My

Sellberg

PhD

Researcher

my.sellberg@su.se

+46 732 704 367

@MySellberg

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Profile summary

  • Resilience assessments
  • Transdisciplinary research
  • Science-practice interface
  • Local and regional planning
  • Transition movement
  • Transformation
  • Food systems

My Sellberg’s research focus is on transformations to sustainable and resilient food systems, and how to apply resilience thinking in societal and environmental planning, from local to regional levels

In her PhD, Sellberg used participatory case studies of resilience practice in different contexts; mainly in the Stockholm-Mälaren region in Sweden, but also in Australia. The aim of her PhD was to advance understanding of how to apply resilience thinking and strengthen its potential to contribute to sustainability transformations. Her starting point is a method for resilience assessment, developed by the Resilience Alliance. Among various tools and guides to operationalize resilience, the resilience assessment, is one of few initiatives that is firmly based in social-ecological resilience research. The latest online guide to resilience practice, which Sellberg helped to review, is Wayfinder.

Her PhD was part of SEEN, a project on social-ecological dynamics of ecosystem services in the Norrström basin, i.e. the Stockholm-Mälaren region. The SEEN project is connected to other local-regional case studies of social-ecological systems around the world through the Program on Ecosystem Change and Society (PECS).

In her current work, Sellberg is developing a pilot training programme in resilience practice aimed at civil servants from municipalities, county councils, and regions in Sweden. The project will pave the way for utilizing resilience practice approaches and methods within strategic societal planning in Swedish governance organizations.

Sellberg’s research is transdisciplinary in that it engages actors outside of academia. Through her case studies, Sellberg has collaborated with the Transition Movement, Eskilstuna municipality, and different food actors in the Stockholm-Mälaren region. The longest collaboration has been with Eskilstuna municipality, where she was involved in a project to test resilience assessment as a method within strategic municipal planning. The project focused on the resilience of food systems and resulted in the development of a municipal plan on the topic. From this project, she became interested in transformations to resilient and sustainable food systems. In a more recent participatory case study, she engaged diverse food actors to develop a positive scenario for food in the Stockholm-Mälaren region. The study was part of the ongoing sustainability science project Seeds of a Good Anthropocene.

Sellberg has a MSc in Sustainability from the Social-Ecological Resilience for Sustainable Development programme at the Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, and a BSc in Environmental Science at Lund University. Sellberg also has a background as the chairman of Lund Students for Sustainability (2009–2010) and as an environmental consultant within sustainable business development (2011–2013).

Awards and achievements:

  • Successfully defended her PhD thesis in October 2018
  • Co-authored a report for Eskilstuna municipality on the resilience of their food system
  • Chaired the SRC PhD council 2015–2016

Staff details

ORCID: 0000-0002-0158-164X

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Publications by Sellberg, My

Engaging with complexity in resilience practice

Journal / article | 2021

Sellberg, M., Quinlan, A., Preiser, R., Malmborg, K., Peterson, G.. 2021. Engaging with complexity in resilience practice. Ecology and Society. http://dx.doi.org/10.5751/es-12311-260308

In a complex and turbulent world, there is heightened interest in managing for resilience. However, resilience guides, particularly those used in the development field, often lack a theoretical grounding in complex adaptive systems. There is a demand for guidance on how to operationalize complexity in applications of resilience, such as resilience assessment and planning. This study synthesizes lessons from how twelve cases o...

Towards a caring transdisciplinary research practice: navigating science, society and self

Journal / article | 2021

Sellberg, M., Cockburn, J., Holden, P., Lam, D.. 2021. Towards a caring transdisciplinary research practice: navigating science, society and self. Ecosystems and People. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/26395916.2021.1931452

Transdisciplinary research that bridges science and society is needed to address the complex social-ecological sustainability challenges we are facing. However, many transdisciplinary researchers grapple with balancing the competing demands of scientific rigour and excellence, societal impact and engagement, and self-care. This is especially evident in the growing literature by early-career researchers describing the challenge...

Using local initiatives to envision sustainable and resilient food systems in the Stockholm city-region

Journal / article | 2019

Sellberg, M.M., Norström, A.V., Peterson, G.P., Gordon. L.J. 2020. Using local initiatives to envision sustainable and resilient food systems in the Stockholm city-region. Global Food Security 24.

Globally, food systems face multifaceted sustainability challenges and the need for food system transformation is increasingly acknowledged. However, there is still a lack of knowledge on the pathways for transformation and how they will play out in diverse regional social-ecological contexts. We explored transformation towards more sustainable and resilient food systems in a specific regional context – the Stockholm city-regi...

Improving participatory resilience assessment by cross-fertilizing the Resilience Alliance and Transition Movement approaches

Journal / article | 2017

Sellberg, M. M., S. T. Borgström, A. V. Norström, and G. D. Peterson. 2017. Improving participatory resilience assessment by cross-fertilizing the Resilience Alliance and Transition Movement approaches. Ecology and Society 22(1):28.

The concept of resilience is currently being widely promoted and applied by environmental and development organizations. However, their application of resilience often lacks theoretical backing and evaluation. This paper presents a novel cross-fertilization of two commonly used approaches for applying resilience thinking: the grassroots movement of Transition Towns and the Resilience Alliance’s Resilience Assessment. We compar...