Supplying the Population – Interactions Among Demographic Trends, Needs, and Supply Systems - demons

Population development becomes more and more dynamic. The present demographic trends are characterized by unprecedented declines in fertility rates and family sizes, improvements in mortality and life expectancy, demographic ageing, migration as well as significant urbanization. Today, population growth is taken place almost exclusively in the developing countries, while in almost all of the industrialized countries the population will decrease in the coming decades. However, these processes operate at different levels, and they affect different societies in different intensities. These heterogeneous and a-synchronic demographic processes are getting more prominent, both at the public as well as the scientific level. More and more the demographic issue is regarded as matter of critical concern for sustainable development.

Provisioning as Societal and Scientific Challenge

Supplying the population with goods and services such as water, food, housing, energy and transportation is essential to a society’s reproduction and capacity to maintain its potential for further development. If the regulation of those supply systems fails, serious supply crises and profound environmental problems can be the result. This may endanger the generative reproduction as well as the reproduction of the natural basis of life in societies. The core of the research project concerns social-ecological issues arising from the interplay of various demographic developments, changing lifestyles and needs, and the supply of the population of a certain area with basic goods and services such as water, food, energy, housing, or transport etc. The research project aims at contributing to a better description and understanding of these complex interactions, which display a hybrid character: On the one hand, they consist of human interactions with natural systems; on the other hand, they feature a considerable divergence of values and knowledge. Therefore, the project is dedicated to a transdisciplinary research approach.

Interactions Between Demographic Changes and Social-ecological Transformations

Focus of the project is the analysis of water and food supply systems. These kinds of supply systems rely to a great extent on natural resources and are particularly important for the satisfaction of basic needs. At the same time, water and food supply experience major changes and challenges worldwide. Major research topics are:

• What significance does the size, distribution and structure of a population, as well as the needs, social status, consumption and lifestyles of its members have for the supply of people in a given area?
• In what ways are population dynamics relevant to crisis-prone modes of development and transformations of supply systems?
• What is considered as sustainable supply, especially with water and food in light of heterogeneous demographic trends in different regions of the world?

Interdisciplinary Junior Research Group

The project combines a multidisciplinary approach to research with an interdisciplinary integration of concepts and methods and a transdisciplinary problem orientation. Within the interdisciplinary problem analysis, a theoretical framework is developed. Historical and recent empirical case studies in different world regions (South-east Asia, Middle East, Europe and Africa) concentrate on selected demographic aspects: population distribution, migration, decrease in population size, urbanization, and population growth. Innovative solutions are introduced in order to enhance the adaptive capacity of supply systems to cope with demographic changes. Five researchers from different social and natural sciences are involved: political science, economics, sociology, geography and biology.  The members of the project use their research work to further qualify themselves – both in their own disciplines and in transdisciplinary social-ecological research.

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