Hans Bruyninckx took office as the Executive Director of the European Environment Agency on 1 June 2013.
Over the last 20 years, he has conducted and managed policy-oriented research in the areas of environmental politics, climate change, and sustainable development, as well as being involved in numerous policy processes as an advisory board member and policy advisor to government agencies and other key actors.
His expertise lies primarily in the field of European and international environmental policy, studying the effects of globalization on the global governance of environmental issues and sustainable development. His experience pertains to the level of the regions (Flanders in a comparative European perspective), the EU Member States, the EU level, the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), and processes of global environmental governance (climate change in particular).
Before his appointment to the EEA, he was head of the HIVA Research Institute in Leuven, Belgium, a policy-oriented research institute associated with the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, where he was head of the Political Science department from 2007 to 2010. Dr Bruyninckx was also a senior member of the interdisciplinary Leuven Centre for Global Governance Studies and promoter-coordinator of the Flemish Policy Research Centre on Transitions for Sustainable Development (TRADO).
In addition, he has worked extensively with civil society and business actors, in support of public-private initiatives or private regulatory approaches to environmental, climate change and sustainability issues. He was president of the board of Bond Beter Leefmilieu (The Association for a Better Environment), a Flemish umbrella organization bringing together many different environmental groups.
Dr Bruyninckx studied undergraduate and master’s degrees in political science specializing in international relations at Antwerp University and Katholieke Universiteit Leuven. In 1996 he completed a PhD degree at the Colorado State University on the topic of international environmental politics, subsequently teaching at several other universities in the United States and Europe, including Colorado State University, Canisius College and Wageningen University.
Dr Bruyninckx speaks fluent English, French and German in addition to his native Flemish. He is a keen sailor as well as an outdoor and sports enthusiast.