Manfred M. Fischer (born 25 February 1947) is an Austrian and German regional scientist, Emeritus Professor of economic geography at the WU-Vienna University of Economics and Business, and adjunct professor at the Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing.

Biography

Manfred M. Fischer earned his

doctorate A doctorate (from Latin ''doctor'', meaning "teacher") or doctoral degree is a postgraduate academic degree awarded by universities and some other educational institutions, derived from the ancient formalism '' licentia docendi'' ("licence to teach ...

(

Dr. rer. nat. for, la, Doctor rerum naturalium, Doctor of Natural Sciences, paren=left, ), abbreviated Dr. rer. nat., is a doctoral academic degree awarded by universities in some European countries (e.g. Germany, Austria and Czech Republic) to graduates in phy ...

degree) ''summa cum laude'' in

geography Geography (from Ancient Greek ; combining 'Earth' and 'write', literally 'Earth writing') is the study of the lands, features, inhabitants, and phenomena of Earth. Geography is an all-encompassing discipline that seeks an understanding o ...

and

mathematics Mathematics is a field of study that discovers and organizes methods, Mathematical theory, theories and theorems that are developed and Mathematical proof, proved for the needs of empirical sciences and mathematics itself. There are many ar ...

from Friedrich-Alexander University Erlangen (

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

) in January 1975. He had started his academic career in September 1975 at the Institute for Geography and Regional Research,

University of Vienna The University of Vienna (, ) is a public university, public research university in Vienna, Austria. Founded by Rudolf IV, Duke of Austria, Duke Rudolph IV in 1365, it is the oldest university in the German-speaking world and among the largest ...

, the institution from which he received his

habilitation Habilitation is the highest university degree, or the procedure by which it is achieved, in Germany, France, Italy, Poland and some other European and non-English-speaking countries. The candidate fulfills a university's set criteria of excelle ...

degree (venia docendi) in

human Humans (''Homo sapiens'') or modern humans are the most common and widespread species of primate, and the last surviving species of the genus ''Homo''. They are Hominidae, great apes characterized by their Prehistory of nakedness and clothing ...

(economic and social) geography in May 1982, with a thesis entitled ''A Methodology of Regional Taxonomy''. In December 1988 he was appointed Professor and Chair in

Economic Geography Economic geography is the subfield of human geography that studies economic activity and factors affecting it. It can also be considered a subfield or method in economics. Economic geography takes a variety of approaches to many different topi ...

at WU-Vienna University of Economics and Business where he assumed the headship of the Institute for Economic Geography and GIScience from 1989 to 2015. He also directed the Institute for Urban and Regional Research at the

Austrian Academy of Sciences The Austrian Academy of Sciences (; ÖAW) is a legal entity under the special protection of the Republic of Austria. According to the statutes of the Academy its mission is to promote the sciences and humanities in every respect and in every fi ...

, 1996-1999, and acted as Dean for Humanities, Social and Formal Sciences at WU-Vienna, 2002-2003, and for the Social Sciences from 2004 to 2009 at the same institution. Dr. Fischer has mentored young scholars both in Austria and as a visiting professor to other institutions, including

University of California at Santa Barbara The University of California, Santa Barbara (UC Santa Barbara or UCSB) is a public land-grant research university in Santa Barbara County, California, United States. Tracing its roots back to 1891 as an independent teachers college, UCSB joine ...

(USA), Oskar Lange Academy of Economics in Wroclaw (Poland), Free University Amsterdam (Netherlands),

University of Bologna The University of Bologna (, abbreviated Unibo) is a Public university, public research university in Bologna, Italy. Teaching began around 1088, with the university becoming organised as guilds of students () by the late 12th century. It is the ...

(Italy),

National Technical University of Athens The National (Metsovian) Technical University of Athens (NTUA; , ''National Metsovian Polytechnic''), sometimes known as Athens Polytechnic, a university in Athens, Greece. It is named in honor of its benefactors Nikolaos Stournaris, Eleni Tosi ...

(Greece), University of Joensuu (Finland), Leibniz University Hanover (Germany) and

Johannes Kepler University Linz The Johannes Kepler University Linz (German: ''Johannes Kepler Universität Linz'', short: ''JKU'') is a public university in Austria. It is located in Linz, the capital of Upper Austria. It offers bachelor's, master's, diploma and doctoral degre ...

(Austria). He is co-founder and joint editor-in-chief of the Journal of Geographical Systems (and its predecessor Geographical Systems), a

journal A journal, from the Old French ''journal'' (meaning "daily"), may refer to: *Bullet journal, a method of personal organization *Diary, a record of personal secretive thoughts and as open book to personal therapy or used to feel connected to onesel ...

with a distinct focus on the interface between modelling, statistical techniques and spatial issues in a broad spectrum. He is also co-founder and a co-editor of Springer’s book series, Advances in Spatial Science.

Research

Dr. Fischer is an active researcher in

regional science Regional science is a field of economics concerned with analytical approaches to problems that are related specifically to regional and international issues. Topics in regional science include, but are not limited to location theory or spatial eco ...

