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In dieser Arbeit wird das Thema der Überfischung vor der Küste Westafrikas behandelt. Der Schwerpunkt liegt auf der industriellen und auf der illegalen Fischerei, welche hauptsächlich von den Industrienationen ausgehen. Hierbei werden die Rechtslage und die Auswirkungen auf die Ökonomie und die Soziologie in Westafrika behandelt. Im Hinblick
auf die intensive Fischerei lautet die zentrale Frage, ob die industrielle und die illegale Fischerei zu einem Zusammenbruch des Fischereisektors in Westafrika führen. Fazit der Arbeit ist, dass die lokalen Fischer und die Arbeiter aus den Weiterverarbeitungsbetrieben massiven Existenzproblemen ausgesetzt sind. Des Weiteren führt der Mangel an Fischereiprodukten zu einer Vielzahl von Problemen in der Bevölkerung, als Beispiel ist hier die Mangelernährung zu nennen. Den Abschluss dieser Arbeit bilden umfassende Lösungsvorschläge aus den Bereichen Recht, Politik und
Sozialwissenschaften.
Befreiung aus dem Kreislauf des Konsums. Über den Beitrag von Yoga zu einer suffizienten Lebensweise
(2014)
Suffizienz ist ein Strategieansatz, dessen Verfolgung für das Erreichen einer nachhaltigen Entwicklung unerlässlich ist. In ihrer praktischen Umsetzung trifft die Suffizienzstrategie jedoch auf vielfältige Hindernisse, die die Etablierung von konkreten Maßnahmen verhindern. Im Rahmen dieser Arbeit wurde untersucht, inwiefern die Philosophie und Praxis des Yoga einen Schlüssel für die Umsetzung der Suffizienz auf privater Ebene darstellen kann. Nach der Methodik der qualitativen Sozialforschung wurden Einzelinterviews mit Yogalehrer*innen durchgeführt, deren Auswertung das Transformationspotenzial des Yoga in Richtung einer suffizienten Lebensweise näher erläutert. Die Forschungsergebnisse bestätigen eine Suffizienzorientierung der befragten Personen seit dem Beginn ihrer Yogapraxis und deuten auf eine erhöhte Bereitschaft für die Akzeptanz von Suffizienzmaßnahmen hin. Ein direkter Zusammenhang zwischen Yoga und dem Wissen um die Notwendigkeit einer suffizienten Lebensweise konnte nicht nachgewiesen werden.
Die Ergebnisse dienen der Suffizienzforschung als Ansatzpunkte für die Entwicklung neuer Umsetzungsstrategien.
Insbesondere in den sogenannten entwickelten Ländern findet Nachhaltigkeit immer mehr Anklang. Die meisten dort lebenden Menschen würden sowohl ihre Ziele befürworten, als auch ihre Hindernisse überwinden wollen. Aber wir stellen fest, dass Nachhaltigkeit im Augenblick der Handlungsentscheidung nicht vorrangig behandelt wird. Im Gegenteil, sie wird hinten angestellt. Dieser Aufsatz erklärt, woran es liegt, dass sich Menschen letztendlich kaum mit Nachhaltigkeit emotional identifizieren können - weder im positiven noch im negativen Sinne. Das Erreichen von Nachhaltigkeit kann somit nur dann gelingen, wenn ein Ziel gefunden wird, das Menschen tatsächlich motiviert - und das gleichzeitig Nachhaltigkeit hervorbringt
Fostering sustainable urban mobility at neighborhood-based mobility stations with cargo bikes
(2019)
Over 25 years after the UNCED conference in Rio de Janeiro in 1992, agriculture in the European Union (EU) has below the line not come much closer to being sustainable. By now, efforts to promote sustainability in agriculture have predominantly been based on “mainstream science”. This has resulted in strategies directed mainly at agricultural production, measures targeted at individual farms, and a major focus on technology-centered solutions. Yet, there have been many claims emphasizing that such approaches are insufficient to deal with wicked, sustainability-related problems. Rather, it has been argued, we need to question the governance of sustainability issues, i.e. who makes which decisions in which way. A central aspect of sustainability governance is collaboration, which has been lauded for its benefits but also criticized for its challenges. The potential benefits of collaboration have apparently been recognized also in the context of EU agriculture. Yet, there has been a lack of holistic consideration of how collaboration can be systematically integrated and promoted in the governance of EU agriculture. Sustainable agriculture cannot only be encouraged through changes in the overall governance system but also through the support of existing and emerging small-scale collaborative initiatives for sustainable agriculture. Indeed, there has been substantial research on the conditions that influence success of similar collaborative initiatives. However, the knowledge resulting from this research remains rather scattered and does not allow for the identification of overall patterns. Additionally, little of this research specifically focuses on sustainable agriculture. What is more, the promotion of collaboration for sustainable agriculture is further complicated by the lack of clarity of the meaning of sustainable agriculture, which is an inherently ambiguous and contested concept. This cumulative dissertation aims to address these gaps by contributing to a better understanding of how collaboration can be facilitated and designed as a means to govern for and advance sustainable agriculture. For this purpose, the dissertation