The book addresses urban transformations towards sustainability in light of challenges of global urbanization processes and the consequences of global environmental change. The aim is to show that urban transformations only succeed if both innovative scientific solutions and practice-oriented governance approaches are developed. This assumption is addressed by providing theoretical insights and empirical evidence pointing particularly at 3 concepts or qualities which are determined here as being central for achieving urban sustainability: resource efficiency, quality of life and resilience. Urban case studies from several international research projects illustrate our conceptual approach of urban transformations towards sustainable development. Thus, the book reaches far beyond a mere additive description of single case studies. It incorporates the results of condensed synthesis, resulting from comparisons and evaluations. It provides, based on cross-cutting reflection of single casesand different scales and methods of analysis, general and transferable findings. They do not only consider the scientific sphere but deliberately go beyond it discussing transferability of knowledge into practice, governance options and the feasibility of policy strategies in order to pave the way for sustainable urban transformations to happen today and in the future.
Biografie (Erik Gawel)
Erik Gawel is Professor of Economics at the University of Leipzig and Deputy Head of the De-partment of Economics at the Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research (UFZ). He studied economics and business administration at the University of Cologne, where he earned his PhD in Economics. In 2004, he qualified as a university lecturer at the University of Augsburg. He has worked at the Research Institute for Public Finance at the University of Cologne and at the Max Planck Institute for Research on Collective Goods, and served as a staff member of the Commis-sion of Inquiry into Sustainable Energy Supply set up by the German Bundestag. He was a guest research fellow at the Centre for Interdisciplinary Research at the University of Bielefeld and vis-iting professor for the German Research Foundation's post-graduate research programme on Risk Regulation and the Civil Law System at the University of Bremen. He is the author of numer-ous scientific books and papers and also works as a publicly certified expert for the area of public sector accounting. His research interests include environmental economics, institutional econom-ics and public finance.
