Profile
Abstract
I'm a historical sociologist working on the relationship between society and nature in a global perspective. My first book Working Nature: Steam, Power, and the Failure of the Energy Economy (forthcoming) offers a historical account of the energy economy informed by a Critical Theory of Nature: Rather than assuming society uses energies available in nature, I propose to conceive of the energy economy as a dialectical self-realization of society against nature's resistance.
My recent research deals with the decarbonization of the electric grid, the theory and practice of Soviet energy planning, as well as early Soviet ecological thought.
My main areas of interest include:
Global historical sociology of the environment, resources, and energy
Electric Grids, Energy Transitions and Decarbonization
Environmental and Energy History in Russia and Eastern Europe
Historical Epistemology & Sociology of Science and Technology
Historical Materialism and Critical Theory
Professional career
- 02/2024 - 04/2024
Fellow in the program on 'Technology, the Environment, and the Future of Europe' at the Remarque Institute for the Study of Europe, New York University - 11/2019 - 09/2022
Post-Doc at the Department of Sociology, University of Toronto - 10/2017 - 10/2019
Researcher in the Graduate School on 'World Politics', University of Bielefeld - 04/2016 - 06/2016
Doctoral Fellow at the German Historical Institute, Moscow - 02/2014 - 09/2017
Junior Researcher at the Department for Science Studies, Forum Internationale Wissenschaft, University of Bonn - 10/2011 - 01/2014
Student Assistant, Berlin Social Science Center
Education
- 10/2016 - 04/2017
Fulbright Fellow at Columbia University, New York City - 10/2007 - 12/2013
Undergraduate and Graduate Studies in Social Sciences and Slavic Languages in Berlin and Belgrade
- show detailsRuß, D.'Socialism is not just Built for a Hundred Years': Renewable Energy and Planetary Thought in the Early Soviet Union (1917-1945)Contemporary European history. 2022. 31 (4). pp. 491–508.
- show detailsRuß, D.Energetika: Gleb Krzhizhanovskii’s Conception of the Nature–Society MetabolismHistorical Materialism. 2021. 29 (2). pp. 188–218.
- show detailsRuß, D.Produktivistische Ökologie: Der Energiebegriff der klassischen Moderne und seine Implikationen für eine kritische SoziologieBerliner Journal für Soziologie. 2023.
Research fields
Philosophy, Sociology, Historical science
Contact for media inquiries
Phone: 0341 9737866