Eversberg, Dennis / Fritz, Martin / von Faber, Linda / Schmelzer, Matthias (2024): The new socio-ecological class conflict. Conflicting mentalities
and interests in the dispute over transformation. Research report of the Junior Research Group „Mentalities in flux: imaginaries and social structure in modern circular bio-based societies (flumen)“, Jena.
https://doi.org/10.22032/dbt.62699

Flumen provides sociologically based explanations for the social conflictuality and possibilities of the (non-)success of a socio-ecological transformation. In a Germany-wide representative ‘BioMentalities’ survey, the Junior Research Group asked 4,000 people about their mentalities, i.e. their attitudes, views and feelings regarding socio-ecological change as well as their everyday habits and socio-economic situation. Using the survey data, researchers from flumen analysed mental and socio-structural contrasts within German society that are shaping the current social debates on socio-ecological transformation.

The research report presented here summarises the key evaluation results. In addition, a book was published in summer 2024, that provide readers with more detailed explanations, for example on the positioning of the flumen study in the interpretive landscape of other empirical studies on socio-ecological transformation as a field of conflict, on the content and methodology of the flumen survey, on the analysis procedure used to evaluate the data and on the various interpretive results.

The survey results show that people’s attitudes to the questions of whether, how quickly and in what form a socio-ecological transformation is necessary differ, in some cases strikingly – and that these opinions tend to be related to people’s social situations and the associated interests. The authors interpret this as a new socio-ecological class conflict.

Junior research group leader Dr. Martin Fritz, together with Kajsa Emilsson and Roger Hildingsson, has published the article “The active, the sympathetic, and the reluctant: political action and eco-social attitudes among Swedish residents” in the European Political Science Review.

Abstract:

In this study, we investigate how eco-social attitudes are interlinked with various modes of political action aimed at preventing environmental change and promoting social welfare. Using multiple correspondence analysis and cluster analysis, we explore the links between attitudes and political action, and associated socio-political characteristics, in the case of Sweden. Our results show a three-node pattern forming a political action triangle: individuals expressing joint support for social welfare and environmental concerns are most actively engaged in political action, while those supporting environmental concerns are sympathetic to take part in political action without actually participating, and those supporting social welfare or expressing low support for either set of concerns seem overly reluctant towards all types of political action. This pattern, which is also tied to distinctive socio-political characteristics, has wider implications for understanding the agency and the mobilization of support for tackling the multiple ecological and social crises contemporary societies are facing.

To the article: here

Download the article: here

13 Nov 2024, 6 am MST (North America) / 2 pm CET (Germany) / 3 pm EET (Finland) 

Title: Exploring the Green Frontier: Patterns of Inequality in Europe’s Recent Forest Initiatives

Authors: Dr. Jodie Asselin (University of Lethbridge, Canada) and Dr. Agata Konczal (Wageningen University, Netherlands)

Abstract: 

In recent decades, there has been a global consensus on the urgent need for coordinated efforts to combat forest loss and degradation, given forests’ critical roles in climate change mitigation, biodiversity, and local economies. However, the development and implementation of forest policies are complex and politically charged, often addressing ‘wicked’ problems with diverse actors and conflicting values. The proposed solutions—such as conservation, rewilding, certification, and forest expansion—introduce their own challenges. This paper introduces the concept of ‘green frontiers’ as a lens to better understand patterns and consequences of this new forest dynamic in Europe. Applying critical perspectives typically used for frontier studies in the Global South to the Global North, this paper addresses a gap in literature on frontier-making in Europe while highlighting how environmental discourses are reshaping landscapes and communities, often reflecting historical patterns of dispossession and exploitation. 

We hereby warmly invite you to our next Scientific Coffee Human-Forest-Relationships session.

 9 October 2024

2-4pm CEST (Germany) / 3-5pm EEST (Finland) / 6-8 am MDT (North America)

Input: Kristina Wirth (FVA Freiburg, Germany)

Title: „Creating understanding through artful connections“

To join the event, please use the Zoom Link: https://uni-jena-de.zoom.us/j/61027392103, Meeting-ID: 610 2739 2103, code: 513063

Abstract

The current debate about the future of German forests is all over the media, while conflicts between citizens and foresters are on the rise. These debates and conflicts revolve primarily around questions of the ‘right’ approach to the management of our forests. Our team conducted an empirical study on the central issues and interactive patterns of those conflicts. After that, we implemented a participatory project with involved conflict parties (foresters and citizens’ initiatives) and a graphic designer. Together we further elaborated the empirical results and turned them into artful media elements (cartoons, film, portraits: https://www.fva-bw.de/en/top-meta-navigation/departments/societal-change-unit/completed-projects/fight-over-the-forest), with the idea of encouraging engagement with the conflicts by employing humor and creativity.
In this presentation, I will briefly introduce the main findings concerning conflicts on forest management in Germany. Then I will focus on the participatory process and the resulting media elements as well as the so far observed effects of their use.