, crossing the boundaries to

economics Economics () is a behavioral science that studies the Production (economics), production, distribution (economics), distribution, and Consumption (economics), consumption of goods and services. Economics focuses on the behaviour and interac ...

statistics Statistics (from German language, German: ', "description of a State (polity), state, a country") is the discipline that concerns the collection, organization, analysis, interpretation, and presentation of data. In applying statistics to a s ...

and

computational science Computational science, also known as scientific computing, technical computing or scientific computation (SC), is a division of science, and more specifically the Computer Sciences, which uses advanced computing capabilities to understand and s ...

. He has made important contributions to the development of novel methods and techniques within

spatial analysis Spatial analysis is any of the formal Scientific technique, techniques which study entities using their topological, geometric, or geographic properties, primarily used in Urban design, Urban Design. Spatial analysis includes a variety of techni ...

spatial statistics Spatial statistics is a field of applied statistics dealing with spatial data. It involves stochastic processes (random fields, point processes), sampling, smoothing and interpolation, regional ( areal unit) and lattice ( gridded) data, poin ...

and

spatial econometrics Spatial econometrics is the field where spatial analysis and econometrics intersect. The term “spatial econometrics” was introduced for the first time by the Belgian economist Jean Paelinck (universally recognised as the father of the disciplin ...

, and their application to a wide range of social science areas. His devotion to excellence in research has given him international recognition in the regional science community and beyond. His research activities show a strong commitment to collaborative production of knowledge. In this spirit, he participated in several interdisciplinary scholarly programmes, such as, for example, the GISdata research programme and the Network for European Communication and Transportation Research (NECTAR) of the

European Science Foundation The European Science Foundation (ESF) is an association of 11 member organizations devoted to scientific research in 8 European countries. ESF is an independent, non-governmental, non-profit organization that promotes science in Europe. It was e ...

, and presented his research at various international conferences. Manfred M. Fischer is also known as a conference organizer. He has helped to design regional science conferences both in Europe and in North America, and has – in his capacity as Chair of the 500-person Commission on Mathematical Models of the

International Geographical Union The International Geographical Union (IGU; , UGI) is an international geographical society. The first International Geographical Congress was held in Antwerp in 1871. Subsequent meetings led to the establishment of the permanent organization i ...

(1988-1996) – planned scholarly meetings and engaged in the developments of research relationships between scholars from different parts of the world including Australia, China, Eastern and Western Europe and North America.

Publications

His publication list, with a majority of works written with colleagues, includes 20 monographs, 22 edited books and over 260 chapters in international books and articles in peer-reviewed

academic journal An academic journal (or scholarly journal or scientific journal) is a periodical publication in which Scholarly method, scholarship relating to a particular academic discipline is published. They serve as permanent and transparent forums for the ...

s. Some of his books have been translated into Chinese.

Selected books

* * * * * *

Selected journal articles

* * * * * * * * * * * *

Honours and awards

Manfred M. Fischer is one of the most cited regional scientists. He has been named as one of the fifteen most influential authors in

over the period 1990-1999, in regional science publication patterns in the 1990s. He is listed among the most cited scholars during the 1977-1989 and the 1990-2001 periods and among the all-time intellectual leaders of regional science and listed as top economic geographer in the German-speaking world (based on research output and citations). Dr. Fischer is the first recipient of the prestigious Jean Paelinck Award of the Regional Science Association International (RSAI), honouring outstanding scholarly achievements in the field of

methods (ERSA Congress in Lisbon, 2015). In addition, he has received the Founder's Medal of RSAI that is awarded every four years to scholars who have made significant lifelong contributions to

(ERSA Congress in Vienna, 2016). Other accolades include the ERSA Prize in Regional Science (ERSA Congress in Bratislava, 2012), the RSAI Fellows Award (North American Meetings of the RSAI in Toronto, 2006) and Special Issues of the ''International Regional Science Review'' and the ''Review of Regional Studies'', edited in his honour. In 2021, he has received the Bronze Medal of Masaryk University in Brno (Czech Republic), awarded for long-term contributions to the development of the Faculty of Economics and Administration of the university where a library for Ph.D. students in regional economics – named the Manfred M. Fischer library – had been opened in 2019.

Learned societies

* Foreign Member,

Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences The Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (, KNAW) is an organization dedicated to the advancement of science and literature in the Netherlands. The academy is housed in the Trippenhuis in Amsterdam. In addition to various advisory a ...

(KNAW), elected 1999 * Corresponding Member,

(AAS), elected 1996 * Fellow, International Academy of Sciences for Europe and Asia (IEAS), elected 1995

References

External links

Personal homepage
at the website of the WU-Vienna University of Economics and Business
Manfred M. Fischer's personal homepage on Google SitesAwarding of the RSAI, Founder's Medal Award to Manfred Fischer (2016)Manfred M. Fischer's CV with a complete list of publicationsORCID-IDPure
{{DEFAULTSORT:Fischer, Manfred 1947 births Living people Members of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences Regional scientists University of Erlangen–Nuremberg alumni University of Vienna alumni Academic staff of the University of Vienna Academic staff of the Vienna University of Economics and Business Scientists from Nuremberg