From Knowledge to Action - New Paths towards Sustainable Consumption

The German Federal Ministry of Education and Research will shortly fund ten research projects dealing with the complex issue why people may support the approach of sustainable consumption,however, do not implement it into their daily routines.

Sustainable consumption is a societal issue which has continually grown in importance on the political agenda in the last few years. Despite considerable knowledge regarding the necessity of sustainable consumption patterns and a broad range of measures in the field of consumer information there cannot be recognized a general trend towards sustainable consumption within the society.

Social-ecological Research aims at identifying and analysing the constraints that conflict this implementation of knowledge into action. Starting out with a view at consumer perspectives and activities the projects will generate orientation and transformation knowledge which can be used by different groups of actors and improve consumer competence. The projects are supposed to specify the expected sustainability benefits in the given fields of research thereby focusing on energy efficiency.  A particular challenge poses the task to build a bridge between individual activities and ecological and social framework conditions. Additionally, gender sensitivity represents an important part of work in this field of research .

By embracing relevant stakeholders such as consumers, industry and the retail market, researchers integrate practical knowledge that is crucial for the work on life-world issues. Moreover, it gurantees that the gained transformation knowledge will finally corrrespond to the actual needs of the stakeholders. However, this does not mean that the researchers are responsible for the implementation of their results.