Joscha Wullweber

Univ.-Prof. Dr. Joscha Wullweber is Heisenberg Professor for Politics, Transformation and Sustainability at the University of Witten/Herdecke (Faculty of Business and Society, Department of Philosophy, Politics and Economics) and Director of the International Center for Sustainable and Just Transformation (tra:ce). His work lies at the intersection of International Political Economy, critical finance studies, and political ecology, focusing on the governance of global finance, shadow banking, central-bank politics, and the political economy of sustainability transitions.

Research & Teaching

• Political economy of sustainable transformation
• Global governance of finance and shadow banking
• Central-bank policy and green monetary policy
• Carbon finance, climate finance, and ecological crisis
• Innovation and technology governance
• Urban sustainability transformations

His research is currently organised around three major third-party funded projects: Climate change and global finance at the crossroads (BMFTR), the transdisciplinary RuhrortPlus urban transformation project, and the Heisenberg project Neutrality lost: The politics of central banking in the age of shadow banks.

Scientific Output

Since 2019, Wullweber has published two major monographs—Zentralbankkapitalismus (2021, Suhrkamp) and Central Bank Capitalism Politics: Monetary Policy in Times of Crisis (2024, Stanford University Press)—and numerous journal articles on green monetary policy, shadow money, and the discursive legitimation of central-bank activism. His 2024 Stanford book synthesises a decade of research on how central banks have become pivotal market-making actors in post-crisis capitalism.

Advisory & Outreach

• Member of the German Federal Government’s Scientific Advisory Council on Global Environmental Change (WBGU) since November 2024
• Regular media commentator (3sat scobel, Wohlstand für Alle podcast)
• Principal investigator on multi-million-euro federally funded projects linking climate and finance policy

Research Team

At tra:ce he leads an interdisciplinary team of post-docs and doctoral researchers including Dr Jan Fichtner, Dr Sonja Knobbe, Paula Haufe, Nicolás Águila, Janina Urban, Simon Schairer and Riccardo Baioni, together with student assistants.