Project Team:
Egon Becker
Thomas Kluge
Aicha Vack
Peter Wehling
Gunter Vogt
Field of research
Research Area:
water
about the Institute
|
"Sustainable Development" has become, at the latest since the UN Conference on
the environment and development in 1992 in Rio de Janeiro, a central model for
international environmental politics. But so far this concept has been neither made
concrete nor operationalized so that it may serve as a practical strategy for action.
Since the idea of "sustainable development" couples social, economic and
ecological processes, its operationalization will only be possible on the basis of
cross-discipline cooperation. The project looks at the possibility of an
operationalization of "sustainable development" in terms of two topics. First,
in a theoretical and methodological study, the question is asked: whether, and to what
extent, applied ecosystems research represents an interdisciplinary approach to handling
the conceptual problems raised by the model of "sustainable development." This
question will be investigated by looking at two selected ecosystems research projects
taken as examples from the interdisciplinary UNESCO program, "Man and the
Biosphere." (MAB)
Second, the possibility of "regional sustainability" will be studied from a
problem oriented perspective, using the example of water economy. Starting with a critical
evaluation of present strategies for water economy, and the systems models that stand
behind these, criteria for, and perspectives on, modes of water use meeting future
requirements are formulated.
The results of both sub-projects will also be further evaluated in terms of the extent
to which they may be used to develop approaches to modeling regional water economies and
modes of water usage within a social-ecological systems model framework. The starting
theses and interim results have been under discussion in an accompanying colloquium at the
University of Frankfurt.
|