Junis Sander works as a public policy analyst at Technopolis Germany and has developed expertise in policy-oriented research and evaluation as well as project management, communication, stakeholder engagement and workshop facilitation. With an academic background in social science research and international political theory, her work focusses on promoting international cooperation, equality and social innovations for a just sustainable transition. Methodologically, she is experienced in desk research, literature reviews, interviews, focus groups, surveys, statistical analysis, contribution analysis, process tracing and foresight studies – with a particular interest in participatory approaches and collaborative knowledge transfer.

Junis has contributed to evaluations, impact assessment and studies for international, European and national public bodies. Recently she was involved in the Foresight Study on new and emerging plant pests in the EU for the European Parliament’s STOA Panel. She also worked on the evaluation of the (social) innovation funding schemes DATIpilot and GdI, for the German research ministry. As part of the Service Delivery Team she supported the UfM Working Groups, creating policy briefs on Mediteranean R&I cooperation. She was also involved in the implementation of the Africa-Europe Innovation Platform for EISMEA.

Before joining Technopolis Group Junis has contributed to research and advisory projects at the Research Office for Social Innovation, supporting transfer-oriented co-creation with proposal writing, communication strategies, and stakeholder acquisition. As a Research Assistant in the Cluster of Excellence Climate, Climatic Change, and Society, she co-authored the Hamburg Climate Futures Outlook 2021 and engaged in interdisciplinary synthesis of climate futures. In her M.A. thesis, she conducted qualitative field research on the Zapatista in Mexico, analysing the political opportunity structure and dynamics of the autonomous self-governance project.

She holds a B.A. in Sociology and a M.A. in Political Science, both from the University of Hamburg. During a semester abroad at Aristotle University Thessaloniki she focused on journalism and communication. She is fluent in German and English, has working knowledge of Spanish (B2) and basic knowledge of French (A2).

Relevant projects and publications:

• Africa-Europe Innovation Platform (AEIP) (Client: European Innovation Council and SMEs Executive Agency (EISMEA), project contributor, 2025-2027)
• Evaluation of the social innovation funding measure „Gesellschaft der Ideen“ (Client: BMBF/BMFTR, project contributor, 2025-2026)
• Foresight Study on new and emerging plant pests in the EU (Client: European Parliament’s Science and Technology Options Assessment (STOA) Panel, project contributor, 2025-2026)
• Formative evaluation of (social) innovation funding measure “DATIpilot Innovationssprints” of the BMBF/BMFTR (Client: BMBF/BMFTR, project contributor, 2025-2029)
• Service Delivery Team for the UfM Working Groups (Client: European Commission, DG RTD, project contributor, 2025-2026)
• Stammer et al. 2021. Hamburg Climate Futures Outlook 2021. Assessing the plausibility of deep decarbonization by 2050. Cluster of Excellence Climate, Climatic Change, and Society (CLICCS). Hamburg, Germany. (Co-author)