Bright Prospects

With its goal of making an original and effective contribution to the strengthening of social cohesion, the BMW Foundation is instrumental in investigating processes of social change. A new focus of our work is on bright prospects of sustainable growth and progress.

Growth has traditionally been measured by factors such as labor, capital, and technology. In spite of the increasing productivity and efficiency of the economic system, there is currently wide debate about whether further material growth is possible both from an economic and ecological perspective. Besides environmental pollution and the dwindling of natural resources, the massive public debt in Western industrialized countries is seen to be the main culprit behind the alleged end to constant growth. Economic growth is no longer seen as a panacea.

The topic of progress, too, is undergoing a change in definition. The global economic crisis has further accelerated a fundamental about-face on the “right” economic and social system. Progress does not only amount to a further increase in the gross domestic product (GDP), because GDP does not say anything about people’s well-being and satisfaction with life, nor about illiteracy, life expectancy or similar social dimensions. What, then, do we mean by progress?

To make our research findings in the fields of sustainable growth and progress accessible to a broader public, we regularly organize major panel discussions in cooperation with BMW Welt. The BMW Foundation also supports the newly established Center for Societal Progress. The 2011/2012 issue of the nation-wide FoundationReport, which is widely supported by the BMW Foundation, focuses on the topic of “Sustainability and Climate Protection.”