Michael J. Bernstein

I lead large-scale European research projects that bring together partners from across sectors and countries, run professional education programs for ocean industry and government leaders, and publish in peer-reviewed journals on responsible innovation, sustainability governance, and democratic participation in science policy.

Much of my most meaningful work happens in the design of processes: building the conditions under which people from different disciplines, organizations, and worldviews can think and act together on problems that none of them can solve alone. I've done this in stakeholder workshops across Europe, in training programs for research funders, and in facilitated dialogue on contested topics including AI governance, nuclear waste siting, and green energy transition.

I earned my PhD in Sustainability from Arizona State University, where I also worked as a postdoctoral scholar and, later, an assistant research professor. While in graduate school, I had the opportunity to work as a consultant to the White House Council on Environmental Quality, where I got hooked on working for the public interest. Earlier still, I coordinated multi-team writing and editing projects in my first job out of college at a nonprofit — a role that, in retrospect, taught me a great deal about editorial diplomacy and how to move complex collaborative work forward.

I moved to Vienna in 2017 to join the Austrian Institute of Technology, where I've been privileged to lead a research team of eight international scientists and built a portfolio of EU-funded projects on topics from responsible innovation to democratic futures. If you made it this far in my bio, you also deserve to learn that I love tango dancing. Abrazos!