Theodor Kocher Prize

Political scientist Lukas Fesenfeld (Policy Analysis and Environmental Governance group) has been awarded the Theodor Kocher Prize of the University of Bern. The prize, worth CHF 50,000, is awarded to young researchers at the University of Bern for outstanding and innovative scientific achievements in a specialised field or subject area. The award is traditionally presented on Dies Academicus, in memory of the Bernese Nobel Prize winner for medicine Theodor Kocher (1841-1917).

Lukas Fesenfeld has a broad range of scientific interests and has conducted research at the University of Bern and ETH Zurich in the fields of environmental governance, political economy and the psychology of food and climate policy. The title of his dissertation at ETH was 'The political feasibility of transformative climate policy - public opinion on the transformation of food and transport systems'. Since 2020, Fesenfeld has been a senior researcher at the OCCR, working on the transformation of food systems, among other topics. From 2021 to 2023, he was PI of the project The Political Economy of Meat System Transformation, funded by the Swiss Network for International Studies.

Positive tipping points are another focus of Fesenfeld's research. He sees them as a ray of hope for climate protection. He is one of the founders of NAHhaft, a think and do tank for the transformation of food systems.