The Ambiguities of “Sustainable” Berlin

Ares Kalandides and Boris Grésillon
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Ares Kalandides: Institute of Place Management, Manchester Metropolitan University, Manchester M15 6BH, UK
Boris Grésillon: Centre Marc Bloch, Humboldt-University, 10117 Berlin, Germany

Sustainability, 2021, vol. 13, issue 4, 1-13

Abstract: City marketing has a strong tradition in Berlin, with two organizations, Berlin Partner and Visit Berlin, responsible for designing and implementing relevant strategies. Sustainability has been on and off the city marketing agenda, almost exclusively in its environmental dimension. In this article, we examine the current representations of Berlin as a “sustainable city” in the official city marketing strategies. We look at how sustainability is used and instrumentalized to create a specific city profile and also to attract particular target groups in tourism. We propose an analysis of sustainable planning in Berlin since reunification to show how it has moved into different directions over time and how this has (or has not) been followed by city marketing. In this endeavor, we move between the existing, and as we argue deeper and more sophisticated, environmental planning of the city on one hand, and the reductions and simplifications of city marketing representations on the other. Finally, we argue that there are inherent contradictions in marketing a sustainable city, where both in terms of tourism and economic development, the concept of growth seems to be reaching environmental limits.

Keywords: Berlin; city marketing; sustainability; green city; smart city; urban development; destination marketing (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
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