Joanne Linnerooth-Bayer is Program Director of the Risk and Resilience (RISK) Program at the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) in Laxenburg, Austria. She is an economist by training, and has received a BS and PhD at Carnegie-Mellon University and the University of Maryland, respectively. Her current interest is global change and the risk of catastrophic events, and she is investigating options for improving the management of catastrophic risks in transition and developing countries. She and her colleagues have carried out extensive research on this topic and are developing options for the donor communities, as well as the climate adaptation community, to support insurance and other forms of pro-active disaster assistance. This research is part of her broader interest in governance and burden sharing especially in the context of adaptation to climate change.

Dr. Bayer is an associate editor of the Journal for Risk Research and is on the editorial board of Risk Analysis, Risk Abstracts, and Journal of Natural Resources Policy Research. She serves on the boards of the Austrian Climate Research Program, the Munich Climate Insurance Initiative and the European Commission Environment Advisory Committee. Other affiliations include the faculty of Beijing Normal University and the Science Committee of the Chinese Academy of Disaster Reduction and Emergency Management.