Dynamics of rural areas (DORA): National report - Germany

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Human Settlement Systems: Spatial Patterns and Trends

The papers in this volume were originally presented at a conference on the analysis of human settlement systems held at IIASA. This meeting closed an IIASA research activity, started in 1975, that had the goals of identifying functional urban regions in several industrialized countries and making comparative analyses of their population and employment trends to enhance our understanding of the spatial and temporal evolution of human settlement systems. This research on human settlement systems and strategies established a wide international collaborative network and created a sizeable data base for examining demographic and economic changes. This book presents the findings of some of this work

Postsocialist Shrinking Cities

This book provides a comparative analysis of shrinking cities in a broad range of postsocialist countries within the so-called Global East, a liminal space between North and South. While shrinking cities have received increased scholarly attention in the past decades, theoretical, and empirical research has remained predominantly centered on the Global North. This volume brings to the fore a range of new perspectives on urban shrinkage, identifying commonalities, differences, and policy experiences across a very diverse and vivid region with its various legacies and contemporary controversial developments. With chapters written by leading experts in the field, insider views assist in decolonizing urban theory. Specifically, the book includes chapters on shrinking cities in China, Russia, and postsocialist Europe, presenting comparative discussions within countries and crossnational cases on theoretical and policy implications. The book will be of interest to students and scholars researching urban studies, urban geography, urban planning, urban politics and policy, urban sociology, and urban development

Suburban crisis? Demand for single family homes in the face of demographic change

