Mechthild Becker

Mechthild Becker is a Research Analyst in the Brazil East Africa Peru India Climate Capacities (B-EPICC) Project and supports capacity building & knowledge transfer of the interdisciplinary project through her activities as the project's Knowledge Broker. She has been part of the project since 2018, working as a Scientific Assistant on migration and conflict potentials. Her research primarily focuses on climate-induced migration, policy analysis and social dimensions of climate change, with a particular focus on gendered impacts.

Ms Becker holds a BA in the international degree programme Political Management from the University of Applied Sciences Bremen and an MA in Modern Indian Studies from the University of Göttingen. During her undergraduate studies, Ms Becker spent a semester at the prestigious Indian Institute of Technology Madras in Chennai with a full scholarship from the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD). Experiencing the impacts of an extreme monsoon season herself, Ms Becker started to get interested in the social and cultural construction of risk in times of a changing climate. She came back to India during her master studies and spent a semester at the Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi, where she took courses in socio-political change in India and the organisation of community health. An internship in the Climate and Resources section of the Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung in New Delhi confirmed her resolution to work in the field of climate impact research.

When she is not at PIK, Ms Becker uses her skills as a certified intercultural trainer to foster Indo-German academic exchange. You may also find her painting or walking through one of Potsdam’s beautiful parks, thinking about how to make this world a more just and sustainable one for everyone.

• Becker, M. (2022): Resilienz als Grundpfeiler selbstbestimmten Handelns in einer sich wandelnden und wärmer werdenden Welt. Globale und lokale Perspektiven. - In: Pfaff, T., Schramkowski, B., Lutz, R. (Eds.), Klimakrise, sozialökologischer Kollaps und Klimagerechtigkeit: Spannungsfelder für Soziale Arbeit, Weinheim : Beltz Juventa, 278-293.

• Upadhyay, H., Vinke, K., Bhardwaj, S., Becker, M. A., Irfan, M., George, N. B., Biella, R., Arumugam, P., Muriki, S. K., Paoletti, E. (2021): Locked Houses, Fallow Lands: Climate Change and Migration in Uttarakhand, India, Potsdam and New Delhi : Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK) and The Energy and Resources Institute (Teri), 106 p.

• Vinke, K., Becker, M. (2021): Den Krisenpfad verlassen, die sozial-ökologische Transformation einleiten: Ein Blick auf Pandemiebewältigung, Klimawandel und Generationengerechtigkeit. - Der geteilte Mantel, 2021, 20-22.

• Becker, M., Vinke, K., Bergmann, J. (2020): Vom wütenden Wett er vertrieben. - welt-sichten, 2020, Dezember/Januar  12-2020/1-2021, 34-36, https://www.welt-sichten.org/artikel/38371/klimafluechtlinge-vom-wuetenden-wett-er-vertrieben.

• Vinke, K., Blocher, J., Becker, M., Ebay, J. S., Fong, T., Kambon, A. (2020): Home Lands: Island and Archipelagic States’ Policymaking for Human Mobility in the Context of Climate Change, Bonn : Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH, 152 p, https://www.adaptationcommunity.net/publications/home-lands-island-and-archipelagic-states-policymaking-for-human-mobility-in-the-context-of-climate-change/.

• Becker, M., Vinke, K. (2020): Die Vertreibung aus dem Paradies. - In: Deutscher Caritasverband e.V. (Ed.), Klimawandel & Humanitäre Hilfe, (Im Fokus), Freiburg : Deutscher Caritasverband e.V., 10-13, https://www.caritas-international.de/cms/contents/caritas-internationa/medien/dokumente/sonstiges/im-fokus/klimawandel-humanita/caritas-int_brosch_im-fokus-klima-2020.pdf.