Events

Title: Social Product Declarations: Assessing the Social Sustainability Performance of Products throughout their Life Cycle

Speaker:  Professor Marzia Traverso, RWTH Aachen

Date & Time: 14 January 2026, 16:00-18:00

Location: Online (request link via gsvc@hwr-berlin.de) and Campus Lichtenberg, room House 6B, Room 6B259.

Social Product Declarations (SPDs) represent a good way to assess, compare and communicate the social sustainability performance of products considering the entire life cycle. Based on Social Life Cycle Assessments (S-LCAs), they highlight impacts of a product lifecycle on different stakeholders such as: workers, local communities and users. In 2023, the world’s first Product Category Rules (PCR) for SPDs, and the first ever SPD, was published thanks to the support of Hitachi Rail and Circular Srl (GmbH in Italy). The project was led by Prof. Marzia Traverso, director of INaB RWTH Aachen University – the guest lecturer of this session. The lecture gives insights into the concept of SPDs, their development as well as benefits and challenges that arise during their formation and usage.

Marzia Traverso is a full Professor and head of Chair and Institute of Sustainability in Civil Engineering in RWTH Aachen since 2017. She holds a PhD in Environmental Technical Physics from the University of Palermo. Furthermore, Professor Traverso is an environmental engineer, working in the field of Life Cycle Assessment and sustainability performance of building and transport sector and strategic environmental assessment to the transportation urban systems.

Title: Responsible Contracting, LkSG & CSDDD – Lessons Learned from Practice

Speaker:  Daniel Schönfelder, Responsible Contracting Project

Date & Time: 3 December 2025,16:00-18:00

Location: Online (request link via gsvc@hwr-berlin.de) and Campus Lichtenberg, room House 6B, Room 6B259.

The LkSG & CSDDD oblige companies to implement HREDD procedures in their supply chains. Responsible Contracting describes an approach of doing this in a way that incentivizes collaboration and openness, as well as sharing of risks and responsibilities. It emphasizes not only supplier, but also buyer responsibilities, including on responsible purchasing practices. The lecturer will share his learnings from his practice of implementing LkSG, CSDDD & Responsible Contracting with companies and associations of different sizes and continents and bring some practical exercises to sparkle joint discussion and learning.

Daniel Schönfelder is a lawyer and lecturer in Business and Human Rights. He also works as the Lead European Legal Advisor for the Responsible Contracting Project and in-house on implementing the German Supply Chain Due Diligence Act.

This lecture is part of our Lecture Series in the winter semester 25/26. Find the full program here.

17–18 November 2025 | HWR Campus Lichtenberg, Berlin 

Academic conference organised by the HWR-Competence Centre on Challenges and Resilience of Global Supply and Value Chains

Global supply and value chains are a key arena of societal contestation. They connect production and consumption across borders, generate wealth, yet at the same time raise pressing questions of sustainability, responsibility, and power. Policymakers, businesses, and scholars are engaged in vivid debates about how supply chains should be regulated, governed, and transformed. The conference aims to bring together diverse perspectives on value chains – ranging from legal and economic approaches to sociological, political science, and cultural perspectives.

Programme

17 November, 11am–7:30pm

18 November, 9:30am–1:30pm

Title: Industry Dialogues as Strategy to Implement Due Diligence Legislation

Speaker:  Maren Leifker, United Nations Global Compact

Date & Time: 12 November 2025, 16:00-18:00

Location: Online (request link via gsvc@hwr-berlin.de) and Campus Lichtenberg, room House 6B, Room 6B259.

In recent years, so-called Multi-Stakeholder Initiatives (MSIs) have proliferated. These instruments enable companies to exchange knowledge and experiences on sector-specific risks, involve stakeholders, and pool leverage in order to jointly address structural challenges in global supply chains. They are therefore often regarded as effective mechanisms for the implementation of due diligence standards.

At the same time, MSIs are subject to critical scrutiny. Many are considered insufficient in delivering measurable sustainability outcomes and, in particular, in improving the situation of rights-holders.

The lecture will explore these debates and provide a practice-oriented insight into the Automotive Sector Dialogue, a flagship initiative launched by the German government in 2020. 

