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Up to now, there is no equivalent to the smart city concept for rural areas. Such a concept can draw on the findings and experiences from the urban context, but must adequately take into account the characteristics and structures of rural areas. This is where the enrolment of a concept for smart countryside in this paper starts as an action-oriented framework. Through an integrative consideration of current trends and tendencies, normative debates about equality and justice as well as possibilities in various fields of action, it includes development options that become possible through digitalisation and 'smart' implementation. Their realisation should be strongly demanddriven. The concept includes also governance processes and knowledgemanagement, and the application of co-design approaches. Development potentials of digitalisation are seen beyond simple technology orientation. The concept of digitalisation presented here can contribute to a more comprehensive transformation of rural areas towards sustainability. It formulates a joint design mandate for politics, society and science. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Volunteer firefighters are an established institution in many rural areas across Europe. In spite of this ubiquity, many volunteer brigades have been increasingly facing challenges in discharging their functions. Issues such as undertaking necessary investments, and ensuring daytime availability have become particularly critical against the backdrop of an increase in the number of interventions. Many of the measures intended to futureproof volunteer firefighting are based on transferring responsibility to different actors. To this end developing and expanding the reach of fire safety education functions to enhance the public's prevention and self-protection skills. The aim of this paper is to explore the process of institutional change induced by innovative initiatives, which aim to advance fire safety education. For the study, we draw on empirical research, which follows the development and mainstreaming of two projects in Austria and Germany. These initiatives aim to standardise disparate approaches and are underpinned by new forms of multi-level cooperation. Our inductive analysis identifies five key steps which define the successful long-term implementation of projects in coproduced services of general interest. We conclude with observations on the redistribution of responsibility for fire services and hazard prevention in contemporary societies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The urgent transformation of our energy system towards a sustainable infrastructure of public services regularly fails in regional implementation due to spatial and social requirements of rural areas. Using the example of a transdisciplinary project, this paper identifies dilemmas in the participatory implementation of the regional energy transition and formulates conditions for the success of a spatially sensitive energy transition governance. As shown by the governance approach developed for "co-transformation", context-sensitive forms of participation in co-regulation, co-allocation and co-visioning can contribute to procedural, distributional and future justice and thus to the acceptability of the regional energy transition as a public service infrastructure in rural areas. Central fields of action are open-ended and regionally adapted forms of participation through co-regulation in the planning process, approaches to spatial co-allocation of energy transition-related burdens and local added values, as well as the co-visioning of regional energy futures and regional energy visions to be derived from them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

According to agonistic democracy theory, conflict is key for the functioning of plural democracies. In particular in 'fractured' societies, deliberative spaces in which adversary positions can be recognized and negotiated, serve as important arenas where antagonisms can be transformed into agonisms. Professionals dealing with conflicts between different interest groups - for instance in the field of spatial planning - are therefore challenged to identify appropriate 'spaces' for debate. Against this background, this paper discusses the extent to which localist discourses and practices can facilitate such spaces. For this purpose, we introduce a scheme for classifying different manifestations of New Localism. This scheme is unpacked and discussed by means of two contrasting case studies that reconstruct notions of New Localism based on amigration-related conflict in a rural area and on a conflict about traffic calming in an urban neighbourhood. Thereby we show how localist discourses and practices can contribute to establishing common symbolic spaces and temporary conflictual consensus, but also to concealing and normalizing exclusionary positions in small-scale conflicts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The population structure and life in rural areas have become more diverse in recent years due to the arrival and stay of refugees. The participation of the newcomers in the labour market is relevant on the one hand from the point of view of integration policy and for the regional economy, and on the other hand it fulfils various functions for them. However, little attention has been paid to the (potential) self-employment of newly arrived refugees in Germany. Using the example of the founding of grocery stores in rural areas of Germany, the aspirations of refugees on the labour market, the founding and business practices of operators and the perspectives of customers were examined from multiple perspectives. The qualitative interviews conducted with (potentially) self-employed newly arrived refugees and (semi-)standardized surveys of customers form the data basis for this paper. It is conceptually inspired by the state of research on migrant's integration to work and immigrant entrepreneurship as well as the subform refugee entrepreneurship. Results show a variety of meanings of employment and a distinct desire for selfemployment. Moreover, structural and individual obstacles could be identified in the foundation phase, while co-ethnic employment is considered crucial for the operation of a store. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Theworld of labour is undergoingmajor changes.With the processes of digitalisation, the possibilities to work flexibly wherever people live or spend their time are increasing. Digitalbased forms of work promote the development ofmobile work in a self-determined location (e.g. in a home office or co-working space). Such location-independent forms of work offer new opportunities for further development of rural areas and especially small andmedium-sized towns. The strategic (re) linking of living and working is in many respects both an opportunity and a challenge in equal measure: A shift in the centre of people's lives can strengthen the place of residence in rural areas through increased (also) economic demand, through amix of uses and a diversified demand for local supply or through a reduction of traffic loads, such as commuting. In this paper, we explore both the socio-spatial preconditions and the effects of this shift from places of work to places of residence in rural areas. The aim is to outline a systematic classification of co-working spaces with regard to sustainable spatial development in order to promote the opportunities of mobile work in different suburban and rural areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]