Inge-Merete Hougaard

Inge-Merete Hougaard is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Anthropology, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Copenhagen. Her research focuses on political ecology, resource rights, landscape change, and climate policy, with fieldwork in Denmark and Colombia. She leads the Green Rural Subjects (2025–2028) project and contributes to UCPH's Green Solution Centre initiatives on land use change and peatland knowledge.

• University: University of Copenhagen
• School: Faculty of Social Sciences
• Department: Department of Anthropology
• Academic Rank: Assistant Professor
• Email: imh@anthro.ku.dk

Her research interests include political ecology, climate politics, state-making, land rights, biochar, carbon removal, rural precarity, and narrative-based co-creation of landscapes. She employs ethnographic and narrative methods to study how green transition projects reshape human and non-human relations in rural areas.

The recent research articles show a strong focus on climate solutions, land reform, and socio-environmental justice. Themes span from carbon farming and biochar in Danish agriculture to moral ecologies of sand mining in Colombia and the political recognition of Afro-descendant communities. The work integrates anthropology with environmental policy, emphasizing participatory methods and narrative co-creation.

She actively supervises students and teaches courses in anthropology and global development, including Climate, Environment and Nature: Basic Anthropological Concepts and Kulturøkologisk Klimalaboratorium. She has collaborated with municipalities, the Danish Nature Agency, and international research groups such as Cattle Crossroads.

Her public engagement includes policy briefs, interactive websites like Lyt til Landskabet, and participation in national and international conferences. She contributes to public debates on land reform and green transition through media, workshops, and events like Folkemødet and Co-creating Landscape Change.