You are cordially invited to attend the lecture series “Habitability in Times of Global Crisis” in the winter term 2025/2026. The lectures will take place on Wednesdays from 6:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. (c.t.) in lecture hall PHIL HS 3. The aim of the lecture series is to provide an exemplary insight into the diverse habitability research conducted at various universities around the world and to present the interdisciplinary approaches of different researchers, with a particular focus on the social sciences, humanities, and economics perspectives that complement and expand on the natural sciences.
The event is open to the public and registration is not required. We look forward to seeing you there and to an exciting discussion about the challenges and opportunities of habitability and sustainability!
Moving Beyond Environmental and Climate Determinism: Refocusing the Debate on Habitability and Human Mobility
The presentation challenges climate-deterministic approaches that frame habitability and human mobility primarily through climatic thresholds. It advances a multidimensional and socially differentiated understanding of habitability, emphasizing that experiences of living in changing environments are shaped as much by social relations, translocal connections, and flows of resources and knowledge as by environmental conditions. The presentation calls for integrating social and environmental dimensions to move beyond climate determinism and to reframe debates on habitability and migration.
Biography
Patrick Sakdapolrak is Professor of Population Geography and Demography at the University of Vienna. His work explores the links between population dynamics, environmental change, and development, focusing on migration, displacement, and how vulnerable groups respond to risk. He co-founded the Environmental and Climate Mobilities Network and the Climate Mobilities Knowledge Hub. Patrick studied Geography and Development Studies in Heidelberg and Wollongong and earned his PhD from the University of Bonn.
Mapping Habitability: Land Change, Expertise, and the Politics of Sustainability in the Drylands of Mendoza, Argentina
This lecture explores the socio-environmental transformations of irrigated drylands in Mendoza, Argentina, through the lens of land use and land change (LULC) dynamics. Drawing on two empirical case studies and a theoretical bridge between Land Change Science (LCS) and Political Ecology, it examines how mapping, land management, and expertise intersect in shaping the conditions of habitability amid global crisis.
The first study offers a long-term quantitative analysis (1986–2018) of LULC transformations in the Mendoza and Tunuyán river basins, revealing the expansion of vineyards into the Andean piedmont, peri-urbanization over former agricultural lands, and the abandonment of irrigated plots downstream. These spatial patterns mirror broader processes of agrarian restructuring and uneven water access. The second case engages a critical ethnography of cadastral surveyors and remote mapping technologies, showing how “all-terrain experts” and digital cartography reconfigure land regimes by legitimizing market-oriented commodification and rendering peasant uses invisible.
To frame these cases, the lecture draws on Turner and Robbins’ (2008) classic articulation of Land-Change Science and Political Ecology, which underscores the need to integrate systemic environmental analysis with power- and context-sensitive explanations. Through this dialogue, the lecture argues that habitability in the age of planetary crisis cannot be reduced to biophysical thresholds but must be understood as a contested outcome of knowledge, governance, and territorial politics.
Biography
Facundo Martín is Researcher at the National Council for Scientific and Technical Research (CONICET) and Professor of Geography at the National University of Cuyo in Mendoza, Argentina. He investigates agrarian transformations, land and water politics in Latin America. He was recently awarded the Georg Forster Fellowship for experienced researchers of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation (2024-2025).
Toxic Habitats, Feminist Futures: Habitability and Multispecies Survival in the Mekong Borderlands
What does it mean to inhabit a world turned toxic? This lecture examines habitability in Southeast Asia’s extractive borderlands, where gold mining, hydropower, and monoculture have transformed multispecies ecologies and the moral landscapes of survival. Based on eighteen months of ethnographic fieldwork in Chiang Khong, Northern Thailand, it follows Mae Ying, riverine women whose livelihoods depend on Kai (river algae) harvesting and seasonal synchronization with the Mekong’s cycles. Their embodied practices—sediment sensing, algae foraging, and ritual offerings to the Naga, guardian of the river—form vernacular ecologies of care that oppose the epistemic violence of hydrological abstraction. Drawing on feminist political ecology, multispecies ethnography, and decolonial geology, this lecture revisits the question of what makes life livable amid toxicity. It builds on three interrelated works—“Women, Toxic Geologies and More-than-Human Mekong Ecologies” (ARI-NUS, 2025), “Spectral Mekong, Eco-Ghosted Waters: The Naga's Hauntology and More-Than-Human Futures in the Anthropocene” (Chiang Mai University, 2025), and “Damming the Mekong in the Anthropocene: Solastalgia and Gender Vulnerability of Ecological Disruption in Northern Thailand” (Journal of Mekong Studies, 2025)—to argue that habitability is not merely endurance but a practice of collective care, where women, rivers, sediments, and spirits co-produce survival. Through this lens, to inhabit becomes an ethical act of staying with contamination—a feminist, more-than-human politics of persistence in a fractured world.
