Digital Responsibility for Germany
CDR Conference 2025 on October 6 in Berlin
On October 6, 2025, the sixth CDR Conference of the CDR Initiative will take place in Berlin from 11:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.
The conference will be opened by Frank Schwabe, Parliamentary State Secretary at the Federal Ministry of Justice and Consumer Protection (BMJV). This year's conference will focus on “Digital Responsibility for Germany” and the opportunities it presents for organizations.
The program, featuring high-profile speakers from politics, business, and civil society, will focus on how organizations of any kind and size can put digital responsibility into practice for their customers, employees, and society, and what added value this brings to the organizations themselves and to society as a whole.
Since January 2023, the office of the CDR-Initiative has been run by the ConPolicy Institute for Consumer Policy and its partner concern.
New publication for the German Environment Agency
Concept Study on Environmental Awareness in Companies Published
Citizens often demonstrate strong environmental awareness in their daily lives – for example when shopping, traveling, or separating waste. Yet people also act as employees within companies. The role that environmental behavior plays in the workplace has been examined in a concept study conducted by imug, the Institute for Ecological Economy Research (IÖW), and ConPolicy – Institute for Consumer Policy, commissioned by the German Environment Agency.The aim of the study was to develop a survey instrument capable of capturing the environmental awareness of both employees and companies. Based on an initial literature review, a pilot survey was carried out.
The newly published final report presents first insights from this pilot survey: employees provided differentiated assessments of their companies’ environmental performance but rated them only as average overall. At the same time, environmental aspects play a role for many when choosing a new employer. Notable differences emerged particularly between sectors and company sizes. With this study, an important foundation has been laid for systematically and representatively measuring environmental awareness in companies in the future.
Method kit from the 'Environmental Policy in Dialogue' project published
How do we reach the hard-to-reach?
The socio-ecological transformation will only succeed if it has broad social support. However, many people do not feel addressed by environmental and sustainability policy or are skeptical about it. This is precisely where the 'Environmental Policy in Dialogue - Environment / Populism / Democracy' project commissioned by the Federal Environment Agency comes in. The aim was to develop and test formats that would effectively involve target groups that are difficult to reach.
Under the direction of adelphi and together with the nexus Institute and sociodimensions, innovative participation and communication formats were designed. ConPolicy was responsible for evaluating these formats - examining their impact, initiating learning processes and identifying potential for further development.
The now released publication, the method kit 'Environmental Policy in Dialogue', bundles practical and proven approaches to build bridges to skeptical target groups. It shows precisely how participation can be designed in such a way that dialog is successful.
The publication and the method kit can be found here Further information on the project can be found here
ConPolicy contribution in the anthology "The Elgar Companion to Consumer Behaviour and the Sustainable Development Goals"
Digital Recommendations for Sustainable Consumption
How can sustainable consumption be effectively promoted in the digital sphere? This question was addressed by Marlene Münsch, Dr. Jana Diels, Hannah Horschke, and Prof. Dr. Christian Thorun in a book chapter for the anthology The Elgar Companion to Consumer Behaviour and the Sustainable Development Goals.
Under the title “Same same, but sustainable: the impact of digital recommendations on sustainable fashion consumption”, the chapter examines how digital product recommendations influence sustainable consumption behavior in online shopping. An online experiment with over 2,000 participants tested the effects of recommendations in a simulated online shop. Sustainability labels and generic cues (e.g., color design or claims) were combined. The results show: recommendations paired with credible sustainability cues increase the likelihood that consumers choose more environmentally friendly alternatives. At the same time, strong environmental awareness positively influences sustainable decisions, while high environmental knowledge leads to a more critical evaluation of general sustainability claims.
The anthology highlights various focal points as part of a reassessment of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) – including sustainable consumption and the potentials of digital transformation.
You can find the chapter here. You can find the anthology here. Further results from the research project ZuSiNa are available in our online guide.
Interactive exhibition and experiments on the PRiME research project launched in Nuremberg
Experience the metaverse - opportunities, risks and VR experiments
As part of the Prime - Privacy in the Metaverse research project, ConPolicy and its partner universities Bamberg, Göttingen and Bonn are hosting an interactive exhibition at the Josephs Innovation Lab in the heart of Nuremberg's city center.
Until mid-October, visitors can immerse themselves in the metaverse, try out a VR headset, take part in our interactive quiz, take photos with the prime avatar and find out about the opportunities and risks for their own privacy in the metaverse.
There is also the opportunity to register for our experiments in which we want to explore behavior in virtual worlds.
You can find more information about the Prime research project here
You can find more information about the Josephs Innovation Lab here
Recommended reading
Bissel et al. (2025)
Driving sustainable change: A systematic map of behaviorally informed interventions to promote sustainable mobility behavior
Recent reports have highlighted the importance of changing human behavior if climate change is to be mitigated. In this respect, behaviorally informed…
Read more
News about ConPolicy
Recommended reading
Upcoming events
