From Societal Trends to Future Landscapes: Participatory Scenarios and Ecosystem Service Implications in Germany

Understanding how socio-cultural dynamics influence biodiversity is essential for anticipating long-term developments in cultural landscapes. While direct drivers such as land-use change are well-studied, indirect societal trends including value change, societal transformation, demographic change, health, digitalization and technology, and mobility remain less explored despite their potential to shape biodiversity trajectories. This study investigates how these trends act as indirect drivers of biodiversity change in German cultural landscapes and how they can inform future-oriented landscape management.

The research is conducted within the large-scale and long-term ‘Biodiversity Exploratories’ research platform through the project SoCuLa ‘Socio-cultural Drivers of Biodiversity Change in Germany’. Twenty-five indicators were developed to operationalize the six societal trends, and region-specific morphological matrices were constructed to explore potential combinations of indicator expressions. Participatory workshops with representatives of key stakeholder groups in three regions were used to co-develop pessimistic, optimistic, and desirable scenarios, while explicitly considering temporal horizons and contextual uncertainties. Morphological analysis provided a framework for integrating qualitative and quantitative knowledge to examine multidimensional social-ecological challenges.

The workshops generated region-specific scenario sets that illustrate plausible pathways of land use and cultural landscape evolution under varying socio-cultural conditions. Subsequent evaluation through an online survey correlated these scenarios with local prioritization for ecosystem services and regional multifunctionality. Preliminary analyses suggest that, based on previous studies, cultural landscapes currently meet regional demands for ecosystem services, and it is expected that desirable scenarios will generally continue to fulfill these demands in the future. However, assessing the scenarios rated as most likely may reveal potential mismatches between projected land-use pathways and local ecosystem service prioritization.

These findings highlight the importance of integrating socio-cultural trends into biodiversity planning and demonstrate how participatory scenario development can support adaptive governance. By linking societal trends, stakeholder perspectives, and ecosystem service data, the study provides a robust framework for anticipating long-term biodiversity futures and informing sustainable landscape management.