Regional Diversity: Comparing Industrial and Border Regions
Principal investigators: Dr. Oleksandr Zabirko and Prof. Dr. Thomas Steger
This research area focuses on analyzing the dynamics of industrial and border regions, with particular emphasis on the Donbas and the Black Sea region.
Focus areas:
- Cultural and Historical Specificity of Industrial Regions: How do regional characteristics influence the identity and developmental trajectory of industrial and border areas?
- Globalization and Demodernization: Examining the impact of global transformation processes on the economic and social fabric of industrial regions
- Transformation in Industrial Enterprises: Investigating the organizational and structural changes necessary for industrial companies to adapt to shifting economic and social landscapes
- Participatory Structures: Exploring ways to effectively involve local communities in processes of change and regional development
Cooperations with Research Projects
Sponsor:
German Federal Ministry for Education and Research
Management:
Dr. Oleksandr Zabirko and Dr. Alina Strzempa
Runtime:
2022-2026
Sponsor:
Chair of Leadership and Organisation, University of Regensburg
Management:
Dr. Andreas M. Hilger and Prof. Dr. Thomas Steger
Runtime:
2021-2026
The project analyses Ukrainian ICT (Information and Communication Technology) firms who have demonstrated remarkable resilience during the ongoing war, employing a range of strategies to adapt, survive, and even thrive in the challenging environment over the period from 2021 to 2025. Particularly escape-based internationalisation including a relocation of operations and shifts to becoming a footloose industry have proven successful. Many companies moved their staff and infrastructure to safer regions within Ukraine or to neighbouring countries. Due to their technological core competencies, Ukrainian firms are also forerunners in remote work adaptation. Leveraging the existing culture of remote work in the ICT industry, firms transitioned seamlessly to fully remote or hybrid models, ensuring continuity despite infrastructure disruptions.
Sponsor:
Leibniz-Gemeinschaft
Management:
Dr. Tamar Qeburia
Scientific Supervisor:
Prof. Dr. Guido Hausmann
Runtime:
2025-2028
The subproject explores the global history of mineral resources from the geographic periphery of the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union, using the example of the exploitation, mining and sale of manganese ore from Western Georgia and Southeast Ukraine from the late 19th century to the 1950s. Manganese ore has a central importance in the refining of steel, its mining in the West Georgian deposits in Chiatura and in Nikopol in Southeast Ukraine was an important part of the global industrialization history. The high quality of the Western Georgian deposits was essential for the German (Ruhr area), other European and US mining and steel industry of the time. The research project explores this commodity frontier as one interrelated Georgian-Ukrainian commodity frontier. The frontier emerged in Western Georgia as an environmental space in the second half of the 19th century and spread as a result of rising global demand to encompass southeast Ukraine before World War I and in subsequent Soviet times. The project analyses the formation and long decline since the 1920´s of this manganese commodity frontier in the framework of the conceptual analysis of commodity frontiers in Eastern Europe. It explores also the role of key regional actors in the two subregions in a time of regime changes, first by examining their role in the social and environmental remaking of the two subregions, and second by analyzing their perception of and interaction with the global manganese ore market.