Felicitas Klemp

The lead project aims to understand the political construction and governance of critical infrastructures in relation to their spatiality. Infrastructures are increasingly viewed in terms of their vulnerability to disruption and the resulting security risks. Political resources are devoted to adequately securing "critical infrastructures" such as water supply and energy networks. <br/>But which infrastructures are considered critical and why? The perception and governance of infrastructures are particularly relevant for cities due to their high concentration of people, infrastructure, economic and cultural assets. Accordingly, urban climate adaptation, which seeks to prepare for disruptions such as extreme weather events, and the digitalisation of urban infrastructures, as a potential improvement tool but also as a possible new source of uncertainty for infrastructure networks, serve as fields of investigation.<br/> more info

The cumulative dissertation project tries to approach the topic of critical infrastructures with different approaches. Central aspects are "space" and "scale". First, the perspective of the nation state is examined, because nation states define sectors and infrastructures that are considered critical; they thus have a formative role. Then, the city level is examined as a planning unit, because decisions are also made at this level that influence the nature and functions of infrastructures. Finally, we zoom into the health sector in hospitals, because processes and decisions that change infrastructures also take place here.<br/>Critical infrastructures are inherently potentially affected by failure events, because "critical" refers to the possible failure of infrastructure. Therefore, concepts that guarantee maintenance occupy a special position. In Germany, the focus is on the protection concept, whereas in Nordic countries such as Sweden, resilience is significant as a concept. more info