Foto: Animaflora PicsStock/stock.adobe.com
Research AreaPOLITICS AND PLANNING

The Research Area analyses the political negotiation, planning and transformation of the social and spatial development of cities and regions. It primarily examines the governance of increasingly uncertain, complex and ambiguous constellations. The research is based on the observation that current developments such as climate change, global migration, increasing socio-spatial disparities as well as political polarisation, protests and conflicts put cooperative governance arrangements under pressure. Through its research on common goods as housing, urban infrastructures as well as a climate-neutral, climate-resilient and sustainable urban and regional development, the Research Area contributes to a better understanding of governing cities and regions in multilevel systems. Knowledge transfer addresses policy makers and administrations, but also energy and housing companies, associations and civil society organisations.

Ongoing Lead Project

The project examines large-scale projects as profound disruptions that shake the well-rehearsed routines of institutions and can lead to institutional change. The project examines the large-scale project of the Tesla settlement in comparison to other case studies with regard to disruptive effects on policy and planning and thus tests the transferability of the term disruption to policy and planning research. more

News

26. October | 2022 | News

On 19 September 2022, the symposium and final conference on the BMBF-funded research project "From Shrinkage to Immigration. New Perspectives for Peripheral Large Housing Estates", or "StadtumMig" for short, took place in Berlin. Together with the Institute for Ecological Urban and Regional Development (IÖR) in Dresden, the Berlin Institute for Empirical Integration and Migration Research (BIM) and the B.B.S.M. Brandenburgische Beratungsgesellschaft für Stadterneuerung und Modernisierung mbH, the IRS had investigated local integration policies, open space development, the need for adaptation of the social infrastructure, the prospects for people to stay and the opening of urban societies to newly arrived refugees in large housing estates in eastern Germany. The project has now entered a two-year implementation and continuation phase. more info

29. March | 2022 | News

Since 2018, the ExTrass project of the IRS research group Urban Sustainability Transformations has been researching how active German cities – especially medium-sized cities and smaller large cities – are in climate policy: What they are doing to adapt to increasing extreme weather events, but also to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. In cooperation with the University of Potsdam and other partners, the team developed both a quantitative overview and detailed qualitative case studies. Now a two-year transfer phase has begun, in which the ExTrass research results will be translated even more strongly into recommendations for planning and municipal policy practice. more info

Events

IRS Spring Academy
Photo: ESB Professional/shutterstock.com
23. May | 2023 - 26. May | 2023
Investigating Space(s): Current Theoretical and Methodological Approaches: Spaces of Financialisation and De-Financialisation

Since the last decade, the term “financialisation” has become increasingly popular in academic research as well as in public policy debates. By highlighting the role of financial actors and logics in shaping urban development, it depicts how housing, land, and inhabitants are treated as assets. Moreover, it drives attention to emerging social inequalities, urban segregation, and sustainability concerns. more infos

Research Groups

Foto: artfocus/stock.adobe.com

Sustainability and climate policy is increasingly being shaped under the impression of drastic disruptive events: Heavy rainfall events and heat waves, but also sudden changes in social and political priorities challenge established institutional procedures and planning processes. Against this background, the Research Group investigates the prerequisites and possibilities of local and regional sustainability and climate policy as well as the sustainable transformation of cities. more infos

Foto: moritz/stock.adobe.com

The Research Group focuses on how political processes, negotiations and inequalities manifest in the planning of cities. Comprehending cities as political arenas, our research revolves around global themes such the financialisation of urban development, socio-spatial disparities and international migration. more infos