In the former Western German states, a third of the single- or two-family houses – 22 percent of all dwellings – was built in the years from 1949 to 1978. Considering the lifecycle of this housing stock and current socio-demographic trends, the viability of affected neighbourhoods looks uncertain. Demographic processes like aging and population decline are well underway, albeit with some spatial variance. On top of the reduced demand for single homes caused by these processes, societal changes are also leading to new lifestyles that affect housing choice. Household structures are adapting to more diverse ways of living in today’s society. The corresponding housing preferences have triggered an increased demand for urban living space, with a tendency towards concentrations around Germany’s economic hotspots. Neighbourhoods in regions of unfavourable demographic and economic conditions are facing these risks with particular signifi cance. At the same time, problematic stocks area also present in certain sub-areas or municipalities of generally successful regions. On a local scale, there will be communities that benefi t from these developments and others that will be negatively affected. On the regional and national scale, we expect islands of growth within shrinking regions, and vice versa. It is foreseeable that not only economically disadvantaged, but also above average performers will have to deal with diffi cult market conditions for an ever increasing vacant housing stock. Adverse settings like unsuitable locations, defi ciencies in the structure, or excessive energy consumption of buildings, as well as the negative perception of a neighbourhood can add up to a compound of problems for an area. The worst case scenario would be a downward spiral of vacancies and abandonment, devaluation, deterioration and decline of an area – development paths that have so far been unheard of in the context of the single family home sector in Germany. Our contribution starts off by conceptualizing the research matter: the social, demographic and economic root causes of the developments described above and the foreseeable consequences. For this purpose, we analyze the building and dwellings databases of the Federal Statistics Offi ces, and provide an overview over the magnitude and geographical extent of potentially affected housing stocks. An analysis of the present national housing stock provides the starting point for indicator-based modeling of risk areas on the municipal level in selected states. Finally, we raise the question on how to address these issues and conclude with some deliberations about possible strategies for urban renewal in peripheral single family home areas.In den alten Bundesländern ist jedes dritte Wohngebäude ein zwischen 1949 und 1978 errichtetes Einfamilienhaus – in diesem Gebäudebestand befinden sich 22 Prozent der Wohnungen Westdeutschlands. Die Einfamilienhäuser dieser Epoche werden zukünftig verstärkt von soziodemografischen Veränderungsprozessen betroffen sein, denn hier steht derzeit bzw. in den kommenden Jahren ein Generationenwechsel bevor. Allgemein vollzieht sich eine teilräumlich unterschiedlich ausgeprägte Schrumpfung und Alterung der Bevölkerung, infolgedessen sich das demographisch bedingte Potenzial für die Einfamilienhausnachfrage in den nächsten Jahren verringern wird. Zudem führt der gesellschaftliche Wandel zu qualitativen Veränderungen der Nachfrage. Die allgemeine Pluralisierung von Lebensmodellen und Wohnwünschen äußert sich in veränderten Haushaltsstrukturen sowie in der räumlichen Verschiebung der Wohnungsnachfrage zugunsten stärker verdichteter Räume, so dass urbane Wohnformen zunehmend an Bedeutung gewinnen. Besonders gefährdet sind Wohngebiete in Regionen mit ungünstigen demografischen und wirtschaftlichen Rahmenbedingungen. Aber auch in prosperierenden Regionen kann es Teilräume oder einzelne Gemeinden mit problematischen Beständen geben. Bezogen auf einen lokalen Betrachtungsmaßstab bedeutet dies, dass sich unter den bestehenden Wohnquartieren eines Ortes Gewinner und Verlierer herausbilden werden, in regionaler und überregionaler Perspektive ist mit Wachstumsinseln in Schrumpfungsregionen zu rechnen und vice versa. Es ist daher absehbar, dass nicht nur in Regionen mit ökonomischen Problemen sondern auch in wirtschaftlich erfolgreichen Bundesländern eine steigende Anzahl von Kommunen mit Vermarktungsschwierigkeiten im Eigenheimbestand zu kämpfen haben wird. Nachteile wie ungünstige Lageeigenschaften, bauliche oder energetische Mängel sowie Imageprobleme können sich zu gewaltigen Problemkomplexen potenzieren. Im ungünstigsten Fall drohen Leerstand, Wertverlust, Vernachlässigung und Verfall – Entwicklungen, die im Einfamilienhaussektor in Deutschland bisher weitgehend unbekannt sind. Der Beitrag thematisiert die demografischen und sozioökonomischen Ursachen dieser Entwicklung sowie die sich daraus ergebenden absehbaren Konsequenzen. Auf Basis der Gebäude- und Wohnungszählung von 1987 wird ein Überblick über den Umfang und die geographische Lage der potenziell gefährdeten Bestände gegeben. Dazu wird eine kreisscharfe Bestandsanalyse auf Bundesebene sowie eine daraus resultierende gemeindescharfe Modellierung in den ausgewählten Bundesländern vorgenommen. Zuletzt werden Fragen zum Umgang mit dieser Problematik aufgeworfen und erste Überlegungen zu den Möglichkeiten des Stadtumbaus in peripheren Einfamilienhausgebieten aufgezeigt

Postsocialist Shrinking Cities

This book provides a comparative analysis of shrinking cities in a broad range of postsocialist countries within the so-called Global East, a liminal space between North and South. While shrinking cities have received increased scholarly attention in the past decades, theoretical, and empirical research has remained predominantly centered on the Global North. This volume brings to the fore a range of new perspectives on urban shrinkage, identifying commonalities, differences, and policy experiences across a very diverse and vivid region with its various legacies and contemporary controversial developments. With chapters written by leading experts in the field, insider views assist in decolonizing urban theory. Specifically, the book includes chapters on shrinking cities in China, Russia, and postsocialist Europe, presenting comparative discussions within countries and crossnational cases on theoretical and policy implications. The book will be of interest to students and scholars researching urban studies, urban geography, urban planning, urban politics and policy, urban sociology, and urban development