addresses three sub-aims: 1) Advancing the understanding of the concept of sustainable agriculture; 2) scrutinizing the current governance system regarding its potential to facilitate or hamper collaboration; 3) assessing conceptually and empirically how actor collaboration can be facilitated as a means to govern for sustainable agriculture, both from a top-down and a bottom-up perspective. In doing so, this dissertation focuses on EU agriculture and applies a mix of methods, ranging from qualitative to quantitative dominant. The findings of this dissertation highlight that collaboration has been underappreciated and even hampered as an approach to governing for sustainable agriculture. In contrast, this dissertation argues that collaboration offers one promising way to promoting and realizing agriculture and emphasizes the need to integrate different approaches to collaboration and to sustainable agriculture. Thus, the findings of this dissertation encourage and justify more research, discussion, and action around collaboration in the context of sustainable agriculture. Additionally, the dissertation provides first tangible insights both on principles for systemic change to promote governance for sustainable agriculture and on factors that are crucial for the successful management of small-scale collaborative initiatives. Most importantly, this dissertation advocates an ‘integrative attitude’ among and between scientists and practitioners which could enable more collegial, collaborative and hopefully more constructive research, discussion and action for sustainable agriculture.
This dissertation examines how smallholder farming livelihoods may be more effectively leveraged to address food security. It is based on empirical research in three woredas (districts) in the Jimma Zone of southwestern Ethiopia. Findings in the chapters that follow draw on quantitative and qualitative data. In this research, I focus on local actors to investigate how they can be better supported in their roles as agents who have the ability to improve their livelihoods and achieve food security. This general aim is operationalized through three research questions that are addressed in separate chapters. The research questions are: (i) How do livelihood strategies influence food security?; (ii) What livelihood challenges are common and how do households cope with these?; and (iii) How do social institutions, in which livelihoods are embedded, influence people’s abilities to undertake livelihoods and be food secure? Using quantitative data from a survey of randomly selected households, I applied a number of multivariate statistical analysis to determine types of livelihood strategies and to establish how these strategies are associated with capital assets and food security. Here I view livelihood strategies as a portfolio of livelihood activities that households undertake to make a living. The predominant livelihood in the study area was diversified smallholder farming involving mainly the production of crops. Food crops such as maize, teff, sorghum, and in smaller quantities – barley and wheat, were primarily produced for subsistence. Cash crops namely coffee and khat were primarily produced for the market. Based on our analyses, we found five types of livelihood strategies to be present along a gradient of crop diversity. Food security generally decreased with less crops being part of the livelihood strategy. The livelihood strategies were associated with households’ capital assets. For example, the livelihood strategy with the most number of crops had more access to a wider range of capital assets. They had larger aggregate farm field size, and were more involved in learning with other farmers through informal exchange of information and knowledge. The status of food (in)security of each household during the lean season was measured using the Household Food Insecurity Access Scale (HFIAS). A generalized linear model established that the type of livelihood strategy a household undertook significantly influenced their food security. Other significant variables were educational attainment and gender of household head. The findings contribute evidence to the benefits of diversified livelihoods for food security, in this case, the combination of diverse food crops and cash crops. Smallholder farming in southwest Ethiopia is beset with process-related and outcome-related challenges. Here, a process-related challenge pertains to the lack of different types of capital assets that people need to be able to undertake their livelihoods, while an outcome-related challenge pertains to lack of food. The most frequently mentioned process-related challenges were associated with the natural capital either as lack in necessary ecosystem services or high levels of ecosystem disservices. Farming households typically faced the combined challenges of decreasing soil fertility, land scarcity, die-off of oxen due to diseases, and wild animal pests that raided their crops and attacked their livestock. Lack of cash was also common and this was associated with an inability to access goods and services that households needed to address other problems. For example, lack of cash