Arthur Mol Vice chair executive board Wageningen UR

Prof A.P.J. (Arthur) Mol, Vice chair of the Executive Board, Rector Magnificus of Wageningen University

Primary position

Prof Arthur P.J. Mol was appointed Rector Magnificus and member of the Executive Board of Wageningen University & Research on May 28th 2015.

Responsibilities within Wageningen University & Research

As an environmental expert and sociologist, Mol was appointed chair of Environmental Policy in 2000. From 2009 to 2014 he was director of the Wageningen School of Sciences and a member of the Doctorate Board. His core research themes include globalisation, social theory and environmental issues, ecological modernisation, sustainable production and consumption, information-based management and urban environmental management. He conducts research on several continents.

Current additional positions

Mol is an editorial board member for eight international peer review journals.

  • Editor - Edward Elgar
    January 2012 - current
    New Horizons in Environmental Politics book series
  • Board member Research committee Environment & Society - International Sociological Association
    July 1998 – current
  • Advisory Board Sustainable Places Research Institute of /Cardiff University
    January 2010 – current
  • Board Member - Agri Food Capital, North Brabant, the Netherlands
    June 2016 – current
  • Rectorencollege Nederlandse Universiteiten - VSNU
    June 2015 – current
    On behalf of WUR
  • Member Steering Committee Onderzoek en Onderwijs - VSNU
    July 2015 - current
    On behalf of WUR
  • Chairman/Member Steering Committee Versnellingsplan – VSNU
    July 2015 – current
    On behalf of WUR
  • Member Supervisory Board - Wetsus
    July 2015 – current
    On behalf of WUR
  • Member Scientific Advisory Committee AMS - Amsterdam Institute for Advanced Metropolitan Solutions
    July 2015 - current
    On behalf of WUR
  • Board Member Euro League of the Life Sciences ELLS
    2015 – current
    On behalf of WUR
  • Chairman/Member Begeleidingscommissie PBL - Planbureau voor de Leefomgeving
    July 2016 – current
    On behalf of WUR
  • Member Governing Board IHE Delft Institute for Water Education
    July 2017 – current
    On behalf of WUR
  • Member TO2 Federation
    August 2018 – current
    On behalf of WUR
  • Board Member European Bioeconomy University EBU
    2018 – current
    On behalf of WUR
  • Board Member OnePlanet Research centre
    August 2019 – current
    On behalf of WUR

  • Board Member EWUU Alliance
    March 2020 – current
    On behalf of WUR

  • Advisor - Nationaal Comité Herdenking Capitulaties 45 Wageningen
    Jul 2020 - current
    On behalf of WUR
  • President European Life Science Universities ICA
    October 2020 – current
    On behalf of WUR

Former scientific, advisory and professional activities

Arthur Mol studied Environmental Sciences in Wageningen, graduating in 1985, and went on to obtain a PhD in Sociology from the University of Amsterdam in 1995.

He was a professor of Environmental Policy at the School of Environment and Natural Resources at Renmin University in China from 2009 to 2013. He also worked as a professor at Tsinghua University in Beijing from 2013 to 2015, at the National University of Malaysia from 2014 to 2015 and at Chiba University in Tokyo from 2009 to 2014.

Mol has been a member of the China Committee of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences from 2013-2015 and a member of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Global Governance and Democratic Government programme at the Catholic University of Leuven's Centre for Global Governance Studies in Belgium from 2010 to 2017.

Until 2017 Mol was a member of the High Level Panel of Experts (HLPE) of the UN Commission for World Food Security (CFS).

From 2009 to 2013 he was a member of the Steering Committee for the Sustainable Development Knowledge Partnership of the UN Commission for Sustainable Development in New York.

He was the Wageningen University & Research representative in the Netherlands Deans of Social Sciences from 2013 to 2015 and a board member of the Amsterdam Institute for Advanced Metropolitan Solutions (AMS) from 2014 to 2015.

Publications

Arthur Mol has co-authored 24 books and 14 special issues of international scientific journals. He has also published 187 peer-reviewed articles and 90 scientific book chapters.

He has an h-index of 21 on Web of Science, 24 on Scopus and 43 on Google Scholar. Mol has supervised 48 PhD candidates, with 22 currently in preparation.

The Wageningen University & Research Library has an overview of all publications Professor Mol has written throughout his career at Wageningen University & Research.

Honours/awards

  • Selected as one of 200 leading Dutch researchers in the 'Cream of Science' list by the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, 2005.
  • Frederik H. Buttel Award, International Sociological Association, 2010
  • Award for distinguished scholarship of the American Sociological Association, Environment and Technology section, 2010
  • Vinus Zacheriasse Award for the best Social Science publication in 2010 for: L. Zhong and A.P.J. Mol, (2010), 'Water Price Reforms in China: Policy-making and Implementation', Water Resources Management 24, pp. 377-396