Papers of the symposium

Urbanization is one of the global processes in a sense that it takes place all over the world, and also in a sense that it influences the whole society, modifying its structure. The globality of its presence is not against the fact but requires it that in all concrete regions of the world, and in all concrete groups of society it can be characterized with specific features. Because of the significance of the process, its global characteristics, its way of appearance, which are characteristic of the place and the social group, the process of urbanization is studied from several sides of science and in a way endeavouring for complex approach. The target region of the urbanization process stands in the center of researches, similarly to the other aspect when the researchers investigate the social side, i.e. in what classes the benefits of the rearrangement can be experienced and what structural changes it causes there. Taken altogether, during the urbanizational researches those territories are left untouched which were left out from the urbanization or connected to it only as scenes of emigration, and those social groups are also left in darkness which are not - or negatively - influenced by the urbanizational processes. However, it is doubtless that the complete revelation of urbanization process needs a thorough investigation of both aspects. Geographers have experienced the above contradiction for decades, therefore the International Geographic Union created the working committee on problems of rural areas several years ago. It was partly the results of this committee and partly the comprehensive knowledge of the problems occurring in the region, that lead prof. Andrzej Stasziak to initiate an international research on the rural territories of East-Central Europe, especially to reveal the kinds of migrations in the region. He established the flexible, but to a certain extent necessary institutional background as well, by creating a smaller research team within the Geographic and Region-Organizational Institute of the Polish Academy of Sciences, and took upon the task of organization. Annually he ensures possibility or initiate a meeting for the researchers of East-Central Europe involved in this theme. The first two meetings took place in Poland, they both turned out to be successful, and the lectures were published. The initiation and the series of programmes achieved reasonable international reaction. The researchers dealing with the rural areas of East-Central Europe met first out of Poland in 1992. The international conference was held in Pécs and Kecskemét, Hungary between June 1 -6 , 1992. The conference was organized by the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Center for Regional Studies (Pécs) and Scientific Institute of the Great Hungarian Plain, resident in Kecskemét. The Regional- and Settlement Developmental Committee of the Pécs Committee of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences joined the organizational works as well as other local governments. Taking it into consideration that the political changes taken place in East-Central Europe modified the relationship and inner structure of the region in a significant extent, furthermore that the first consequences and the results were measurable the main theme of the conference was evident; ’The Impact of Eastern European Changes on Rural Areas’. More than twenty lectures were held by researchers coming from the region undergoing a significant transformation from political geographical point of view; i.e. the European bordering states have left the former Soviet Union, the possible mobility of the former socialist countries, has increased, the disintegration of Yugoslavia has begun and there were obvious signs of disuniting of Czechoslovakia which is reality at present. Austria joined the activity of the sessions for the first time, represented by professor Walter Zsilincsar, who held an interesting lecture and took a considerably active part in the debates following the other lectures, confronting the other experts’ prognoses and notions with the Austrian reality. The Hungarian delegation, using the advantages of the ,,home field” , consisted of more members than usual. Among the delegates we can find, among others, experts from Pécs, Kecskemét, Debrecen, Szeged, Szombathely and Budapest. It is noticeable that besides geographers, who naturally formed the majority, sociologists, economists and historians were present in the home delegation. The versatility, created from both home and foreign aspect, made the debates exceedingly interesting. The conference was accompanied by field trips. The first of them touched those Baranya county areas (Hosszúhetény and its environments), where the creation of the criteria of agri-tourism can be an important element of the survival strategy in the rural areas. The participants of the conference could directly get acquainted with house owners, who rearranged their houses according to the criteria of agritourism, thus made them capable of receiving guests. Talking to the owners could mean the opportunity of collecting first-hand experiences for the experts. The second field trip started from Kecskemét, and aimed at getting familiar with the economic and settlement system of the scattered farms formed on the sandy areas between the Danube and the Tisa, especially known for their vine and fruit cultures, and at the practical enumerating of the ways of development of the scattered farms. Besides this the participants visited the Kiskunság National Park, having a farewell-dinner and signing the declaration stated earlier. This declaration, that was signed by each participants of the conference and that we published, and that each delegation delivered through their channels to the representatives of the decision sphere of the given country, draws the attention to the fact that the privatization taking place in the region, besides being just by all means and historically necessary, disturbs the formed and functioning system of connections of the rural areas, thus may be the source of many a problem. It requires more support to the rural areas, draws the attention to the necessity of the right choice in the new ways of development and to the fact that though the ecological state of the rural areas is better than the similar indexes of several industrial zones, the danger is increasing in these areas, too. It is just the Hungarian experiences that underline the necessity of taking care of the ecological balance, the relatively favourable position of the rural areas for strategic reasons (e.g. the possibility of agri-tourism). Only a minor part of the lectures dealt with the processes concerning the whole of the region, while most of them were dealing with the whole of the countries, or at the level of case studies, with certain regions. The most important conclusion of the considerably active debates might be that in the given countries the changes amount to the same consequences within the same circumstances, and this similarity does underline the necessity of the debate of the experts dealing with the rural areas of the region. There is a great opportunity to take over experiences despite the fact that besides the fundamental similarity, specific features of a country or region motivate the processes, too. The support of the Research Centre for Regional Studies of HAS and a few research projects (the Great Plain programme, different OTKA1 subjects) made it possible for us to edit the subjects of the conference and to enable the international professional public opinion to judge it. Now that we offer the completed volume to the reader, at the same time we thank for the participation of the foreign colleagues, the cooperation of the home experts and the help of all those who had any sacrifice in organizing the conference, the implementation of the field trips or in the creation of the book. Pécs—Kecskemét, 01.12 .1992

