The Call for Applications for doctoral study commencing in November 2025 is now available.

Deadline for applying: 28 May 2025, 4 PM (Italian time)

The PhD programme in Sustainability: Economics, Environment, Management and Society (SUSTEEMS) is an interdisciplinary doctoral degree jointly offered by the Department of Economics and Management, the Department of Civil, Environmental and Mechanical Engineering, the Faculty of Law, and the Department of Sociology and Social Research.

The vision of Susteems is to become a leading training hub for a new generation of researchers and professionals who will act as a driving force towards transformative change in the economy, private enterprises, organizations, and public administration. Read more on our vision here.

Developing a sustainable society presents some of the most crucial challenges concerning the future of our planet, and it requires an interdisciplinary approach involving economics, management sciences, engineering and social sciences. This PhD programme provides rigorous knowledge in a broad range of qualitative and quantitative methods and disciplines (see the Curriculum) to allow a deep understanding of the interaction between natural and social systems. It provides students the flexibility to pursue in-depth research on a wide variety of topics.

In their PhD thesis, PhD students can address research questions within a disciplinary boundary or from an interdisciplinary perspective. They can conduct both theoretical and empirical investigations using diverse methodological approaches. The PhD thesis consists of three papers to be published in scientific journals.

The official language of the doctoral programme is English.

On April 23, 2024 (see poster below), the first PhD students from 36°cycle discussed their research thesis and got their PhD degree (see poster below and pictures).

More details can be found here.