Bei uns ist es doch schön! Oder?

Demographic change affects the cities and communities in North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) in many different ways. While some continue to grow, others are shrinking with ist population unstoppably aging. How can these big differences be explained and above all: What can the communities do about it? One possibility would be to increase the attractiveness of the city / community in order to have a positive influence on the number of arrivals and departures.
But what makes a city attractive? How do residents rate the attractiveness of their own city? And how can communities benefit from this knowledge? These are the main questions this dissertation deals with and which it will answer.
The development, testing and evaluation of an online survey is presented, in which around 3,600 citizens from 11 different cities and communities in NRW took part.
The economic survey instruments are, corresponding to all test quality criteria (objectivity, reliability, validity), suitable for generating intervention indicators to improve attractiveness and for using them for communal development processes. Its application assists the democratization of decision-making processes through broad citizen participation.