prevented households from buying fertilizers or replacing the oxen they lost to diseases. Confronted with multiple and simultaneous challenges, households coped by drawing on more readily accessible capital assets in order to address a lack. This process is here referred to as capital asset substitution. The findings indicate that when households liquidate a physical asset in order to gain cash which they then use to address other challenges, the common outcome is an erosion of their capital asset base. Many households reported having to sell their livestock to buy fertilizers, as required by the government, without seeing an increase in their harvest. The same process of liquidating capital asset to purchase food particularly during the lean season, also led to erosion of capital assets. On the other hand, when households drew on their social capital to address the challenges, they tended to maintain their capital asset base. The local didaro system is one such example in which farming households with adjacent farm fields synchronize their cropping timing and pool their labor together to address the problem of wild animal pests. Human capital, for example, in the form of available labor was also important for coping. Protecting and enhancing natural capital is needed to strengthen the basis of livelihoods in the study area, and maintaining social and human capitals is important to enable farming households to cope with challenges without eroding their capital asset base. Smallholder farming in southwest Ethiopia is embedded in a social context that creates differentiated challenges and opportunities amongst people. Gender is an axis of social differentiation on which many of the differences are based. Since the coming into power of the currently ruling Ethiopian political coalition, important policy reforms have been put in place to empower women. This includes the formal requirement that wives’ names are included in land certificates. Local residents reported notable changes related to gender in the last ten years. To make sense of the changes, we adapted the leverage points concept which identifies places to intervene in a system with different depths and effectiveness for changing the trajectory of a system. Using this concept, we classified the reported changes as belonging to the domains of visible gaps, social structures, and attitudes. Importantly, changes within these domains interacted, suggesting that changes facilitate further changes. The most prominent driver of the changes observed was the government’s emphasis on empowering women and government-organized interventions including gender sensitization trainings. The changes toward more egalitarian relationships at the household level were perceived by local residents to lead to better implementation of livelihoods, and better ability to be food secure. The study offers the insight that while changing deep, underlying drivers (e. g. attitudes) of systemic inequalities is critical, other leverage points such as formal institutional change and closing of certain visible gaps can facilitate deeper changes (e. g. attitudes) through interaction between different leverage points. This can inform gender transformative approaches. While positive gender-related changes have been observed, highly unequal gender norms still persist that lead to women as well as poor men being disadvantaged. Social norms which provide the basis for collective understanding of acceptable attitudes and behaviors are entrenched in people’s ways of being and doing and can therefore significantly lag behind formal institutional changes. For instance, daughters in southwest Ethiopia continued to be excluded from land inheritance because of long-standing patrilineal inheritance practices. This impacted on women’s abilities to engage in smallholder farming in equal footing as men. Norms influenced practices around access and control of capital assets, decision-making, and allocation of activities with important implications for who gets to participate, how, and who gets to benefit. Landless men also faced distinct disadvantages in sharecropping arrangements where people involved often have unequal socioeconomic status. Processes that facilitate critical local reflections are needed to begin to change unequal social norms and transform smallholder farming to becoming more inclusive and egalitarian spheres. To more effectively leverage smallholder farming for a food secure future, this dissertation closes with four key insights namely: (1) Diversified livelihoods combining food and cash crops result in better food security; (2) Enhancing natural and social capital is a requisite for viable smallholder farming; (3) Social and gender equality are strategically important in improving livelihoods and food security; and (4) Institutions particularly social norms are key to achieving gender and social equality. Because the livelihoods-food security nexus depend on people’s agency in their livelihoods, this dissertation concludes that livelihoods should be recast as critical spheres for expanding human agency and that conceptual development as well as formulation of suitable tools of measurement be pursued.
