Project: The sustainability-term and crafts and trades

Client
Volkswirtschaftliches Institut für Mittelstand und Handwerk an der Universität Göttingen (ifh), Forschungsinstitut im Deutschen Handwerksinstitut e.V. (DHI)

Duration
01/12/2010 – 31/12/2011


Brief description
While the term „sustainability“ is rooted far in the past, nowadays it is a topical and frequently used expression. Throughout the time it evolved from a concept for the use of natural resources to a (political) guiding principle, which by now appears also in parts of German economy. Based on various key measures like annual turnover, employees and the amount of provided apprenticeship training positions, the craft can be seen as a meaningful factor of German economy.

This project's ambition is to determine, in which forms and aspects sustainability is visible in the context of German craft.

The results form the base of thoughts on how the craft deals or may deal with sustainability consciously or unconciously, directly or indirectly and implicitly or explicitly. Those kinds of information are useful for the craft to determine its own position with respect to the usage of the sustainability term. Furthermore, knowledge of handling of this term is a foundation for making the impact of the craft on sustainable development in internal and external communication comprehensible and visible. Not least because the German government made its approach to sustainability explicit by launching a sustainability strategy in April 2002 under the caption Perspektiven für Deutschland, this aspect is important for the craft.


Publication
Hensel, Stephan (2012), Der Nachhaltigkeitsbegriff, die nationale Nachhaltigkeitsstrategie und das Handwerk in Deutschland, in: Kilian Bizer, Katarzyna Haverkamp (Hrsg.), Nachhaltigkeit im Handwerk, Göttinger handwerkswirtschaftliche Studien, Band 88, Mecke, Duderstadt, 13-66, 2012.


Contact