Maren Leifker is a lawyer with a PhD on corporate liability under the CSDDD. She has extensive experience in business and human rights, including her role as Senior Policy Advisor at the German NGO Brot für die Welt and as a civil society representative on the BAFA stakeholder advisory board. Since July 1, she has been with the UN Global Compact Network Germany, coordinating the Sector Dialogue with the automotive industry.

This lecture is part of our Lecture Series in the winter semester 25/26. Find the full program here.

Event of the Office for Research Funding, of the Research Committees of the Departments 1-5 and the Vice President for Research and TransferV.

Wednesday, 12 November 2025, 1:30-3pm

Registration required via forschung@hwr-berlin.de 

Chair: Jelena Hoffmann, HWR Research Competence Centre: Challenges and Resilience of Global Supply and Value Chains

Programme

Title: The Victim Territories of CO2 Neutrality for Electric Cars in Brazil

Speaker:  Prof. Klemens Laschefski, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Brazil

Date & Time: 8 October 2025, 4-6pm

Location: Online (Request link via gsvc@hwr-berlin.de) and Campus Lichtenberg, room 1.4098

Brazil, which is hosting this year’s World Climate Conference (COP30), presents itself as an innovative supplier of the raw materials needed for ‘CO₂ neutrality’ and ‘energy transition’ strategies. One of the most ambitious, but also most controversial, projects in this context is certainly the exploitation of lithium deposits in the Jequitinhonha Valley, which are needed for the production of batteries for electric mobility. Less attention is paid to rare earths and very common metals such as niobium, copper, aluminum, and iron ore, which are necessary for the production of new cars, regardless of their drive type, and which are all abundant in Minas Gerais and regions such as Grande Carajas. Added to this are the strategies for CO₂ neutrality in mining and metal processing companies, which are intended to achieve the use of supposedly renewable fuels such as ethanol from sugar cane, biodiesel from oilseeds, and hydrogen in their machine and vehicle fleets. The production of hydrogen relies on the consumption of large amounts of electrical energy, which is to be generated by gigantic photovoltaic farms, hydroelectric power plants, and wind farms. Finally, the production of ‘green steel’ in Brazil traditionally relies on charcoal obtained from eucalyptus monocultures.

The presentation will address the consequences of land grabbing at the starting point of the supply chains for electric and other vehicles. The focus will be on an immense colonization drive in previously unexploited territories belonging to indigenous and traditional communities, particularly in the Cerrado (Brazilian savannah), which has been largely ignored in the international climate debate.

Klemens Laschefski is Professor for Political Ecology and a member of the Study Group on Environmental Issues (Grupo de Estudos em Temáticas Ambientais – GESTA) at the Federal University of Minas Gerais (Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais – UFMG). He is a fellow of the Research Productivity Programme (PQ) of the National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq). He is currently working on the topics addressed in the lecture as part of the project “Local, Indigenous, Quilombola and Traditional Communities and the construction of the ‘Lithium Valley’ in Minas Gerais, Brazil: Empowering silenced voices in the energy transition (LIQUIT)”, funded by The British Academy, CNPq – Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico and FAPEMIG – Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de Minas Gerais.

This lecture is part of our Lecture Series in the winter semester 25/26. Find the full program here.

Title: A multidimensional sustainability governance approach – The case of the German Supply Chain Act in the Brazilian Battery Value Chain

Speaker: Helena Gräf (HWR Berlin)

Date & Time: 08 July 2025, 18:00-20:00

Location: HWR Berlin, tba

Title: Human Rights Due Diligence Laws: Some Reflections on the
Prospects and Challenges with Reference to India

Speaker: Praveen Jha (Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi, India)

Date & Time: 17 June 2025, 6-8pm

Location: HWR Berlin, Campus Schöneberg, Room B 5.12

Panel of the Research Competence Centre at the Biennial Conference of the Standing Group on Regulatory Governance

Speakers: Hartmut Aden, Tamara Dangelmaier, Christian Hilpert, Christina Teipen, Markus Schultze-Kraft