Seit den frühen 1990er Jahren wird transdisziplinäre Nachhaltigkeitsforschung in Form von problemorientierten Forschungs- und Lernprojekten konzeptioniert und praktisch umgesetzt, an denen außeruniversitäre Akteur_innen beteiligt sind. Diese Forschungsarbeit verfolgt drei Ziele: Erstens, die Konzeptualisierung der Begriffe Kultur, Multi-, Inter- und Transkulturalität in der Literatur zur transdisziplinären Nachhaltigkeitsforschung zu untersuchen. Zweitens, die Konzeptionierung und Umsetzung von transdisziplinären Forschungs- und Lernprojekten in Hinblick auf kulturelles Differenzieren zu analysieren. Drittens, konzeptionelle Beiträge zur Gestaltung von transdisziplinären Forschungs- und Lernprojekten zu entwickeln. Methodisch wird auf Literaturanalysen und eine qualitative Untersuchung zweier transdisziplinärer Lernforschungsprojekte zurückgegriffen. Unter dem Begriff Forschungs- und Lernprojekt werden in dieser Forschungsarbeit sowohl Forschungsprojekte als auch Lehr-Lernforschungsprojekte gefasst. Zentrale Ergebnisse der Forschungsarbeit sind die Folgenden: Erstens wird der Kulturbegriff in der transdisziplinären Nachhaltigkeitsforschung zwar vielfältig verwendet, als Forschungsthema, Hintergrund von Beteiligten, Kooperationsweise, Projektkontext, in Hinblick auf Interkulturalität oder als Wissenskultur, allerdings kaum ausdifferenziert und konkretisiert. Zweitens besteht auf der Ebene der Konzeptionierung von transdisziplinären Forschungs- und Lernprojekten: 1) ein starkes Übergewicht von Integration und Konsens gegenüber einer Auseinandersetzung mit Differenz, 2) eine implizite Vorauswahl von Beteiligten durch bestimmte Begrifflichkeiten und methodologische Ansätze und 3) eine Reproduktion von Machtverhältnissen durch (dichotome) Symmetrie- und Ausgleichsvorstellungen. Drittens zeigt sich auf der Ebene der Umsetzung von Lernforschungsprojekten: 1) eine starke Prozessorientierung der Projekte, 2) ein Spannungsfeld zwischen einer Öffnung und Steuerung in Hinblick auf den Projektverlauf und 3) vielfältige Differenzaushandlungen in Interaktionen (wie Zeitlichkeit, Verantwortung, Erfahrung, Relevanz). Die Ergebnisse zeigen, dass politische Implikationen der Forschung und zentrale Ungleichheitskategorien der Kultur- und Sozialwissenschaften (u.a. race, class, gender, body) kaum thematisiert werden. Vorschläge zur Gestaltung transdisziplinärer Forschungs- und Lernprojekte werden in Hinblick auf ein Verständnis von Forschungsdesigns als Prozesse, einem Erkunden von Differenzierungen und Forscher_innen-Positionen und der Bedeutung eines Verlernens entwickelt. Die folgenden Vorschläge zur Gestaltung von transdisziplinären Forschungs- und Lernprojekten werden aus den Ergebnissen entwickelt: Kulturkonzepte sollten nicht als voneinander getrennt, sondern als miteinander verschränkt betrachtet werden. Generell sollten Kulturkonzepte stärker definiert werden. So können durch offene Kulturkonzepte problematische Implikationen (Stereotypen, Rassismus, Kulturalisierung) vorgebeugt werden, die Zielen transdisziplinärer Forschung entgegenstehen. In Hinblick auf die Arten und Weisen kulturellen Differenzierens sollte bewusster mit Differenzierungen umgegangen werden (Wer differenziert wen wie?). Dies schließt ein, eine Sensibilität gegenüber kulturellem Differenzieren zu entwickeln und Differenzierungen in Forschungsprozessen zu erkunden. Kulturelles Differenzieren entfaltet ein wichtiges epistemologisches und transformatives Potential in der transdisziplinären Forschung, um Selbstverständlichkeiten zu reflektieren und Gemeinsamkeiten zu entdecken.
