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Team

Mag. Manfred Spiesberger

Section: Research Policy & Development

Function: wissenschaftlicher Mitarbeiter

Contact:

Publications:

Work and research focus:

  • Research and Innovation policies, especially in Eastern Europe and countries of the Former Soviet Union
  • Evaluations, impact assessments and foresight
  • Social innovation in energy for climate adaptation, climate change and water

Running and completed projects:

Other Publications:

INTAS and its Activities in Innovation: What a Research Funding Organization Can Do (2004), in: Leal Filho, Walter (ed.): Supporting the Development of R&D and the Innovation Potential of Post-Socialist Countries, Amsterdam.

Round Table: Open Access issues for developing countries (2003), in: Grüttemeier, Herbert/Barry Mahon (ed.): Open Access to Scientific and Technical Information, Amsterdam.

Der Europäische Wirtschaftsraum als Beispiel für Differenzierte Annäherung an die EU (2000), in: Freiburghaus, Dieter (ed.): Wohin des Weg's Europa?, Bern.

Flexible Integration - Möglichkeiten und Grenzen der Berücksichtigung einzelstaatlicher Besonderheiten und Wünsche durch die Europäische Union (1998), together with Dieter Freiburghaus and Elisabeth Eberharter, in: Cottier, Thomas/Alwin R. Kopše (ed.): Der Beitritt der Schweiz zur Europäischen Union, Zürich.

Übergangsregime zur Abfederung von Differenzen bei EG/EU-Beitritten (1998), in: Österreichische Zeitschrift für Politikwissenschaft 1998, 4, 407-423.

Parlamentarismus in der Sowjetunion und Rußland 1985 - Herbst 1993 (1997), master thesis, accepted in May 1997, Vienna.

Participation at events:

Education and career:

Mr. Manfred Spiesberger is a senior researcher and project manager at Centre for Social Innovation (ZSI), Vienna/Austria since 2008. He studied Political Science, Russian and History of Eastern Europe. He is fluent in German, English, French, and Russian.

In the field of energy, Manfred Spiesberger is currently involved in two major H2020 projects: ENTRANCES on coal phase out and decarbonisation of industries, and PHOTORAMA on PV panel recycling. He coordinated the EU FP7 project ener2i (www.ener2i.eu, energy research to innovation, 2014-16), which stimulated cooperation among businesses and researchers from the EU and the Eastern Partnership countries on Renewable Energies and Energy Efficiency. He has been working with the EC's Joint Research Centre on social innovation in energy and its link to smart specialisation policies. 

In evaluations he was work-package leader in the H2020 TAIPI project (www.taipi.eu) on impact assessment for the EU’s Flagship projects (Graphene and Human Brain Project), and did studies for the COST office. His recent foresight activities include serving as teamleader of an expert group to support the EU Mission Board “Adaptation to climate change including societal transformation” with foresight expertise in 2019-2020. 

He has been involved for many years in EU funded projects related to R&D and innovation cooperation with countries of the Former Soviet Union. He served as a monitoring and foresight expert for the ERA.Net RUS Plus (http://eranet-rus.eu/, 2013-2022). In 2019 he was organising and moderating thematic workshops for the European Commission on the topic of water in Central Asia. He was rapporteur for reviews of the Moldovan (2015-16) and Georgian (2017-18) innovation systems in the frame of the EU's H2020 Policy Support Facility (PSF), team leader of international review panels of the S&T systems of Kyrgyzstan (2015-16) and Moldova (2011-12) in INCO-NET projects, and member of an international review panel of Armenia’s innovation system organised by UNECE.

From 2002-2006 he was an Austrian National Expert with the EU funding programme INTAS, International Association for the promotion of cooperation with scientists of the New Independent States (NIS) of the Former Soviet Union, where he was innovation manager. Before he was working in the Austrian National Contact Point (NCP) office for FP5, and four years as a research and teaching assistant at the Swiss Graduate School of Public Administration in Lausanne.