Presentation short abstract

This workshop presents the concepts and learnings from FARN’s educational project countering authoritarian capture in rural socio-ecological transformation conflicts. Participants map transformation struggles from their contexts, analyse far-right narratives, and develop dialogical interventions.

Presentation long abstract

This interactive workshop presents the German educational organization FARN and its pilot project “Region in Transition: Understanding Conflicts, Shaping Dialogues, Strengthening Cohesion” as a concrete practice example of resistance to far-right authoritarianism in rural socio-ecological conflicts in Germany. Rooted in radicalisation prevention within nature and environmental protection, the project responds to authoritarian, nationalist and fossilist backlash against climate and transformation policies by empowering local multipliers to work conflict-transformatively and democratically.

The workshop foregrounds how socio-ecological transformation conflicts become key terrains for authoritarian capture and counter-hegemonic organising. A concise input introduces FARN’s approach, which links conflict research, environmental psychology and political education to train actors from civil society, municipalities and small and medium-sized enterprises to analyse transformation conflicts, recognise far-right and conspiracist narratives, and design values-based dialogues that strengthen democratic cultures in their regions.

Participants then work in groups to map transformation conflicts from their own research or home regions and identify how far-right actors exploit these arenas for their political projects. Inspired by the Region in Transition model, the groups sketch dialogical and educational interventions that can build local resilience and solidarity. The workshop thus functions as a translocal laboratory for thinking political ecology together with concrete practices of democratic resistance to far-right authoritarian projects in contested rural futures.