Prof. Dr. Armin Beverungen

Armin Beverungen is professor for the sociology of organization and economy. Previously, he has held research and teaching positions at the University of the West of England, Leuphana University and the University of Siegen. From September 2022 to August 2023, he was on leave at Leuphana and a visiting professor at the Institute for Media Studies at Ruhr-University Bochum. He regularly teaches in the technologies section of the contextual studies program at the University of St. Gallen. He is an organization scholar and sociologist by training, and received his PhD for a history of critical management studies from the University of Leicester. His research interests have included the financialization of the university, corporate governance and business ethics, the politics of labour, and open access publishing. At Leuphana, he has been involved over most of the last nearly ten years in establishing the Centre for Digital Cultures. In this context, his research has increasingly engaged with media studies and science and technology studies.

Armin’s current research revolves around digital (media) technologies and organization; algorithmic management, automation and artificial intelligence; and smart, logistical cities. He is currently occupied with three projects in particular: as co-speaker of the key subject area „Climate Futures in Digital Cultures“ he is setting up a new strategic research area as part of the Centre for Digital Cultures. In a consortial research project funded by the VolkswagenFoundation on “Smartness as Wealth” Armin explores with Randi Heinrichs, Orit Halpern (TU Dresden), Marc Steinberg (Concordia University, Montreal), Liza Cirolia (African Center for Cities, Kapstadt) and Anindita Nag (Jindal Global, Delhi) the promises of wealth associated with smart technologies in cities. In a research project funded by the VolkswagenFoundation and the Lower Saxony Ministry for Science and Education (as part of zukunft.niedersachsen) entitled Automating the Logistical City: Space, Algorithms, Speculation (2021-2025) Armin explored with his collaborators how Amazon’s logistical urbanism speculates on urban, automated futures.

Armin is the director of the international BA program in „Cultural Studies: Organization, Society, and the Arts“, deputy director of the MA program in Cultural Studies: Culture and Organization, and a member of the study commission for the MA programs in the School of Culture and Society. He teaches regularly in the school’s programs and regularly supervises BA and MA theses. Armin is available for PhD supervision in his field of research.