Bernd Klauer is a senior scientist at Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research, Leipzig and an Honorary Professor for Sustainability and Water Resources Management at University of Leipzig, Germany.

Reiner Manstetten has a Habilitation in Economics at the University of Heidelberg, Germany. He is currently a lecturer at the Philosophical Seminar of the University of Heidelberg.

Thomas Petersen has a Habilitation in Philosophy at the University of Heidelberg, Germany. He is currently a lecturer at the Pädagogische Hochschule (College of Education) Heidelberg.

Johannes Schiller is a senior scientist at the Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research, Leipzig, Germany.

Preface Part 1 Sustainability and time 1. Ways to approach sustainability policy 2. Sustainability: theory and policy Part 2 The conceptual framework of stocks 3. The perspective of stocks 4. Material stocks 5. Immaterial stocks and institutions 6. The persistence of institutions 7. Judgement 8. Time and the practical dimension of the concept of stock Part 3 Applying the stocks framework 9. Shaping institutional change in the course of contamination management in Saxony-Anhalt 10. Ways of achieving sustainable land use in Germany: A stocks-based analysis Part 4 The art of long term thinking 11. The stocks framework as a heuristic for sustainability policies 12. Applying the heuristic: Key elements of a sustainable inland shipping policy 13. Stocks: a schooling in long term thinking 14. Literature