Climate changes, such as sea level rise, soil subsidence, extreme rainfall, and drought, induce new challenges and risks for real estate and infrastructures, especially in low lying urbanized deltas, as in the Netherlands. Urbanized deltas are vulnerable to risks for flooding, excessive heat and rainfall, and damage to pile foundations and (underground) infrastructures. While people’s homes, communities, and livelihoods are at stake, real estate climate risks also stand to destabilize markets and society at large. 

Climate risk management requires collaborative, integrated strategies that cut across public, private, and civic spheres to achieve societal impact. A crucial part of such a strategy is facilitating and assessing transdisciplinary dialogue and knowledge co-creation between scientific institutions, non-academic societal partners, and citizens at large. 

Your goal, in this PostDoc project, is to co-design and co-develop an Integrative Forum (IF) that aims to facilitate two-way transdisciplinary exchange and dialogue on climate risk management. The IF, on the one hand, provides a ‘soft space’ for debate and reflection between research teams and societal partners. On the other hand, the dialogue in the IF provides an opportunity for innovative research on institutionalized logics, tactics, and procedures that hinder or enable effective cross-disciplinary collaboration. Artificial Intelligence techniques will support the creation of the IF by, e.g., recognizing the stakeholders’ values and norms, clustering and visualizing stakeholders’ arguments and perspectives, finding novel viewpoints, and modelling opinion dynamics over time.

You will assist in the designing and developing the IF in pursuit the following research objectives, which will be refined during the course of the project:

1. Generate cross-disciplinary research insights and build collective governance capacity through dialogue, reflection, and mutual learning facilitated within the Integrative Forum and other ‘soft spaces’ of the consortium.
2. Draw out stakeholders’ institutionalized logics, tactics and procedures in order to facilitate cross-consortium reflection and learning and build collective governance capacity. Data comes from recordings and transcripts (utilised also for AI techniques) of the meetings in the forum, which will be organized regularly during the project. You will be able to have additional conversations and interviews, and use other data collection methods as appropriate.
3. Create generalizable institutional and strategic insights about how to enable productive transdisciplinary and cross-actor exchanges that build capacity for integrated climate risk management in the built environment in the Netherlands and beyond.

This PostDoc position is part of Work Package 5 (WP5) of the Real Estate Development & Building in Low Urban Environments (RED&BLUE) research initiative, a major new program funded by the Dutch Research Council. This initiative aims to develop transdisciplinary knowledge on climate resilient real estate and infrastructure development. More information can be found at: www.redblueclimate.nl. In addition to you, WP5 also involves a PhD researcher, with whom you will closely collaborate.

As a member of the RED&BLUE team, you will do high-impact research on a pressing societal topic relevant within the Netherlands and beyond. Your research will enable you to actively collaborate with other researchers and societal partners, providing you with exceptional mentorship, personal development, and networking opportunities. You will also build upon the work of other researchers and real-world urban use cases when developing your own research.

The Postdoc:

• Holds a PhD degree from an internationally recognised institution, preferably in the field(s) of real estate, spatial governance, planning or related specialisations in geography.
• Has demonstrated competencies or strong interest in understanding climate risk, adaptation and/or resilience in the built environment.
• Preferably has knowledge of ‘institutionalism’ and of methods to assess (changing) governance capacity across disciplines and public, private and civic spheres of society.
• Has excellent scientific skills, as demonstrated by peer-reviewed publications, preferably across two or more different scientific disciplines.
• Is good at collaborating with and leading others.
• Works proactively and independently and has good communication skills.
• Has a high level of written and spoken English.
• A good command of the Dutch language, considering the consortium members and case studies of this research as well as the societal dissemination of your results to Dutch audiences. If the candidate does not speak Dutch, (s)he should be willing to learn Dutch as the first priority, and we expect the candidate to reach the Dutch B1/B2 language level within one year.
• Excellent communication skills and the ability to switch between operational and managerial levels within the various disciplines that are part of this research.
• Team spirit and an open personality, particularly for cooperation with colleagues across disciplines and for co-supervision of students.

TU Delft offers PostDocs a 2-year contract. Salary and benefits are in accordance with the Collective Labour Agreement for Dutch Universities, starting from € 2.836 per month to € 4.474 (scale 10) depending on track-record and years of experience.

Salary and benefits are in accordance with the Collective Labour Agreement for Dutch Universities. The TU Delft offers a customisable compensation package, a discount on health insurance and sport memberships, and a monthly work costs contribution. Flexible work schedules can be arranged.
For international applicants we offer the Coming to Delft Service and Partner Career Advice to assist you with your relocation. An International Children's Centre offers childcare and there is an international primary school.

Delft University of Technology

Delft University of Technology is built on strong foundations. As creators of the world-famous Dutch waterworks and pioneers in biotech, TU Delft is a top international university combining science, engineering and design. It delivers world class results in education, research and innovation to address challenges in the areas of energy, climate, mobility, health and digital society. For generations, our engineers have proven to be entrepreneurial problem-solvers, both in business and in a social context. At TU Delft we embrace diversity and aim to be as inclusive as possible (see our Code of Conduct). Together, we imagine, invent and create solutions using technology to have a positive impact on a global scale.
Challenge. Change. Impact! 

Faculty Architecture & the Built Environment

The Faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment has a leading role in education and research worldwide. The driving force behind the faculty’s success is its robust research profile combined with the energy and creativity of its student body and academic community. It is buzzing with energy from early in the morning until late at night, with four thousand people studying, working, designing, conducting research and acquiring and disseminating knowledge. Our faculty has a strong focus on 'design-oriented research’, which has given it a top position in world rankings. Staff and students are working to improve the built environment with the help of a broad set of disciplines, including architectural design, urban planning, building technology, social sciences, process management, and geo-information science. The faculty works closely with other faculties, universities, private parties, and the public sector, and has an extensive network in the Netherlands as well as internationally.
Click here to go to the website of the Faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment.