Climate governance and leadership

Meet our members

About the director

Adriane MacDonald is an associate professor in the Department of Management and Canada Research Chair in Governance and Sustainability. Her research focuses on understanding why business, government and non-profit organizations partner to address sustainability issues; how partners communicate and collaborate; and how partnerships can be structured and managed to achieve tangible sustainability and corporate social responsibility outcomes.

See Adriane's faculty profile

Impact lab members

Daniel Curwin

Curwin is a PhD student at Concordia University’s Climate Business Institute and Next Generation Cities Institute. His research examines partnerships, stakeholder engagement, and governance in community energy initiatives. He has led business development for a Canadian energy storage firm, working with communities and utilities across Atlantic Canada and New England on pilot projects. He has also worked as a provincial policy analyst and as a strategy consultant for energy companies, governments, and industry associations.

Isabel Drummond

Drummond is a PhD student in Geography, Urban, and Environmental Studies at Concordia University, co-supervised by Alexandra Lesnikowski. She holds a BES in Geography and Environmental Management from the University of Waterloo. Her research explores how open innovation and living labs support urban carbon mitigation, with a focus on community participation and engagement. Her interest in climate governance is grounded in community-led action, rural development, and Indigenous sovereignty.

Angelina Giordano

Giordano is an MSc candidate at Concordia University’s John Molson School of Business. Her research examines how different funding types affect local government project implementation in sectors such as transportation, waste, and energy. She analyzes data from the Municipal Net-Zero Action Research Partnership (N-ZAP) survey of 256 municipalities across 10 provinces and the Green Municipal Fund project database to assess links between funding and municipal climate action.

Tessa Hansen

Hansen is a PhD student in Geography, Urban, and Environmental Studies at Concordia University. She completed a BA in Human Environment (2024), with honours research on national adaptation strategies and UNFCCC obligations. Her work now focuses on how organizations and experiments measure and report climate efforts. Her doctoral research examines how public institutions and universities support climate adaptation and whether these efforts address deeper social and political drivers of urban vulnerability.

Carmen Sweetoo

Sweetoo is an MSc in Management student at Concordia University and a member of the Volt-Age initiative’s Community Energy Systems project. Her thesis examines how governance, partnerships, and energy-justice considerations shape the implementation of Community Energy Systems in Canadian municipalities, with a focus on projects funded through the Federation of Canadian Municipalities’ Green Municipal Fund. She holds a BSc in Psychology and Behavioural Neuroscience.

Morteza Taghdisi Masabi

Taghdisi Masabi is a PhD candidate in Management at Concordia University’s John Molson School of Business. His research sits at the intersection of social entrepreneurship, organizational theory, and strategic management, focusing on how organizational actors deviate from prevailing institutional expectations. He studies how social enterprises and Social Movement Schools strategically leverage deviant practices and navigate institutional pressures and social control mechanisms to effect change and achieve their goals.

Scientific Committee

Chiraz Ben Ali
Associate Professor, Department of Accountancy
Young-Chul Jeong
Associate Professor, Department of Management
Imants Paeglis
Associate Professor, Department of Finance