This publication is the eleventh volume of the series “Rural areas: Issues of local and regional development”. It aims at intensifying scholarly exchange on topical questions of social, political, economic and landscape related transformations of rural areas in Germany and Europe.
The current social megatrends and diverse crises are encouraging new ways of thinking about sustainable future development not only in cities and metropolitan regions but also in Europe’s rural areas. In recent years, the perception of problems resulting from the multiple crises has increasingly led to discourses that address sustainability in terms of a profound and comprehensive socio-ecological transformation. This has become a major subject of interdisciplinary research, which in the international context is also comprehended as transition research. Research on rural areas in Europe is also characterized by interdisciplinarity and different approaches. It often takes part in order to elaborate knowledge footpaths to future-proofed local and regional development. The international conference “Rural Geographies in Transition” (Groningen 2023), took up the diverse approaches of research on rural areas and rural development in Europe and positioned them within the broader field of transformation and transition research, respectively. The contributions compiled in this volume provide an insight into its breadth.