Biography
Maya Dania is an Assistant Professor of Sociology and Assistant Dean at the School of Social Innovation, Mae Fah Luang University, Thailand. She holds a Ph.D. in Social Sciences from Chiang Mai University, where her dissertation—“Making Kin in the Patchy Anthropocene, Capitalocene, and Plantationocene: Narrative of the River Women, Algae, Banana, and More-Than-Human Ruptured Entanglement in the Multispecies World of Chiang Khong, Thailand”—examines feminist political ecology, multispecies ethnography, and decolonial approaches to environmental change in the Mekong borderlands. Her current research, supported by the Sumitomo Foundation, focuses on Nature-Based Solutions for urban resilience in Chiang Rai, while her collaboration with the UNESCO-Chair Kobe University explores gender resilience in the Mekong River. Both projects advance feminist and community-based frameworks of environmental governance in Northern Thailand. A former Asia Research Institute (NUS) Fellow, she continues to develop transnational collaborations on gender, ecology, and habitability across Southeast Asia. Maya is also contributing to a forthcoming IAS-UBD & Brill edited volume with her chapter “Making Kin along the Mekong River: Exploring Multispecies Entanglements in the Anthropocene.” Her broader work examines how women, rivers, and more-than-human beings co-create survivability within toxic landscapes, articulating a feminist ethics of care for inhabiting damaged worlds.
Sustainability and resilience for whom? From the perspective of theglobal South
The concept of habitability demands that we take a critical and interdisciplinary look at different systems governing society, economy and resources. Currently, sustainability and resilience are ubiquitously used as goals of any national or international action in (development) economics. However, both are analytical and especially normative concepts: Defined by people and made measurable for all countries in the world regardless of their economic status represented by the ubiquitous SDGs. Both concepts are not self-contained theories, but rather scientific paradigms that must be continually questioned and revised. E.g. the currently desired climate neutrality in the global north poses high local costs for the poorer population in the global south. The climate policy of the European Union and also Germany wants to show developing countries also morally how they can make their value chains and inhabitants climate neutral, sustainable and resilient, without asking what the priorities and needs of these countries are. Is that fair? Furthermore, the concepts of sustainability and resilience clearly have positive synergies, but also frictions and trade-offs that need to be researched more intensively. From a normative perspective, achieving optimally sustainable and resilient individuals but also value chains is desirable. But the question is: What can we do? (Where) should we invest? (How) is that possible for whom? (How) shall we measure? There can't just be winners. This lecture aims to provide a critical look at these questions and illustrate them using examples from an empirical long-term study in Tanzania.
