Lucas Erlbacher

Lucas Erlbacher is a PhD candidate in Economics at the School of Business and Economics of the Freie Universität Berlin and the Graduate School of East Asian Studies (GEAS). His doctoral research focuses on reform-era Chinese economic thought (1978 - now). For this he has been awarded the Elsa-Neumann Scholarship for doctoral researchers by the Berlin State. In addition, he has previously received a pre-doc grant by the ‘SFB 294 Strukturwandel des Eigentums’. Lastly, he holds a BA in Business, Economics and Social Sciences (Major: Economics) from the Wirtschaftsuniversität Wien and a MA in Economics from FU Berlin.

Beyond this, Lucas Erlbacher has since 2020 been an associate fellow at the Austrian Institute for European and Security Policy (AIES) for which he has undertaken several research projects on Austria-China relations. In this capacity, he is representing Austria in the European Think-Tank Network on China (ETNC), which brings together China researchers from leading European institutes. In addition, since 2023 he has worked as an analyst for China Macro Group (CMG) on EU-China related projects.

Email: erlbacher.lucas@outlook.com

Research Project

Lucas Erlbacher is currently developing his PhD project in which he will study the evolution and current state of contemporary Chinese economic thought using a novel bibliometric database. Specifically, he seeks to shine light on the evolution of economic research during the Reform era, as well as to identify the main thematic and ideological paradigms shaping contemporary Chinese economic scholarship. Against this background, current debates, notably surrounding the policy concept of ‘Common Prosperity’, will be closely examined.

Activities

Publications

Erlbacher, Lucas (2022): “Austria: From the Chinese Hoffnungsmarkt to European strategic dependence”, In: John Seaman et al. (eds.), Dependence in Europe's Relations with China, Report by European Think- tank Network on China (ETNC), April 2022, 41-47: https://www.aies.at/publikationen/2022/dependence-in-europe-relations-with-china.php
Seaman, J.; Ghiretti, F.; Erlbacher, L.; Martin, X.; Otero-Iglesias, M. (2022): “Introduction: Europe Debates (or doesn’t) its Dependence on China”, In: John Seaman et al. (eds.), Dependence in Europe's Relations with China, Report by European Think-tank Network on China (ETNC), April 2022, 12- 20: https://www.aies.at/publikationen/2022/dependence-in-europe-relations-with-china.php
Erlbacher, Lucas (2021): “China's soft power in Austria: building on the power of nonchalance”, In: Ties Dams et al. (eds.), China’s Soft Power in Europe, Report by European Think-tank Network on China (ETNC), April 2021, 14-19: https://www.aies.at/publikationen/2021/chinas-soft-power-in-europe.php
Erlbacher, Lucas (2020): “Austria: a non-confrontational road to European economic sovereignty”, In: John Seaman (eds.), Covid-19 and Europe-China Relations, Report by European Think-tank Network on China (ETNC), April 2020, 9-13: https://www.aies.at/publikationen/2020/covid19-eu-china-relation.php

Subprojects

JRT02 Clash or Convergence of Capitalisms: Property Conflicts over Chinese Direct Investments in Germany and the European Union

Associate Member/ Fellow