Date & Time: 12 June 2025, 11:00-12:30

Location: Hertie School, Room 3.01

The panel presents interdisciplinary research perspectives on Global Supply and Value Chains (GSVC) and their emerging regulation. While the European Union seeks to influence human rights and sustainability standards in supply chains with the recently passed Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD; Directive (EU) 2024/1760), a broader perspective on GSVCs shows a range of challenges that are only partly covered by the EU’s regulatory approach. GSVC regulation is closely related to evolving industrial policies and mostly ignores the impact of global crises on GSVCs, opaque GSVCs in the shadow economy as well as protest movements against GSVCs. These gaps and blind spots are likely to hamper the performance of the emerging regulatory regimes for GSVCs. The contributions to this panel look at these issues from an interdisciplinary political science, sociological and legal perspective. They are related to the Research Competence Centre: Challenges and Resilience of Global Supply and Value Chains funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG; 2024-2029) as a research impulse and special research area based at the Berlin School of Economics and Law (HWR Berlin).

Conference Papers:

• Asymmetric North-South State Capabilities: Industrial Policies in the Automotive Global Value Chains
• Political discourse and regulatory challenges of threats to supply chains in the wake of the Russian attack on Ukraine
• Resilience, Regulation, and Resistance: A Sociological Perspective on Supply Chains and Amazonian Deforestation
• Establishing New Complaints Mechanisms for Supply Chain Due Diligence
• Beyond regulation? Opacity in global value chains

You can find more information on the panel and included papers on the conference website.

Title: Demand and Growth Regimes and the Structure of International Trade in Selected Countries: a Macroeconomic Framework for the Analysis of Global Value Chains

Speakers: Prof. Dr. Eckhard Hein & Juan Manuel Campana (HWR Berlin)

Date & Time: 14 May 2025, 16:00-18:00

Location: HWR Berlin, Campus Schöneberg, Room B 4.01

Title: The Return of Labor Casualization in Ports

Speaker: Prof. (em.) Dr. Christoph Scherrer (University of Kassel)

Date & Time: 24 April 2025, 18:00-20:00

Location: HWR Berlin, Campus Schöneberg, Room B 5.12

Title: Brazil: The Current Economic and Geopolitical Scenario, and the Impacts on Its Positioning in the GVCs

Speaker: Bruno De Conti (UNICAMP, Brazil)

Date & Time: 26 February 2025, 16:00-18:00

Location: HWR Berlin, Campus Schöneberg, Room B 5.44

Fotos: Kathrin Heller

Die globalen Liefer- und Wertschöpfungsketten stehen heute vor beispiellosen Herausforderungen. Das neue HWR Berlin Forschungskompetenzzentrum wird in den kommenden Jahren hierzu forschen. Mit der Kick-off Konferenz startete Ende November ein breiter Dialog mit interessiertem Fachpublikum über das Thema „Herausforderungen und Resilienz globaler Liefer- und Wertschöpfungsketten“ 

Fachpublikum aus Wissenschaft, NGOs und Ministerien

Kontrovers diskutierten die Wissenschaftler*innen und Mitarbeiter*innen von Stiftungen und Bundesministerien drängende Fragen zu Liefer- und Wertschöpfungsketten. Fokus am Dienstag waren die Auswirkungen auf die gesamtwirtschaftliche Nachfrage, das Wirtschaftswachstum und wie diese polit-ökonomisch erklärt werden können und die wirtschaftlichen Transformationsprozesse seit der Covid19-Pandemie. Neben forschungsstarken Wissenschaftler*innen der HWR präsentierten Bruno De Conti von der Landesuniversität von Campinas (Brasilien), Gale Raj-Reichert vom Bard College Berlin und Joonkoo Lee von der Hanyang Universität (Südkorea) ihre Forschungsarbeiten.

Rohstoffe, Nachhaltigkeit und Digitalisierung

Und auch am zweiten Tage wurd lebhaft diskutiert über die Themen Nachhaltigkeit von Wertschöpfungskette, kritische Rohstoffe, Digitalisierung und illegale Lieferketten. Zur außer- und inneruniversitären Konversation trugen Morgane Fritz von der Excelia Business School in La Rochelle (Frankreich), Nele Kampffmeyer vom Öko-Institut Berlin, Johanna Sydow von der Heinrich-Böll Stiftung, Finn Schufft von der NGO Germanwatch, Florian Butollo vom Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin und Inga Carry von der Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik bei.