Wolfgang Sachs

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Wolfgang Sachs, 2010.

Wolfgang Sachs (born November 25, 1946 in Munich ) is a researcher, university professor and publicist in the field of environment-development-economy.

biography

He studied sociology and Catholic theology in Munich , Tübingen and Berkeley . In 1971 he completed his master's degree in sociology, and in 1972 he obtained the degree of a diploma in theologian. Three years later he received his doctorate. rer. soc. with a work on the "de-schooling of learning".

After working as a research assistant in Berlin (1975–1984), particularly in the research project Energy and Society (1980–1984) and at the Society for International Development in Rome , he was visiting professor at Pennsylvania State University from 1987 to 1990 and from 1990 to 1990 1993 active at the cultural studies institute in Essen .

From 1993-2011 he researched and published at the Wuppertal Institute for Climate, Environment and Energy , most recently as head of the Berlin office. He was also Chairman of the Supervisory Board of Greenpeace Germany from 1993 to 2001 , and from 1999 to 2001 Lead Author at the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Furthermore, from 2003 to 2011 he was chairman of the scientific advisory board of the annual “Terra Futura” trade fair in Florence and from 2009 to 2016 co-coordinator of the Spiekeroog climate talks. Since 2008 he has been one of the two curators of the “ Toblach Conversations ”.

Sachs was also a member of the Club of Rome from 2005 to 2015 and a lecturer at Schumacher College in England from 1993 to 2010 and honorary professor at the University of Kassel .

His scientific work as a cultural and social scientist deals with the ecological crisis of modernity, in the north as in the south of the world:

For one, he started in 1984 with Die Liebe zum Automobil. A look back at the history of our desires. a book on the history of the mentality of the car with ecological intent.

He is the pioneer of the growth-critical debate about sufficiency , which points to the need to reduce consumption because “mere efficiency increases” are not sufficient. For a frugal lifestyle, according to Sachs, one should orient oneself to the "four E's": deceleration, unbundling, decommercialization and clearing out. Decelerating refers to withdrawing from the constant thought of progress and rediscovering the leisurelyness. Growth and prosperity should be unbundled through the promotion of regional economies. De-commercialization refers to the replacement of the gross domestic product as an indicator of prosperity and also to record services such as “ commons ” that are provided outside the market , which are the “real foundation of value creation”. The fourth E stands for clearing out and calls for a simpler lifestyle and sustainable consumption . He explored new models of prosperity with greatly reduced consumption of nature, worked on deceleration, commons and the art of living. He was a lead author of the books Sustainable Germany (1996) and Sustainable Germany in a Globalized World (2008).

On the other hand, in 1992 at Zed Books, London, he published The Development Dictionary: A Guide to Knowledge as Power , a central anthology for the post-development school, which has been translated into numerous languages. The authors rejected the idea of ​​"catching up development"; the idea of ​​"sustainable development" is also viewed critically if it is linked to the dogma of economic growth. Sachs continues this with his work on globalization, especially with the books Planet Dialectics and Fair Future . It also shaped the results of the expert panels , The Jo'burg Memo and Slow Trade - Sound Farming . Recently he has been dealing with Pope Francis and his view of the world.

Selected Works

  • Sachs, Wolfgang; Compulsory schooling and social control. Arguments for a de-schooling of learning. - Frankfurt a. M .: Diesterweg 1976. Also published in Italian.
  • Sachs, Wolfgang; The love of the automobile. A look back at the history of our desires. - Reinbek: Rowohlt, 1984 (p. 1990). Also published in English and Japanese.
  • Sachs, Wolfgang; On the archeology of the development idea - Frankfurt: IKO-Verlag, 1992. Also published in English, French and Italian.
  • Sachs, Wolfgang; The four E's: Points to remember for a moderate economic style - Political Ecology 11/33, 1993. First, deceleration as the right measure for time, second, unbundling as the right measure for space, third, de-commercialization for prosperity beyond the market and fourth, clearing out towards a policy of less.
  • Sachs, Wolfgang (ed.); The Development Dictionary. A Guide to Knowledge as Power. - London: Zed Books, 1992 ( As in the West so on earth. A polemical handbook on development policy - Reinbek: Rowohlt, 1993). Also published in Spanish, Italian, Indonesian, Japanese, Thai, Persian, Portuguese, Serbian, Turkish.
  • Sachs, Wolfgang (ed.); Global Ecology: A New Arena of Political Conflicts - London: Zed Books, 1993 ( The planet as a patient on the contradictions of global environmental politics - Basel: Birkhäuser 1994)
  • Sachs, Wolfgang (co-author); Sustainable Germany , ed. by BUND and Misereor - Berlin-Basel: Birkhäuser, 1996. Also in English, Italian, Japanese
  • Sachs, Wolfgang; Planet Dialectics: Explorations in Environment and Development. - London: Zed Books, 1999. Reprint with a new preface by Susan George. Zed Books, 2015. ( After us, the future. The global conflict over justice and ecology. - Frankfurt: Brandes & Apsel, 2002). Also published in Japanese.
  • Sachs, Wolfgang (ed); The Jo'burg Memo - Fairness in a Fragile World , ed. von Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung - Berlin, 2002 ( The Jo'burg Memo. Ecology - The new color of justice ). Published in another 14 languages.
  • Sachs, Wolfgang & Santarius, Tilman et al .; Fair future. Limited resources and global justice; a report. - Munich: Beck, 2005. Also in English, Italian, Spanish and Korean
  • Sachs, Wolfgang & Santarius, Tilman et al .; Slow Trade - Sound Farming. A Multilateral Framework for Sustainable Markets in Agriculture , ed. by Heinrich Böll Foundation and Misereor - Aachen, 2007 ( Slow Trade - Sound Farming. Trade rules for a globally sustainable agriculture ) Also published in Spanish, French, Arabic, Czech.
  • Sachs, Wolfgang (co-author); Sustainable Germany in a globalized world. , ed. von Brot für die Welt, eed and BUND - Frankfurt am Main: Fischer, 2008. Also published in Italian.
  • Sachs, Wolfgang & Helfrich, Silke & Kuhlen, Rainer & Siefkes, Christian: Wealth of common goods through sharing. Berlin: Heinrich Böll Foundation, 2010. Also published in English, French and Flemish.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. Uwe Schneidewind: Easier to live well: Sufficiency and post-growth . In: Political Economy . tape 148 , 2017.
  2. Wolfgang Sachs: “A nature-friendly society can in fact only be approached on two legs: through an intelligent rationalization of the means as well as through a clever limitation of the goals. In other words: the 'efficiency revolution' remains directionally blind if it is not accompanied by a 'sufficiency revolution'. ”(Quote from: The four E's ).
  3. a b Wolfgang Sachs: The four E's: Memo items for a moderate economic style . In: Political Economy . tape 33 , 1993, pp. 69–72 , urn : nbn: de: bsz: wup4-opus-668 .
  4. ^ Sufficiency. Outlines of an economy of enough. https://epub.wupperinst.org/frontdoor/deliver/index/docId/5868/file/5868_Sachs.pdf
  5. How sustainable is globalization? Economic delimitation and ecological limitation. Ed .: Heinrich Böll Foundation http://www.gegenstimmen.de/Literatur/sachsglobal.pdf
  6. ^ The Sustainable Development Goals and Laudatio si ': varieties of Post-Development? https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/01436597.2017.1350822?journalCode=ctwq20