Kristina Wirth studied biology and forest research. Afterwards, she started working at the Societal Change Unit at the Forest Research Institute Baden-Württemberg, Germany (https://www.fva-bw.de/en/top-meta-navigation/departments/societal-change-unit) in 2011. There, she discovered her interest and preference for social sciences. Her (current) main research interests are conflicts on forest management and transformative processes concerning forestry in Germany.  

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Scientific Coffee “Human-Forest-Relationships”

Let’s sit and talk in the scientific café! The “Scientific Coffee HFR” sessions give room for open and relaxed discussions on current research subjects related to human and society relations to forests. It warmly welcomes all interested in forest-related research to join online sessions.

Each session lasts approximately two hours. It starts with a 30-minutes presentation of a guest speaker. After the presentation, with coffee or tea and cookies at hand, participants have plenty of room for an open discussion and exchange.

The “Scientific Coffee HFR” takes place two to three times per semester on Wednesdays.

Guest speakers wanted!

If you are interested in contributing to the “Scientific Coffee HFR”, please contact either jana.holz(at)uni-jena.de or tuulikki.halla(at)uef.fi with info on your subject (title and short abstract) and a preferred date.

The idea for a scientific coffee HFR came up during a cooperation between Finnish and German researchers in 2021. The Finnish research project Human-Forest Relationships in Societal Change and the German research group Mentalities im Flux (flumen) organized the workshop “Contested Society-Nature-Relations. Forest related Emotions, Practices & Conflicts in Times of Societal Change” in May 2021. The first “Scientific Coffee HFR” session was held in September 2021.

The “Scientific Coffee HFR” is organized by:

• Human-Forest Relationship Research Club of the Finnish Society of Forest Science
• The research group “Mentalities in Flux” (flumen) Research Project

The environmental NGO “denkhausbremen” invited international experts from civil society, public administration, arts and academia to a beautiful congress center from 23 to 25 September 2024 in the Uckermark Lakes Nature Park, north of Berlin.

At the shore of the lake Großer Lychensee, the 30 participants discussed current bioeconomy policies in the EU, Germany, Sweden, Finland and Estonia and critically engaged with aspects of global justice, sustainability and participation in current bioeconomy-related policies. The discussions covered many aspects, especially the role of the forest sector as a core sector of the bioeconomy and the so-called “biomass gap” that illustrates the shortage of available biomass for bioeconomy investments and programs in the future proofed to be controversial points.

Jana Holz presented the study “BioMentalities” that flumen carried out in 2021/2022 and gave insight into the core conflict lines that were identified regarding diverse mentalities and social-ecological transformation. The report “The new socio-ecological class conflict. Conflicting mentalities and interests in the dispute over transformation” by Dennis Eversberg, Martin Fritz, Linda von Faber, and Matthias Schmelzer, that the presentation is based upon and that summarises the main results of the study can now also be found in English for download: https://www.flumen.uni-jena.de/en/publications/#reviews-and-scientific-reports.

Lilian Pungas (formerly PhD researcher at flumen) presented her case study of invisible bioeconomy in Food Self Provisioning (FSP) practices in Eastern Estonia.

Martin Fritz will give an input on “The new socio-ecological class conflict: Mentalities and interests in the struggle for transformation” on Thursday, June 27 in Padova.

On 27 June Jana Holz will speak at the World Congress of the International Union of Forest Research Organizations (IUFRO) in Stockholm on ‘Human-Forest Relationship – Ambiguity in “taking care of the forest”’ together with Jaana Laine (LUT University, Lappeenranta, Finland) and Ronja Mikoleit (Department of Societal Change of the Forest Research Institute Baden-Württemberg, Germany and University of Freiburg, Germany).

Abstract

The attitudes of humans toward forests can be defined as human-forest relationships, combining historical and modern aspects. These relationships affect global, societal, and individual forest-related aims and practices. This session discusses the importance of diverse human-forest relationships for sustainable future societies. Many people feel a strong emotional attachment being affectively connected to forests – they care for and take care of forest. Deep connections between humans and trees are expressed frequently, but often they are highly diverse, even conflictual.