Literature
Follmann, A., Dannenberg, P., Baur, N., Braun, B., Walther, G., Bernzen, A., ... & Sulle, E. (2024). Conceptualizing sustainability and resilience in value chains in times of multiple crises—Notes on agri-food chains. DIE ERDE–Journal of the Geographical Society of Berlin, 155(1), 29–48. https://doi.org/10.12854/erde-2024-692
Escobar Jaramillo, D., Arata, L., Mausch, K., Sckokai, P., Fasse, A., Rommel, J., Chopin, P. (2024). Linking innovations adoption with farm sustainability: Empirical evidence from rainwater harvesting and fertilizer micro-dosing in Tanzania. World Development, Volume 183, 106732, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.worlddev.2024.106732
How can we inhabit the earth together? A Feminist Political Ecology inquiry in India and Indonesia
with Enid Still and Siti Maimunah
The notion of habitability is influenced by different values, exclusions and inclusions and omissions of what is considered as habitable, for whom and under what conditions. Via the norms applied, habitabilty is thus infused with power-relations. A Feminist Political Ecology (FPE) perspective offers an analysis of the complex relations between nature and society through the gender dimension that is played out and shaped in dynamic ways by power and knowledge relations (Harcourt et al. 2023). At two empirical cases of contested human-nature relations in India and Indonesia, we demonstrate the contribution of FPE as an intersectional, embodied and informed by activism way of doing research. While a focus on affective roots of organic agri-food networks in Tamil Nadu stress the importance of memory, emotions and viscerality in India (Tozzi & Still 2025), the analysis of mining environments unfolds doing FPE as a life project (Maimunah 2024). An FPE approach unravels the powerful forms of making the earth habitable for some and less for others.
Literature
Harcourt, Wendy; Agostino, Ana; Elmhirst, Rebecca; Gómez, Marlene; Kotsila, Panagiota (2023) Contours of Feminist Political Ecology.Cham: Springer International Publishing. https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-031-20928-4_7
Maimunah, Siti (2024) Reclaiming Tubuh-Tanah Air: A Life Project for Doing Feminist Political Ecology at the Capitalist Frontier. https://opus4.kobv.de/opus4-uni-passau/frontdoor/index/index/docId/1165
Tozzi, Arianna & Enid Still (2025) The Ambiguous Ecologies of Agri‐Alternatives: Exploring the Calculus of Social Reproduction in Rural India. Journal of Agrarian Change. 25(4). https://doi.org/10.1111/joac.70048
Habitability in transition: tropical mountains as sentinels of global change
Tropical mountains support exceptional biodiversity and play a critical role in maintaining planetary habitability through climate regulation, water provision, and biogeochemical cycling. They also sustain millions of people whose livelihoods depend on these ecosystem functions. Despite their global significance, tropical mountains remain underrepresented in long-term environmental monitoring networks compared to those in the Global North. This asymmetry constrains our ability to understand how climate change, land-use dynamics, and biological invasions are reshaping ecological processes in these environments. Emerging evidence indicates rapid and substantial shifts in species composition, ecosystem functioning, and the provision of key ecosystem services. This lecture will present fundamental concepts and recent findings on the ecological impacts of global change in tropical mountains, highlighting current trends, challenges, gaps, and the implications of these knowledge asymmetries for assessing habitability in a changing Earth system.
Biography
Dr. João de Deus Vidal Junior is a Brazilian botanist, macroecologist, and a former Climate Protection Leadership Fellow of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation. He has conducted research at the University of Passau (Germany), the University of Campinas (Brazil), the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (UK), and the University of the Free State (South Africa). Currently, he is a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Leipzig, Germany, where he leads the project “Plants and Politics.” His research explores how environmental change and biodiversity influence each other across tropical and mountain ecosystems. His work combines large-scale ecological and environmental data with modeling to understand biodiversity patterns and global change impacts.
Plantations and the Quest for Habitability
Plantations are obdurate: they remain unchanged for long periods of time. This has consequences for life, labour and the environment. In the tea plantations of Assam, northeast India - a region that witnessed one of the biggest labour migrations in human history - people perform generational labour, rendering the plantation into a site of biopolitics and, consequently, of social reproduction. The plantation's effects spiral out of its enclaves. It has bearings on the wider agrarian landscape and ecology. This talk examines what habitability means in a milieu riven by the plantation form, for people, but also for more-than-human denizens of a landscape. How does the plantation operate as a duration? How does it expand? What futures does it invoke? These questions are addressed through empirics looking at plantation labour, agrarian transformations, informal resource extraction and plant and animal life.
Biography
Maan Barua works on the politics, ontologies and economies of the living and material world. His current research is on metabolic urbanization and the politics of city-making. Maan is the author of Lively Cities: Reconfiguring Urban Ecology (University of Minnesota Press, 2023) and Plantation Worlds (Duke University Press, 2024). He was the PI on an ERC Horizon 2020 Starting Grant on Urban Ecologies, (2018-2025) and is a University Lecturer in Human Geography at the University of Cambridge. At present, Maan is finishing a book and visual installation on urban wetlands, provisionally titled An Amphibious Urbanism.
