Labour and production

Work secures living standards, shapes identities, and often determines social status. In many countries, access to social stability is tied to the labour market. Organized industrially, modern production methods externalize social and ecological costs. This is questionable, not least from the perspective of sustainability. Meanwhile, new opportunities are emerging, for example from digitalization, artificial intelligence, and sociopolitical change – including greater education among women. Used wisely and in combination with social innovations, these developments bear potential to boost transformations towards more sustainable societies.
CDE carries out analyses of part-time work, new forms of work, and other social innovations in Switzerland. It examines rural labour markets in non-wage economies as well as global value chains. In this way, it promotes concrete initiatives that seek to shift the function of employment on behalf of new models of wealth and sustainable societies.
Ongoing projects
Environmental justice for human well-being (COMPASS)
Feminization, agricultural transition, and rural employment – FATE
From niche to society: social innovations for sustainable consumption
Local energy transition experiments for a low-carbon society
Tackling inequalities on the way to sustainable food systems – JUST-FOOD
Time is wealth: Part-time work as a means to foster sustainable lifestyles?
Why do we work? Labour and agroecological transition in sub-Saharan Africa – AgroWork
Completed projects
Landless Pastoralists Research Project
Risk and strategies in forest-agriculture landscapes
Social Innovation in marginalized rural areas of Europe – SIMRA
Sustainable social innovations and grassroots movements