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Conversation with Kay Axhausen, ETH Zürich
Item type: Book Chapter
De Gruyter, Chris (2026)
Item type: Person
Item type: Person
Caring for Nature by Caring for People – The Invisible Relational Sustainability of Landfrauen
Item type: Master Thesis
Schmid, Jasmin (2026)
Despite global commitments to sustainable development, the translation of policy into prac-
tice remains contested and dominated by “one-size-fits-all” models. Pluralizing pathways to
sustainability is proposed to better fit approaches to their socioecological contexts and accel-
erate transformative change. Studies of place-based sustainability can therefore expand the
collection of pathways and contribute to diverse and context-specific environmental govern-
ance. In this thesis, I investigate the everyday sustainability of Landfrauen – rural women and
female farmers organized in local clubs – as site of plural understandings. Specifically, I ex-
amine their interpretations and practices of sustainability, their underpinned values and emo-
tions, and the gender roles and structural conditions which shape their labor.
To this end and guided by a feminist methodology, I conducted and analyzed fifteen semi-
structured interviews, nine of which were “cooking interviews”, in the Swiss canton of Aar-
gau. My findings reveal that Landfrauen, often stereotyped as merely “specialists for crumble
cakes”, are critical yet systemically underrecognized drivers of ecological sustainability. Their
practice of sustainability – such as food self-provisioning, mending clothes, or buying local –
is rooted in an ethics of care and relationality and is driven by values of modesty, continuity,
diligence and self-determination. Participants reported that their practices evoke positive emo-
tions, although negative emotions are possible when structural conditions, like time availabil-
ity or infrastructure, are insufficient. Moreover, many sustainability practices are deeply gen-
dered: Women often shoulder recurring, taken-for-granted household tasks while men usually
perform the more visible, more socially acknowledged technical work, thus perpetuating the
structural invisibility of their contributions.
The approach of the Landfrauen offers a distinct alternative to dominant technocratic models
in sustainability governance and shows potential for scaling deep – a fundamental shift in val-
ues, ethics, and relationships with nature – thanks to its patient, locally rooted, and counter-
hegemonic character. While not a substitute for major economic and political transformations,
I argue that such relational and care-based pathways should be systemically nurtured and ac-
tively integrated into sustainability governance as vital extensions to entrenched paradigms,
moving beyond universal metrics to support diverse, place-based transitions.
Unconventional Biexciton Dynamics in Superradiant Perovskite Quantum Dots Driven by Many-Body Correlations
Item type: Dataset
Zhu, Chenglian; Feld, Leon; Movilla, Jose L.; et al. (2026)