Research themes

Political infrastructure; Urban governance; Urban energy transition; Citizenship and Infrastructures; Right to the city; Everyday practices; Informal urbanization; Materialist and socio-technical approaches; Brazil and Jamaica

Funded projects:

Uncovering Heat Vulnerabilities in Rio de Janeiro's favelas, NWO Open Competition XS grant, starting in June 2025 

As extreme heat worsens, especially in urban areas, it’s crucial to address the issue effectively. Current methods often overlook the unique challenges faced by vulnerable populations, particularly in informal settlements where data and monitoring are limited. Collaborating with a Rio de Janeiro favela-based NGO, this project will develop and test a context-sensitive methodology for uncovering heat vulnerability and adaptive strategies. By combining academic insights with community knowledge and employing a ‘more-than-human’ perspective—considering interactions between heat coping strategies, infrastructure, and nature—this study will develop new frameworks for understanding and mitigating heat vulnerability, establishing a novel approach to urban heat resilience.

The Open City Initiative - Development of a local and international network in urban studies at Utrecht University (with Abigail Friendly, Kei Otsuki, and Martijn Oosterbaan), 2021, UGlobe seed grant, Utrecht University

Interfacing Infrastructures for a Sustainable Heating Transition (with Jochen Monstadt), Transforming Infrastructures for Sustainable Cities grant, 2020, Utrecht University.

‘Digital Technologies and Urban Politics’, Centre for Urban Studies seed grant, 2018, University of Amsterdam.

The politics of electricity infrastructure: governance, technology and citizenship in Latin American and Caribbean cities - FNRS award, 2019 (3-years research project):

This project examines how the governance of infrastructure and citizenship change in urban neighbourhoods where sovereignty is contested. In cities of the South, precarious urban utilities (e.g. electricity and water) in low-income neighbourhoods often symbolize a failing citizen-state relationship. However, a diversity of non-state actors affects the way in which infrastructure is accessed and mediates this citizen-state-infrastructure relationship. Private companies often assume the role of providers, and, at the same time, criminal actors (gangs and militias) can directly or indirectly control these infrastructures. Moreover, users’ cooperatives attempt to introduce environmentally sustainable solutions (e.g. solar panels). This project studies the governance of electricity infrastructure and its implications on citizenship formation. Focusing on Rio de Janeiro (Brazil) and Kingston (Jamaica), it investigates (i) how non-state actors (private companies, criminals, users’ cooperatives) negotiate their legitimacy and redefine rights and responsibilities amongst citizens, focusing on technological and social arrangements; and 2) how citizens’ practices relating to these devices are linked to the negotiation of rights and responsibilities associated with political membership. Connecting science & technology studies to citizenship studies, it approaches infrastructure and its technology as mediating relations between citizens, the state, and non-state actors, and it extends understandings of citizenship, including their non-state mediations.

Participation in collective research project (concluded)

HYBRIDELEC, "Hybridations électriques : formes émergentes de la transition énergétique dans les villes du Sud / Electric Hybrids: Emerging forms of the energy transition in Cities of the Global South", LATTS, CERI, PRODIC and CERI (SciencePo), PI: Eric Verdeil and Sylvy Jaglin

ERC SECURCIT program “Transforming citizenship through Hybrid Governance: the Impact of Public-Private Security Assemblages” (2014-2018), University of Amsterdam. PI: Rivke Jaffe. As post-doctoral researcher (2017-2019)

DALVAA program “Rethinking the Right to the City from the Global South – Sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America” (2014-2018), City of Paris grant, Université Paris Diderot. PI: M. Morange and A. Spire. As post-doctoral researcher (2015-2018)

TERMOS program “Energy Trajectories in the Metro-Regions of the South” (2010-2014). French Research Agency grant. Université Paris-Est. PI: S. Jaglin. As researcher (during the PhD). (2012-2013)