Mag. Dr. Isabella Radhuber

Portrait of Isabella Radhuber.

Photo source: Der Knopfdrücker.

Contact

Neues Institutsgebäude
Universitätsstr. 7/2nd floor
Room: D 205
1010 Vienna
T: +43-1-4277-49434
E-Mail: isabella.radhuber@univie.ac.at
Homepage: ORCiD

Office hour

After agreement

Teaching

Courses: u:find

Short biography

Dr. Isabella M. Radhuber is a senior researcher with a focus on “Climate and Health” at the Department of Political Science in the field of Comparative Policy Analysis. She is also a visiting researcher in the Equity and Justice Research Group of the Population and Just Societies Program at the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA), where she conducts research on climate and health, qualitative risk assessment, and the complexity of global crises.

Building on her longstanding experience in conducting research in various postcolonial settings with different actors—including Indigenous communities—she examines the intersection of environmental, climate, and health politics from a bottom-up experience. Building on her expertise in environmental politics, resource extraction, and health governance, her work focuses in particular on climate and health risks, extreme weather events, and transdisciplinary research approaches. Her focus is on the political dimensions of global crises, multidimensional inequalities, and decolonisation processes, as well as on the advancement of participatory, inter- and transdisciplinary, and decolonial methodologies. Her research is published in leading journals across the fields of health, environment, climate, geography, political science, science and technology, and global studies.

Her academic career has been shaped by extensive research stays in various regions of the world, including Latin America, China, India, and the United States. Since 2020, she has been leading the multinational research project “Solidarity in Times of a Pandemic” in Latin America, which brings together over 100 researchers from 12 countries, and she is involved in the European sister project. Previously, she held research positions at the International Institute of Social Studies (ISS) in The Hague, the Department of Geography at the University of Cambridge, and the Institute of Environmental Science and Technology at the Universidad Autónoma de Barcelona (ICTA-UAB). She also served as a visiting researcher at the Institute for Technology Assessment and Systems Analysis (ITAS) at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) and at IIASA. 

Research interests

• Climate and Health
• Impacts from Extreme Weather
• Qualitative Risk Assessments
• Understanding Complexity
• Environmental, Climate and Health Governance 
• Resource Extractivism and Sovereignty
• Data Governance and Artificial Intelligence
• The Complexity of (Global) Crises
• Multidimensional Inequalities
• Decolonisation Processes and Indigenous Agendas
• Participatory, Inter- and Transdisciplinary and Decolonial Methodologies
• Global Majority and Global Minority Contexts

Selective biblopgraphy

  • Radhuber, I.M., Fiske, A., Prainsack, B. (2026). Health Under Climate Pressure: An Emerging Research Agenda. In. Faulkner, A. (Ed.). A Research Agenda in Biomedicine & Society. Elgar Research Agendas  (forthcoming)
  • Radhuber, I., Fiske, A., Prainsack, B. (2025). Health in a Changing Climate: Perceptions of ‘Broken Relationships’ During COVID-19 in Austria. SSM Qualitative Research in Health. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ssmqr.2025.100582   
  • Fiske, A., Radhuber, I., Willem , T., Buyx, A., Celi, L.A., McLennan, S. (2025): Climate Change and Health: The Next Challenge of Ethical AI. The Lancet Global Health, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/S2214-109X(25)00124-X  
  • Zimmermann, B.M., Fiske, A., Prainsack, B., Radhuber, I. (Eds.) (2026) Negotiating Global Crisis in Everyday Life.  Bristol University Press and Policy Press (forthcoming)
  • Radhuber, I., Kieslich, K., Paul, K., Saxinger, G.,Ferstl, S., Kraus, D., Kancelová, N.V., Prainsack, B. (2025). Why ‘Inclusive Policymaking’ Is Needed During Crises: COVID-19 and Social Divisions in Austria. SSM Qualitative Research in Health, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ssmqr.2025.100539
  • Fiske, A., Radhuber, I. M., Salvador, C. F., Araújo, E. R., Jasser, M., Saxinger, G., Zimmermann, B. & Prainsack, B. (2024). Don’t waste the crisis: The COVID-19 Anthropause as an experiment for rethinking human–environment relations. Environment and Planning E: Nature and Space, 1-23. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/25148486231221017   
  • Radhuber, I. M., Fiske, A., Galasso, I., Gessl, N., Hill, M. D., Morales, E. R., Olarte-Sánchez, L.E., Pelfini, A., Saxinger, G. & Spahl, W. (2023). Toward global citizenship? People (de) bordering their lives during COVID-19 in Latin America and Europe. Global Public Health, 18(1). DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/17441692.2023.2285880   
  • Radhuber I, El-Sayed, S., Haddad, Kieslich, K., Ch., Paul, K.T., Prainsack, B., Schlogl, L., Spahl, W. & Weiss, E. (2023). Citizenship in times of crises: biosocial  state-citizen relations during Covid-19 in Austria. BioSocieties, 1-16, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/s41292-023-00304-z   
  • Radhuber, I. M., & Radcliffe, S. A. (2023). Contested Sovereignties: Indigenous disputes over plurinational resource governance. Environment and Planning E: Nature and Space, 6(1), 556-577. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/25148486211068476   
  • Radcliffe, S. A., & Radhuber, I. M. (2020). The political geographies of D/decolonization: Variegation and decolonial challenges of/in geography. Political Geography, 78, 102-128. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.polgeo.2019.102128 

Back