The lecture is open to the public. A certificate of attendance can be issued upon participation in all sessions (registration via StudIP required).
You are cordially invited to the lecture series ‘Sustainability Research at the University of Passau’ in the winter semester 2024/2025. The lectures will take place on Wednesdays from 18:00 to 20:00 (c.t.) in the lecture hall PHIL HS 4. The aim of the lecture series is to provide an exemplary insight into the diverse sustainability research at the University of Passau and to present the interdisciplinary approaches of various faculties.
The event is open to the public and registration is not required. We look forward to welcoming you and to an exciting exchange on the challenges and opportunities of sustainability!
![[Translate to Englisch:] Ringvorlesung: Nachhaltige Entwicklung und Migration - Fokus West-Afrika](/fileadmin/_processed_/2/8/csm_COLOURBOX42955790_ac5cb6e65d.jpg "[Translate to Englisch:] Ringvorlesung: Nachhaltige Entwicklung und Migration - Fokus West-Afrika")
This year's lecture series on sustainability focuses on West Africa, a region that is currently characterised by environmental changes, especially climate change, but also by intense political conflicts and upheavals.
Speakers from academia and practice will shed light on various aspects of migration and (sustainable) development in West Africa.
The events take place on Wednesdays from 6 to 8 pm. The kick-off is planned for 15 November.
‘The Anthropocene’ - the human era. The term goes back to the atmospheric engineer and Nobel Prize winner Paul Crutzen (1933-2021), who postulated that human activity is shaping a new era on Earth that could replace the Holocene. According to Crutzen, the Earth system and humanity can no longer be separated. Humans have become a ‘geological factor’, as their actions have a significant influence on various balances prevailing in nature, which can be seen, for example, in the sharp rise in greenhouse gas emissions due to anthropogenic activities and their direct impact on the climate.
Politicians and scientists have been discussing the concept of the Anthropocene for 20 years now. Building on Crutzen's comments, which he published in the renowned magazine ‘Nature’ in 2002, the - sometimes controversial - debate about the Anthropocene has spread to various scientific disciplines. For example, the effects of human activity on the planet are no longer only being discussed in geology and geosciences, but also in philosophy, political science, history and social sciences, as well as literature and cultural studies
Against the backdrop of a shared human future on Earth, different perspectives on the topic are particularly important.This is why we are also discussing this exciting topic with scientists from various disciplines as part of the puplic lecture series `Anthropocene´ in the summer semester 2023.
![[Translate to Englisch:] Ringveranstaltung „Nachhaltigkeit und Konsum“](/fileadmin/_processed_/c/e/csm_COLOURBOX32829346_af59bd948d.jpg)
Everyone consumes. Every day. As purchasing decisions are influenced by personal habits and attitudes, it is not guaranteed that we will make conscious consumption decisions at all times. But this is exactly what sustainable consumption means: conscious, responsible consumption that ‘takes a closer look’ and scrutinises the costs of one's own individual consumption for people and the environment.
In Sustainable Development Goal 12 ‘Responsible consumption and production patterns’, the guiding principle of sustainable development is dedicated to the interplay between individual consumer, usage and disposal behaviour and international value chains and asks how the interaction between the two can be made more ecologically and socially compatible. As sustainable consumption affects the everyday life and lifestyle of every individual, we are dedicating this lecture series ‘Sustainability and Consumption’ in the winter semester 2022/23 to the discussion of this important sustainability topic.
In the winter semester 2021/2022, theRi lecture serie ´Changing Perspectives in Science and Society` entered its seventh round, this time with five events on the topic of ‘Sustainability in the Context of Digitalisation’. A particular focus was placed on the area of ecological sustainability and resource issues. Various dimensions of the digitalisation of society and the economy and the challenges and opportunities that digitalisation offers for sustainable development were to be critically examined.