This thesis deals with the influence of sustainability communication on the purchase decision of sustainable tourism products involving German specialist tour operators. Sustainability communication is a challenge, because sustainable tourism is an abstract and vague concept which consumers find it difficult to grasp and about which they are sceptical, and the service characteristics of tourism products complicate the decision making stage, which is a high-involvement situation of uncertainty to which sustainable product attributes add complexity. As an introduction, an interdisciplinary theory discussion reveals knowledge gaps in terms of the value-belief-norm theory and the elaboration likelihood model (ELM). The first article, which is the first systematic literature review on the topic, reveals that there is a limited theoretical understanding of sustainability communication, a lack of practical understanding of how to design sustainability messages, and an inadequate set of methodologies for its research. It identifies knowledge gaps concerning: the holistic approach to sustainability communication; its role in the attitude-behaviour gap; an interdisciplinary theoretical understanding focusing on belief-based social psychological theories and theories of persuasion; qualitative methods; and experimental design. The second article investigates the role of sustainability communication in the attitude-behaviour gap, employing the value-belief-norm theory to explain how information is processed by special interest customers. Interview findings show that ineffective sustainability communication is the reason for the gap and that customers unintentionally booked sustainably. The study identifies eight groups of beliefs which explain the processing of sustainability attributes. Sustainability information is effective when it is value-congruent, that is, when customers perceive they can make a difference, they begin to ascribe a responsibility to themselves. The third article investigates how to design an effective sustainability message in tour operator advertising. Drawing on the ELM, the study shows that appeal type does not significantly influence persuasion but the topic presented is important. Cultural sustainability is the sustainability topic that is most persuasive for cultural tourists, while consumer prior knowledge and issue-involvement with the topic promote successful information processing. The thesis has contributed to a target-group specific understanding of effective sustainability product communication and contributes to knowledge in terms of theory, methodology, and practical solutions.
