Sufficiency Policy in Rural Municipalities

The project analyzes how rural municipalities in Switzerland can adopt sufficiency policies and contribute to sustainable development. It examines the potential for sufficiency policies in municipalities with a particular focus on rural areas. The study identifies factors that foster or hinder these policies and explores how the federal government and cantons can support municipalities in developing and implementing them. In a practice-oriented part, selected municipalities are accompanied in the implementation of sufficiency measures.

Background
Global patterns of production and consumption are unsustainable, as they exceed planetary boundaries. Sufficiency strategies aim to transform resource-intensive consumption and production patterns so that societal needs can be met in a resource-conserving, local, and socially equitable manner. Although more and more people are trying to live sufficiently, individuals alone can only drive the transformation toward greater sustainability to a very limited extent, since the necessary political framework conditions that foster sufficient lifestyles and support alternative forms of consumption and production are lacking. Sufficiency policies address this gap, targeting resource-conserving and socially compatible consumption and production patterns of goods and services through incentives, education and/or regulation. This project analyzes sufficiency policy in rural municipalities through both a research and a practice part.

Research Part
The research is based on systematic literature reviews, surveys in rural municipalities, expert interviews, and a representative nationwide online survey. Three scientific publications address the following questions:

• How can sufficiency policy be conceptualized and defined at the municipal level?
• What sufficiency measures exist at the municipal level, both in the literature and in practice?
• Which factors foster or hinder the planning and implementation of sufficiency policies in these municipalities?
• How are sufficiency measures perceived and accepted by the Swiss population?

In addition to the scientific publications, a comprehensive catalog of sufficiency measures identified in literature and practice, as well as “best practice” examples of noteworthy sufficiency measures in Swiss municipalities, will be compiled and published.

Practice Part
In the practice-oriented part of the project, selected Swiss municipalities will receive support in implementing sufficiency measures. In addition, a policy brief will be drafted to outline how political framework conditions could be adjusted to better promote sufficiency.

• Supporting municipalities in implementing sufficiency measures:
  Through a three-stage process, the specific needs and challenges of each municipality will first be identified. Then, participatory and co-creative approaches will be used to develop sufficiency-solutions for these needs, followed by the initiation of concrete implementation. See fact sheet (in German) for more details on the support process.

• Framework conditions conducive to sufficiency:
  A policy brief will explore how the instrument of the New Regional Policy (NRP) could be designed in the future to actively promote sufficiency in municipalities.

   

Scientific Articles

Iten T., Seidl I., Pütz M. (2024) Sufficiency policy: a definition, conceptual framework, and application to municipalities. Sustain. Sci. 19, 1709-1734. doi:10.1007/s11625-024-01534-1

Iten T., Seidl I., Pütz M. (2025) Sufficiency Policy in Rural Municipalities: Measures, Enablers, and Barriers. Env. Pol. Gov. 0, 1–23 doi:10.1002/eet.70027

Further Publications

Database and Examples of Municipal Sufficiency Policy Measures: Wie Gemeinden Suffizienz fördern können(in German)

Pütz M. und Kusma S. (2025) Wie ländliche Gemeinden zum Schutz natürlicher Ressourcen beitragen können. Medienmitteilung vom 29.10.2025 auf wsl.ch und stiftung-mercator.ch.

Iten T. and Müller A. (2025) Creating living space, saving space: sufficiency in concrete terms. Media release dated 6 November 2025 on schweizer-gemeinde.ch.