Exchange of experience on dialogue and participation processes in the bioeconomy
At the beginning of May, the Bioeconomy Council organized an exchange of experiences with representatives of projects on the topic of dialogue and participation in the bioeconomy in Berlin. The aim of this event was to discuss methods and processes for dialogue and participation formats and to derive findings for the Bioeconomy Council. In a next step, the Bioeconomy Council will prepare a report for this purpose, which will be published on this website. This report will include the most important findings and recommendations from the presentations and the discussion.
Below you will find further information on the projects and their representatives.
Presentation of the projects and their representatives
In the following you will also find the presentations for download as well as further links to the projects.
In the project Farming the Uncanny Valley, based on the concept of the uncanny, a methodology was developed to open and guide a dialogue on complex topics such as the bioeconomy in order to find a constructive way of dealing with change. In doing so, situational experiences form the common basis for learning experiences, self-reflection and collaborative exchange. For this purpose, the topic of the bioeconomy was translated into the five thematic areas of insects, plants I, plants II, soil and air, which offer proximity to the lifeworld of potential workshop participants.
Jannis Hülsen, Berlin University of the Arts
Jannis Hülsen holds a degree in design and is theoretically and practically engaged in transformation processes, participation, science communication, innovation processes, imagining the future and encountering the new. In doing so, he has worked with renowned research institutions, universities and museums. He led the interdisciplinary research project "Farming the Uncanny Valley" at the Berlin University of the Arts between 2018 and 2021 and is currently collecting wishes in rural regions of Germany.
Dr. Angelika Trübswetter, YOUSE
Dr. Angelika Trübswetter has been head of User-Centered Change at YOUSE GmbH since 2018. As an educational scientist with a PhD, she is an expert in empirical social research with a strong focus on qualitative methods. Her work focuses on the analysis, design and monitoring of change processes - both on an organizational and societal level. From 2012-2016, she was a research associate at the Fraunhofer Center for Responsible Research and Innovation (CeRRI), conducting research on demand-driven technology development, participatory technology foresight, and interdisciplinarity.
Stefan Schwabe, Berlin University of the Arts
Stefan Schwabe holds a degree in design and works theoretically and practically on transformation processes, participation, science communication, innovation processes, imagining the future, and encountering the new. He led the interdisciplinary research project "Farming the Uncanny Valley" at the Berlin University of the Arts between 2018 and 2021 and is currently collecting ideas for the future in rural areas in the project "Wishes for Tomorrow".
Project links:
https://www.farming-the-uncanny-valley.net/
Publication:
https://www.farming-the-uncanny-valley.net/fuv-book
Triangle of discurse:
https://www.farming-the-uncanny-valley.net/triangle
Bio'nd and Bio:fictions took place as dialogue projects within the framework of the Science Year Bioeconomy. Bio'nd took place with different event formats at the Museum für Naturkunde Berlin, where views into biobased futures were created. In the context of Bio:fictions, bioeconomic knowledge was bundled and translated into future scenarios, which were then processed as design:fictions and disseminated by influencers.
Dr. Siegfried Behrendt, Institute for Futures Studies and Technology Assessment
Dr. Siegfried Behrendt has been working at the IZT since 1990. Initially, he was project manager and coordinator of the working group "Ecological Economics", and since 2019, Dr. Behrendt has been research director for "Resources, Economics & Resilience". PhD in 2009 at the Carl-von-Ossietzky-University Oldenburg, Faculty of Computer Science, Economics and Law. From 2000 to 2019 he was a lecturer at the Berlin School of Economics and Law, and since 2001 a lecturer at the Berlin University of Applied Sciences. Since 1987, he has been a staff member at the Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin.
The BioDisKo project included a citizens' council and a future council with the topics "Biobased economy? What are the consequences for my region?" and "Bioeconomy NRW 2038? A wide variety of dialog formats were integrated, such as graphic recording or future workshops.
Dr. Jan-Henrik Kamlage, Ruhr University Bochum
Jan-Hendrik Kamlage holds a PhD in political science, is managing director of the Center for Environmental Management, Resources and Energy (CURE) and head of the Participation & Transformation Research Group at the Ruhr University Bochum. His research areas are democracy and participation research as well as research on socio-ecological transformation. He has many years of expertise in the conception and evaluation of dialogue-oriented participation processes.