![[Translate to Englisch:] Ringvorlesung „Perspektivwechsel in Wissenschaft und Gesellschaft“](/fileadmin/_processed_/b/2/csm_Colourbox-41837372_786c99edee.jpg "[Translate to Englisch:] Ringvorlesung „Perspektivwechsel in Wissenschaft und Gesellschaft“")
Prof. Dr Martina Fromhold-Eisebith, holder of the Chair of Economic Geography at RWTH Aachen University and member of the German Advisory Council on Global Change (WBGU) until 2020, kicked off the event on 9 November 2021 and spoke about the opportunities and risks of digitalisation. In particular, she referred to the WGBU's demands: digitalisation must be designed in such a way that it can serve as a lever and support for the major transformation towards sustainability and be synchronised with it.
| Datum | Vorträge |
|---|---|
| 09.11.2021 | Prof Dr Martina Fromhold-Eisebith (RWTH Aachen University): ‘Our digital future’ |
| 08.12.2021 | Dr Ulrike Kugler (Ministry for the Environment, Climate and Energy Energy Industry Baden Württemberg): ‘Data centres and sustainable digitalisation’ |
| 15.12.2021 | Prof Dr Hermann de Meer (University of Passau): ‘The energy transition thrives on participation’ |
| 02.02.2022 | Prof Dr Katharina Spraul (TU Kaiserslautern): ‘Digital innovations for the circular economy’ |
| 09.02.2022 | Mascha Brost, Jürgen Weimer (German Aerospace Centre) and Jochen Benz (ZF Mobility Solutions): ‘Automated driving and the mobility transition’ |
For the 5th time in a row, the lecture series was dedicated to major topics and issues of a more sustainable future.
Here is the programme for the 2019/20 winter semester:
| Datum | Veranstaltung |
|---|---|
| 21.10.2019 | Prof Dr Stötter, University of Innsbruck: The role of universities for a sustainable future |
| 04.11.2019 | Prof. Dr. Schmid-Petri, Univ. Passau: Complex, invisible, abstract: Key challenges in communicating climate change |
| 18.11.2019 | Prof Dr Christine Bauhardt, HU Berlin: Does climate change have a gender? The perspective of feminist political ecology |
| 02.12.2019 | Dr Ortrud Leßmann, University of Hamburg: Sustainable development from the perspective of the capability approach. The role of consumption |
| 16.12.2019 | Prof. Dr Sigrid Stagl, University of Vienna: Climate protection from efficiency to opportunities for realisation |
| 13.01.2020 | Dr Kristina Kurze, University of Göttingen, Lecture title: Climate protection after the European elections - The EU's pioneering role put to the test |
| 27.01.2020 | Prof. Dr. Stahl, Uni Passau: Drive by sight - on the unsustainability of international politics |
The lecture series on sustainability continued in the 2018/19 winter semester - this time under the title ‘Business & Responsibility’. Scientists from German and Austrian research institutions as well as practitioners presented their approaches every (almost) 14 days from 23 October, focusing in particular on innovative approaches to sustainable forms of business. Eine An overview of the contents of the individual events can be downloaded here.
| Datum | Titel |
|---|---|
23.10.2018 | Social entrepreneurship: social, sustainable, profit-orientated - is it possible? |
06.11.2018 | Regional corporate responsibility - opportunities and challenges |
20.11.2018 | CSR - more appearance than reality? |
04.12.2018 | The common good region of south-east Bavaria - practical realisation of the common good for citizens, companies and local authorities. |
18.12.2018 | CSR in theory & practice - application using the example of the Heilbronn Declaration |
15.01.2019 | The responsibility of companies for human rights |
29.01.2019 | BMW in responsibility - CSR in the automotive industry (working title) |
The lecture series ‘Changing Perspectives in Science and Society’ also took place in the 2017/18 winter semester. Here you can find the completeProgramm.
Due to its density, the city as a living space promises close networking and exchange, easy access to services and participation in cultural and political events. The quality of public space is shaped by aspects as diverse as mobility concepts, affordable housing and its characteristics for newcomers, children and the poor. The joint lecture series ‘Urban living spaces between participation and value creation’ in the 2016/17 winter semester explored this area of tension between democratic and commercial interests. The aim was not only to take a critical look at various urban dimensions, but also to explore the question of urban development that meets the challenges of a global world. What can an urban environment contribute to the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals?
