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We are an independent institute for action research on future viability located in Berlin, Hamburg, Copenhagen, Vienna and Zurich.

 

We research and create fields of action for a future-ready present.

 

 

We look at everyday practices to learn from them. We question existing property and power relations and support a co-existence based on solidarity. We involve ourselves in discourses and use our competences in order to support the future-ready transformation of our society. We research and act above all in urban areas, as this is where particular everyday practices are established; in cities, an intensive observation of societal transformation processes and future-relevant socio-spatial systems is possible.

 

We assume that a multi-faceted crisis, caused by climate change, capital-oriented globalization, demographic change, increasing urbanization, migration movements and future finance crises will overwhelm present-day societal structures – as long as they are not prepared for such transformations in advance. In order to prepare for these potential upheavals, we have to change the way we live together in a reflective and constructive manner. In order to understand how this could be possible, we investigate transformation processes above all on micro-levels, as experience shows us that individual and everyday praxis can influence societal systems in ways that better prepare them for the future.

 

We learn along the way through performative workshops, artistic research and theoretical work. We share our insights through documentations, publications and public discussions, on the internet and in print. We open up social spaces for experimentation and share our knowledge within ongoing processes. Simultaneously, we reflect upon the reactions that come about. Such feedback loops enable us to develop measures that nurture future-ready transformations in our society.

 

In our offerings we provide the chance to productively bring research, analysis, critique, utopia and practice together. We offer seminars, workshops and city-walks, during which places and practices are experienced that can influence our realizations about future-ready societal structures. The knowledge we generate applies to actors from the municipal administration, urban planning entities and the education system, as well as activists, artists, and researchers with an interest in urban studies, society and culture.

 

Projects

Study Project on cooperation of civil society and administration

 

Horizontal cooperation for urban development towards common good

 

Civil courage? Negotiating with solidarity in the everyday

 

Reclaim your club

 

Transformational communities

 

Relay the everyday

Team

Konrad Braun – architect and urban researcher

 

Heike Derwanz – cultural anthropologist

 

Iver Ohm – cultural scientist

 

Theresa Schütz – artist and urbanist

 

Rainer Steurer – architect and designer

 

Sabeth Tödtli – urbanist

 

Nina Lund Westerdahl – urbanist and artist

 

Michael Ziehl – urbanist and urban researcher

Contact

E-Mail: Hidden Institute

Weigandufer 28
12059 Berlin