Polen weist insbesondere im Süden und Osten des Landes, aber auch in seinen anderen Landesteilen, eine kleinteilige Agrarstruktur auf. Eine solche kleinteilige Agrarstruktur ist in den Augen der polnischen Agrarpolitik ein unerwünschtes Phänomen. Entsprechend misst sie der Veränderung der kleinteiligen Agrarstruktur Polens zu größeren Einheiten hin eine hohe Priorität bei. Vor dem Hintergrund vielfältiger sozial-ökologischer Krisenphänomene, die oftmals mit einer intensiven, industriellen und großskaligen Landwirtschaft verbunden sind, stellt sich jedoch die Frage, ob solche Bestrebungen im Hinblick auf Nachhaltigkeit, der sich die polnische Agrarpolitik und die Politik für die Entwicklung ländlicher Räume ebenfalls verpflichtet, zielführend sind. Um dieser Frage nachzugehen, wurde für die vorliegende Dissertation in zwei landwirtschaftlich besonders kleinteilig strukturierten Regionen Polens (Wojewodschaft Lubelskie und Wojewodschaft Podkarpackie) eine empirische Studie unter Betreiberinnen und Betreibern von kleinen landwirtschaftlichen Betrieben durchgeführt. Ziel der Studie war es zu untersuchen, welche Lebenswirklichkeiten und Wirtschaftsweisen sich in kleinen landwirtschaftlichen Betrieben finden und ob diese Lebenswirklichkeiten und Wirtschaftsweisen den vielfältigen landwirtschaftsbezogenen sozial-ökologischen Krisenphänomenen entgegenwirken können. Den theoretischen Hintergrund der Arbeit bilden die Nachhaltigkeitsdebatte, das Konzept der gesellschaftlichen Naturverhältnisse der Sozialen Ökologie sowie wachstumskritische Positionen (insbesondere die Ansätze von Suffizienz und Subsistenz). Die Ergebnisse der empirischen Studie zeigen, dass die Lebenswirklichkeiten und Wirtschaftsweisen von Betreiberinnen und Betreibern von kleinen landwirtschaftlichen Betrieben sehr vielfältig sind. Die befragten Landwirtinnen und Landwirte verfolgen in ihren Betrieben unterschiedliche ökonomische Modelle - einige von ihnen sind ökonomisch erfolgreiche Landwirtinnen und Landwirte im Vollerwerb, andere haben sich bewusst für Nebenerwerbslandwirtschaft entschieden, und noch andere schließlich betreiben Landwirtschaft aus einer ökonomischen Notwendigkeit und einem Mangel an Alternativen heraus. Doch trotz der unterschiedlichen ökonomischen Modelle, die die befragten Landwirtinnen und Landwirten in ihren Betrieben verfolgen, liegen ihrem Handeln gleichermaßen der Wunsch nach Existenzsicherung und der Wunsch nach Autonomie als wesentliche Motivation zugrunde. Insgesamt zeigen die Ergebnisse der empirischen Studie einige der Herausforderungen für Betreiberinnen und Betreiber von kleinen landwirtschaftlichen Betrieben auf, die aus den gegenwärtigen institutionellen und politisch-wirtschaftlichen Rahmenbedingungen für die Landwirtschaft resultieren. Ebenso zeigen die Ergebnisse, dass die Wirtschaftsweisen, die in den untersuchten kleinen Betrieben vorgefunden wurden, nur bedingt zu einer nachhaltigen Entwicklung ländlicher Räume beitragen können. Die Ergebnisse der empirischen Studie zeigen insbesondere die Dringlichkeit auf, die gegenwärtigen politisch-wirtschaftlichen Rahmenbedingungen für die Landwirtschaft zu ändern und naturerhaltende Wirtschaftsweisen auch finanziell attraktiv zu machen, wenn diese einen Beitrag zu einer nachhaltigen Entwicklung ländlicher Räume leisten sollen.
Nowadays, our (western-world) society is characterized by digitalization. This is realized by information and communication technologies, consuming a huge amount of energy. The fact that digitalization comes along with a lot of negative effects onto the environment is slightly known in the case of energy consumption by hardware, especially regarding mobile devices, having a limited battery life. However, awareness of environmental issues of software, being the driver of hardware, is mainly missing, even if the research field addressing corresponding issues is growing. Thus, the doctoral thesis at hand addresses the question How to draw (a) developers and (b) usersattention to environmental issues of software? By presenting (a) a calculation method of the carbon footprint of software projects and (b) a concept for an eco-label for software products, evaluated by a user survey, the doctoral thesis provides two strategies how to draw the attention to environmental issues of software. Summarizing, this thesis can act as a basis for further research in bridging from science to society in the context of environmental issues of software. Its findings can be seen as starting points for practical implementations of methods and tools supporting a more environmentally friendly way of developing software and informing about environmental issues of software usage. In order to get the implementation of the research results of the thesis going, it highlights practical implications for diverse groups of stakeholders - researchers, certifiers, public administration and professional purchasers, and environmental associations - that have been identified as being important for the practical implementation of the presented concepts and, thus, represent the target group of the doctoral thesis.