Oftentimes, forests are mainly connected to timber production and rationality, but recently, ‘care’ has been identified as an important element in motivating human action regarding nature. Caring is intertwined with legal and psychological forest ownership. Besides valuing forests for their economic benefit, forest owners express both intergenerational respect and care and attach various meanings to forests as beloved places, a space for psychological shelter or an important part of their identity.

The concept of care (Tronto 1993, 2013) has circulated from feminist theory – originally connected to (domestic) care work in capitalism and gendered power roles – into different disciplinary fields. Currently,  glimpses of its potential are making their way into forest-related studies. ‘Care’ encompasses diverse understandings and practices of care taking. It has developed into an “important means of understanding how people relate to the world, and the relationship between people and trees is no exception” (O’Flynn et al. 2021: 228).

Our session contributes to an exploration of the concept’s potential for understanding human-forest relationships. We invite diverse forms of engagement with the concept in relation to forests and their utilization that cover various practices of ‘taking care of the forest’ and/or ‘owning a forest’, their incorporation into culture and their embeddedness in political and institutional structures – be they conceptual or empirically grounded. Central questions for our session are: What does it mean to take care of or to own a forest, in times of climate change and multiple crises? How do people develop and maintain a caring relationship to ‘their’ forest? How is decision-making (in forestry) shaped by relational, social and emotional dimensions? What role do different understandings and practices of care and ownership play in forest conflicts? Do concepts and policies in contexts of bioeconomy, circular economy or biodiversity transform how forests are taken care of? Does a caring relationship towards forests in capitalistic societies remain principally a utopian idea? Or might forests in fact be taking care of humans?

To the programme here.

From April 10 to 12, 2024, Jana Holz will be attending the International Forest Policy Meeting 5 (IFPM5) at the University of Helsinki.

She will be involved in two formats. Together with Tuulikki Halla (University of Eastern Finland), she will moderate an interactive session “Coffee Salon Human-Forest-Relationships (HFR) – Potentials and Challenges for Future-oriented Forest Policy and Research” on Wednesday, April 10. The salon will take place as part of the online event series “Scientific Coffee Sessions Human-Forest Relationships”, which flumen has been organizing in cooperation with the Human-Forest Relationship Research Club since 2021. In addition to the participants of the conference, the salon is also aimed at interested people from the University of Helsinki as an interactive format.

In the session “Epistemic patterns and concepts: Facilitating critical analysis on gender in forestry” on April 11, Jana Holz will present together with Dr. Anna Saave (BioMaterialities, Humboldt University Berlin ) and Ronja Schröder (Carl von Ossietzky University Oldenburg) on the topic “Taking care of the forest as a part of nature – conceptual thoughts and empirical insights”. She will discuss her empirical research on industrial forestry bioeconomy in Finland in comparison to forestry practice in Canada and Germany from the perspective of feminist care theories.

International Forest Policy Meeting
The IFPM5 brings together social science researchers from the fields of forest policy, forest science, bioeconomy and socio-ecological transformation processes under the motto “A political forest”. The conference takes place alternately in different European countries and has an international focus.

Abstract

The environmental crisis, increased inequality and an aging population are likely to increase the demand for welfare services in the OECD countries. Economic growth has long been seen as a solution to these problems. However, this is no longer the case. Very few countries have managed to decouple economic performance from ecological footprints and greenhouse gas emissions. Even where this has been achieved, the rates of emission-decline are too slow to match the Paris climate targets. Consequently, interdisciplinary research is key to probe how welfare systems may cope with these challenges, and how welfare provision and economic growth may be decoupled. By drawing on the basic human needs approach and a unique set of data, we explore the social and ecological performances of OECD countries relative to their economic performances. While high-income countries display diminishing welfare returns as economic performance is not improving the satisfaction of health-related needs, the lower-income countries might yield significant surplus if moving to the level of moderate-income countries. However, the satisfaction of autonomy-related needs is so far strongly coupled to economic performance and thus much harder to achieve in an ecologically sustainable way.

Paulsson, Alexander / Koch, Max / Fritz, Martin (2024): Diminishing returns of growth? Economic performance, needs satisfaction and ecological impacts of OECD welfare states. In: Critical Social Policy, 0(0). https://doi.org/10.1177/02610183231218971