Environmental Geosciences from Tübingen University and a Bachelor of Science in Earth Sciences from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Her PhD project lies at the intersection of marine governance, technology and society and the future of energy sustainability. It models and predicts geopolitical challenges, transboundary conflicts, as well as policy, material, and technological alternatives to emergent Deep Sea Mining (DSM) ventures. While mineral stores are fast depleting on land, the seabed is increasingly produced as the alternative source needed to support the growing metal demands of the world’s energy transition and digital revolution. However, up-to-date, just and sustainable DSM policy is lacking, even though mining companies are rushing to explore extraction options. The project investigates the entanglements of DSM with biodiversity, environmental crisis and indigenous rights. It layers big data, material flow analysis, industrial ecology and hard scientific research against ethical and critical theory considerations (such as intergenerational equity, postcolonial environmental justice and more-than-human stakeholders), to guide the next frontier of marine governance for a just environmental stewardship.
Prior to joining the Hertie School, Nitsan directed the Institute of the Environment at Tufts University in Boston, headed development projects sponsored by the EU, the German development agency GIZ and Relief International, co-founded an award-winning social startup and worked as a consultant for USAID and the US Department of State on various environmental and human-security projects.
Main supervisor: Prof. Lynn Kaack, PhD