For the first time, the Chair of Comparative Development and Cultural Research and the Passau Architecture Forum organised this public lecture series together with the University of Passau's ‘Workshop on Sustainability’ to present and debate ideas from science and planning practice for innovative urban futures.
| Datum | Veranstaltung |
|---|---|
| 03.11.2016 | Destroy in order to preserve? Flood protection in the area of conflict between property protection, cityscape preservation and public participation. Panel discussion with: Christa Gottinger (Höllgasse businesswoman), Peter Haimerl (architect, visiting professor for urban intervention in public space, University of Kassel), Manfred Sturm (city councillor), Karl Synek (city councillor), Anette Wolf (resident & restaurateur in Unterer Sand). |
| 17.11.2016 | Urban sustainability transformation in the context of climate change and participation. Dr Kerstin Krellenberg| Department of Urban and Environmental Sociology | Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research UFZ-Leipzig |
| 08.12.2015 | In search of resonant ways of life between urban utopia and rural pragmatism. Prof. Dr Eberhard Rothfuß | Chair of Social and Population Geography | University of Bayreuth |
| 12.01.2017 | Share the city fairly. Ass. Prof. Dr Doris Damyanovic | Institute of Landscape Planning | University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Vienna |
| 19.01.2017 | Vietnam's metropolises - challenges and solutions for sustainable urban development. Dr Michael Waibel, Institute of Geography | University of Hamburg |
| 26.01.2017 | Home not Shelter. Prof. Dr Ralf Pasel | Institute of Architecture |TU Berlin |
| 02.02.2017 | Turning points in residential construction. Prof. Dr Thomas Jocher| Institute of Housing and Design (IWE) | University of Stuttgart |
If you look at the earth from a great distance, you could come to the conclusion: The world continues to turn while humanity goes round in circles. Every era and every society has experienced objective and subjectively perceived crises and threats. Today, too, we are faced with a multitude of challenges that seem to be closely interwoven. Around the world, many of the old social and economic orders are in the process of disintegration, accompanied by and/or caused by the various effects of globalisation. Science is also finding it increasingly difficult to provide explanations or even answers to the social and political problems and challenges of the Anthropocene. However, there are pioneering thinkers who have adopted new and unconventional ways of thinking and have already changed their perspective. Scientists from German, Austrian and Swiss universities presented their ideas and approaches every two weeks from 22 October.
| Zeit und Ort | Veranstaltung |
|---|---|
22.10.2015 18-20 Uhr WIWI HS6 | On the road to sustainable development - challenges and potentials for research and teaching |
| 05.11.2015 18-20 Uhr WIWI HS6 | ‘As if the earth had long since stopped talking to us’ - On resonance with nature and its loss Prof Dr Angelika Krebs, Chair of Practical Philosophy, University of Basel |
19.11.2015 17-18 Uhr (s.t) | Ecologically sustainable data centres for smart cities - the All4Green and DC4Cities projects Prof. Dr Herrmann de Meer, Chair of Computer Science with a focus on Computer Networks and Computer Communication, University of Passau |
| 03.12.201518-20 Uhr WIWI HS6 | No time for sustainability - The limits of sustainability using the example of the Simpsons Prof Dr Michael Suda, Chair of Forest and Environmental Policy, Technical University of Munich |
| 17.12.2015 18-20 Uhr WIWI HS6 | Sustainability as a corporate challenge and opportunity: here to stay! Prof Dr Markus Beckmann, Chair of Corporate Sustainability Management, Friedrich-Alexander University Erlangen-Nuremberg |
| 14.01.2016 18-20 Uhr WIWI HS6 | ‘Global climate policy in the Anthropocene - how successful were the Paris climate negotiations?’ Prof. Dr Markus Lederer, Chair of Political Science with a focus on International Governance, University of Münster |
| 28.01.2016 18-20 Uhr WIWI HS6 | Global Care Gaps, Care and Care Work: On Capitalism, Inequality and Perspectives of Sociology in the Face of Care Crises. Prof. Dr Birgit Aulenbacher, Head of the Department of Theoretical Sociology and Social Analyses, University of Linz |