Project links:
https://dialogbiooekonomie.de/
https://www.kulturwissenschaften.de/projekt/biodisko/
https://www.biooekonomierevier.de/start
In the DiReBio research project, formats are being developed for shaping bioeconomic change locally. For this purpose, bioeconomic technologies and approaches are explained in regional workshops in order to then jointly develop future scenarios. The workshops use adapted methods from systems and transformability analysis as well as haptic methods of idea development, which in this way lead to bioeconomic idea design.
Dr. Edzard Weber, University of Potsdam
Edzard Weber holds a degree in computer science and a doctorate in business informatics from the University of Potsdam. His work focuses on the following topics
e-participation, mutability and system modeling. After leading the junior research group Decision Management, he took over the responsibilities of the vacant professorship "Digital Government" and is now an academic staff member of the Faculty of Economics and Social Sciences at the Chair of Information Systems, Processes and Systems.
Björn Huwe, Wissenschaftsladen Potsdam
Björn Huwe holds a degree in biology and is currently completing his dissertation in the field of experimental ecology, on the adaptability of plants to changing environmental conditions. Since 2016 he has been working as a project manager at Wissenschaftsladen Potsdam e.V. where his focus here is on the design of - Social Innovation Ecosystems.
Project links:
In the Denkhausbremen Bioeconomy Action Forum, the relevant German environmental and development organizations are committed to an ecologically sustainable and socially just bioeconomy. The Bioeconomy Action Forum organizes workshops and expert congresses such as the Alternative Bioeconomy Summit and publishes position papers. The Bioeconomy Action Forum informs government, parliament, the Bioeconomy Council, specialized authorities, science, media and the public.
Peter Gerhardt, denkhausbremen
Peter Gerhardt is a gardener, agricultural engineer and development policy expert. As a campaigner for environmental associations, he has initiated successful campaigns against large corporations such as IKEA, Aldi, Metro or Procter&Gamble. He has worked and researched in numerous countries of the global south. At denkhausbremen he is the political director and deals with the topics of international solidarity, resource justice and democracy development. Together with the denkhausbremen crew, it coordinates the Bioeconomy Action Forum.
Project links:
Action forum bioeconomy: https://denkhausbremen.de/themen/biooekonomie/
Website sustainable bioeconomy: https://nachhaltige-biooekonomie.de
Grassroot future labs: https://denkhausbremen.de/themen/zukunftslabore-von-unten/
The Bioeconomy Citizens' Dialogue was a project of the Federal Agency for Nature Conservation that was carried out over two years. The methodologies include four citizen dialogues, an online dialogue and participation opportunities on the website. In 2021, a publication was published on the insights and experiences gained.
Dr. Lars Berger, Federal Agency for Nature Conservation
An institutional economist, Lars Berger received his PhD from Humboldt University in Berlin. Against the background of extreme environmental pollution, his research focused on the interactions of social and ecological systems. As a central mechanism, he analyzed the social construction of individual human behavior. Since 2016, he has been working on social issues of nature conservation as a research associate in the Policy Affairs Department of BfN. Here, he deals with social issues such as justice or social cohesion, but also factors of individual behavior against the background of transformative change. Furthermore, he is dedicated to current discourses on topics such as nature (conservation) understandings, bioeconomy or social frictions in the context of contemporary nature conservation.
Link to the publication:
The Commission on the Future of Agriculture is appointed by the German government as an independent commission. It consists of 31 members appointed in a personal capacity from the fields of agriculture, business and consumers, the environment and animal welfare, and science. Through internal as well as public formats, it makes recommendations to policymakers and creates a framework for understanding.
Brigitte Beyer, BMEL
Brigitte Beyer has been with the Federal Ministry of Food and Agriculture since 2008 in various positions in the areas of strategy and coordination, communication, cabinet and parliament, federal-state and policy affairs, agricultural policy. Since 2016, she has been Head of Unit and holds the position of Managing Director of the Commission on the Future of Agriculture (ZKL). Between 2011 and 2014, she was attached to the Permanent Representation of the Federal Republic of Germany to the EU in the portfolio of the Federal Foreign Office as a contact person for the European Parliament on issues of agricultural, fisheries and consumer policy.