Regional Poverty and Population Response:A Comparison of Three Regions in the United States and Germany

In this paper, we examine poverty in three regions in the United States and Germany and discuss its causes and demographic consequences. The three regions are those with the highest rates of poverty in the two countries: the Mississippi Delta and Texas Borderland in the United States and the Northeastern Border Region in Germany. We show that standard models to explain poverty need to be placed in the historical legacies of the three regions in order to understand their current levels of poverty. While our results show many common factors for poverty in the three regions, they also point to important differences. Similarly, we identify differences among the regions in their demographic responses to poverty, in part reflecting their different historical legacies. Thus, one implication of the paper is the importance of place-based poverty-mitigation strategies for successful policy planning.In this paper, we examine poverty in three regions in the United States and Germany and discuss its causes and demographic consequences. The three regions are those with the highest rates of poverty in the two countries: the Mississippi Delta and Texas Borderland in the United States and the Northeastern Border Region in Germany. We show that standard models to explain poverty need to be placed in the historical legacies of the three regions in order to understand their current levels of poverty. While our results show many common factors for poverty in the three regions, they also point to important differences. Similarly, we identify differences among the regions in their demographic responses to poverty, in part reflecting their different historical legacies. Thus, one implication of the paper is the importance of place-based poverty-mitigation strategies for successful policy planning

Population-related Policies in Estonia in the 20th Century: Stages and Turning Points

This article is about the experience of population-related policies in Estonia. During the recent decade much has been published on this theme, usually with an analysis of currently enforced regulations. Repeated amendments of legal norms and procedures, which are inevitable in a period of fundamental reforms, however, tend to limit their value quite rapidly. Against such a background, this paper applies a longer perspective with an attempt to cover the main stages and turning points in the development of population-related policies in the country since the establishment of statehood in 1918. In the interwar period, the efforts to build up a modern nation included setting up relevant institutions and regulations in the ? eld of population-related policies. These undertakings have been seldom discussed in the recent publications. Somewhat similarly, the postwar decades are frequently regarded as fairly distant and of little relevance to present challenges. To understand the developments, however, the longer view should not be neglected. Todays concerns are rooted in the arrangements and disarrangements of the past, and no less importantly, such continuity is strengthened by the nature of population development and the ? ow of cohorts which absorb the in? uences of the societal environment and carry them along through their lifetime. The article is structured in four sections focusing on the development of marriage and the family, children and fertility, the pension system and social welfare, and the health care system. In each section, the aim is to outline successive policy regimes and their main characteristics in terms of objectives and methods of regulations. Understandably, limited space does not allow coverage of minor changes and technicalities, so for more speci? c information the article provides further reference to various source materials