Is Munich dying out? Kindergartens versus old people’s homes

“Munich 2030” dialogue forums

In conducting the 2008 dialogue forums, the third of their kind, on 22 January, the Munich Re Foundation set the focus on the future of Munich. About 130 interested citizens considered the question: "Is Munich dying out?".

Dirk Reinhard, Vice Chairman of the Munich Re Foundation, outlined the problem as follows: “While the megacities of the world are bursting at the seams, cities in Germany have exactly the opposite problem”. Even though the birth rate in Munich did in fact increase in 2007, the population in Germany as a whole still continued to decline.

Asked whether Munich is dying out, Dr. Reiner Klingholz, Director of the Berlin Institute for Population and Development responded with a clear “No”. Nonetheless, the city is unable to escape the effects of certain demographic trends. First, life expectancy has been increasing by an average of three years every decade, with the result that the average age of the populace is steadily rising. That not only puts a burden on the social systems, but also results in declining tax revenues and reduced purchasing power. Second, birth rates have fallen by about one-half since the sixties, with corresponding consequences for regional development such as the building of schools and kindergartens. Third, society is becoming ever more mixed, as there are now 15 million immigrants living in Germany, which gives rise to problems because 40 percent of these people lack education and/or training.

According to Klingholz, Munich benefits from the migratory movements within Germany, which run from the east to the west and from the north to the south. In the years from 1990 to 2004, about 1.5 million people left the area that was formerly East Germany. Klingholz thinks that the drop in population will make itself felt over much larger areas and estimates that in the future it will affect 60 percent of all districts in Germany. Munich, on the other hand, will also be confronted with problems, but in its case they will result from the influx of people. Even now, Munich’s policies regarding children are utterly inadequate and its integration of migrants deficient. On the other hand, the city deserves to be rated very highly indeed for its employment opportunities and its attractiveness for young women in search of education and training.

Another person who is certain that Munich is not dying out is Dr. Elisabeth Merk, a member of the city council overseeing urban development. She cited the current population prognosis indicating that, quite to the contrary, the city will for the first time reach the 1.4 million mark in 2012 and may even have 1.43 million inhabitants as early as 2020 since Munich is one of the “winners” of migration. There will be increases in the number of very young children and in the segment from 25 to 39 years of age. While the number of senior citizens up to 75 years of age will decline from its present level, Bavaria's capital is expected to have about 30 percent more people over 75.

Merk asks herself what consequences this will have for the quality of life, saying “We have to create the prerequisites for Munich to remain social”. The most important thing is affordable living space. Yet the growing number of old people also holds the potential for conflict because they generally have fewer resources, and the issue of growing poverty is becoming more and more significant. She thinks the city’s failure regarding children is due to the high cost of living and would like to focus the city’s investments on the areas of education, qualification and kindergartens. Another high priority, she says, should be to subsidise living space for families: “The goal is to keep people from every layer of society in the city”.

In order to make the city attractive especially for old people, it will be necessary to think about a sensible concept for local mobility, but also to explore the potential of new forms of assisted living. Merk displays optimism about gaining control of the changes resulting from demographic trends, but is also aware that the city's power to plan has certain limits. “It is a question of how society wants to deal with it and how individuals want to organise their lives”, says Merk. Today, people tend to move around more than their parents’ generation did. Greater mobility, also of old people, requires a lot of tolerance.

Good planning must take into account the fact that this tolerance cannot be legislated and must create appropriate areas where the various groups can withdraw. Even so, it will not be possible to entirely avoid conflict between the old and the young, as is evident from an ongoing dispute over a playground in a new residential settlement in Haidhausen. Klingholz, too, pleads for more tolerance in our dealings with one another. One problem in this respect is that the elderly are gaining increasing influence in elections, but that young people represent the future.

Dr. Merk was unwilling to specify which quarters of Munich had particularly profited from growth, declaring “The city is exciting precisely because these things are not known in advance”. She went on to say that the pressure of inflowing migration would of course be felt more strongly in certain quarters and have an impact on parts of the city that have hitherto not been considered so desirable, promising “But we will endeavour to ensure that the development of the city’s various areas proceeds evenly”. Merely focussing on Munich’s core area would not suffice, and it would also be necessary to take into account the city’s margins and surroundings in considering the questions of where space already in use could be utilised more efficiently and where open spaces should be preserved.

In this connection, Klingholz pointed out that city planning could exert only limited influence on the development of the city’s various quarters, which was evident from the rise of quarters such as Prenzlauer Berg and Friedrichshain in Berlin. Also with regard to the demographic trend, the city’s options were limited. “Only to a certain extent are we able to create positive underlying conditions”, declared Merk with regard to, for instance, residential space, kindergartens or infrastructure as family policy lay outside the purview of the cities.

What do the city councilwoman and the Director of the Berlin Institute envision for Munich? According to Merk, the city faces the task of freeing itself from its unvarying philosophy of growth and finding out what areas of flexibility exist. “For myself, I wish for a beautiful and authentic city where the decisions maintain a social balance”.

In Klingholz’s view, children are the motor of future survival because cities with disproportionately aged populations will face significantly greater challenges. He therefore recommended “We have to give families and children more joy in their existence”, and pointed out that Sweden had demonstrated that the desire for a family can be realised better when the sexes are truly equal.

Dirk Reinhard summarised the evening as follows: Munich is profiting from the demographic trend, but must strike a balance between the expectations of the young and the old. That will be possible only with good ideas and with tolerance.