Episodes
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Rupert Read is Co-Director of the Climate Majority Project, and Emeritus Professor of Philosophy at the University of East Anglia, and former spokesperson for Extinction Rebellion (Twitter, Website, Wikipedia entry).
The Climate Majority Project has the mission to "accelerate effective, coordinated climate action by a broad-based coalition of citizens; from grassroots initiatives to high-level policy". Rupert left the relatively stability of academia to wholeheartedly focus on CMP.
Temperature records are falling, and there are signs that climate change is accelerating. For Rupert, the paradoxical insight is that now is not the time to get more radical, but to be ready to welcome more people into the climate movement. Experiencing the weird weather will be the best recruiter into climate action.
In the interview, Rupert unpacks the four strands of the Climate Majority Project:
Truthfulness. Shifting the public narrative about climate change towards the truth, through skilful messaging.Cultures of awareness and resilience. Facing the truth together and taking action calls for inner resources and communities of support.Serious action. Helping people from many backgrounds take meaningful action to help drive the systemic change we need.Building shared understanding. Developing the identity and vision of the emerging mass movement, and helping people see that they are powerful together.Core to the Climate Majority Project is depolarisation, because acting on climate over the long-term needs to be a broad project which reaches across classes, political orientations, identities.
As you might expect from a former philosophy professor, there is a great deal of nuance to Rupert's views. One is that there is no shortcut. Just as a technological fix to our predicament is an illusion, so is revolution. He's wants to create a future which is not based on illusion, which involves a transformation over time, it's going to take the time of political culture.
Rupert very much believes that, yes, the problem is overwhelmingly vast but when you start to see yourself as part of a huge coming wave of action, and you start to feel yourself as part of that, then it's exciting and energising you no longer feels so puny, or hopeless.
Collectively, we are in a time of call-and-response between how the geophysical situation is getting worse, but the human response is also accelerating. The Climate Majority Project is the kind of thing we need so the human response can deal with the geophysical situation, more than just reforming the status quo but not taking the shortcut of revolution, nor settling for ruins.
Links
Rupert's books here.
MP Watch
Community Climate Action
Wildcard
General Counsel Sustainability Forum
Cadence Roundtable
The Deluge By Stephen Markley -- here
More notesTwitter: Powerful_Times
Website hub: here.
Please do like and subscribe, to help others find the podcast.
Thank you for listening! -- David -
Erica Austin is a social entrepreneur, community weaver, facilitator, photographer and Christchurch Ambassador (LinkedIn). She describes her self as a multi-potentialite, or someone with activities in many fields. As we will hear, in Erica's case, this is something of an understatement.
I was first introduced to her as the Community Activator in the Edmund Hillary Fellowship, a community of 500+ innovators, entrepreneurs and investors committed to New Zealand as a basecamp for global impact. (I am an Edmund Hillary Fellow.)
We have a very rich conversation, touching on many huge themes.
One is culture and identity, especially in a place with strong indigenous and colonial heritages plus inward immigration.
As her introduction (using the Maori tradition of Pepeha) makes clear, Erica was born in China, moved to Aotearoa New Zealand when she was young. We talk about Aotearoa New Zealand as both a bicultural and a multicultural nation: "acknowledging that, that Maori people are the first people who've arrived in this land, and then comes multiculturalism, to be able to then create a space for all people to thrive". How she is part of something she calls re-indigenisation, not decolonisation.
Another theme is neurodiversity. Erica was diagnosed with ADHD when she was young, and really sees this as her superpower, which allows her to connect with other people, and people with places.
One consequence is that Erica is involved in many things, and has organised her work according to the Sustainable Development Goals (or SDGs).
Erica's priorities for the next three years are integrating indigenous practice and knowledge into our modern world, and growing the idea of a learning ecosystem, where people are not just learning in schools, not learning just in the organisation, but actually creating multiple different pathways for them to understand and learn to create better future, the future focus learning opportunity.
We did this interview in November 2023, and I remember being energised for days afterwards. I've just re-listened and again have a buzz from Erica's energy, her ambition, her practices of connecting people, and her uses of her superpower.
Links
FESTA
Te Pūtahi Centre for Architecture and City Making
E.A.Curation
Ako Ōtautahi Learning City Christchurch
Ally Skills NZ
Leadership Lab NZ
Asia New Zealand Foundation
Taonga -- treasure
Tangata Tiriti – Treaty People
Treaty of Waitangi
More on the SDG 0 story here.
More notes here
Twitter: Powerful_Times
Website hub: here.
Please do like and subscribe, to help others find the podcast.
Thank you for listening! -- David -
Missing episodes?
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Alex Evans is Founder and Executive Director of Larger Us, a "community of change-makers who share the aim of using psychology for good – to bridge divides, build broader coalitions and bring people together" (Alex's Twitter).
Alex set up Larger Us to flip society from a breakdown dynamic and into a breakthrough dynamic. That means paying attention to hwo the state of world impacts our state of mind, how our state of mind how we show up, and how we affect others through our behaviour, especially in a primed and fast-hyper-connected world.
We were speaking a month on from Hamas attacking Isreal, adn the Isreali response. Alex had written a fantastic blog post on how to make sense and respond without just accelerating the conflict.
He says the real tussle of our times is between those two perspectives : zero-sum ('for me to win, you must lose) or nonzero sum ('for me to win, you must win also'). If we want contribute to towards nonzero sum outcomes, and avoid feeding conflict, then it starts with managing our own mental and emotional states."
For Alex this part of a wider sense that the kind of moment humankind is now living through it is a sort of initiation threshold. We need a deep story that's capable of holding the immense difficulty and intensity and all the contradictions of this moment that we're living through.
Links
Alex's book: The Myth Gap
Rupert Read's Climate Majority Project
Larger Us: Climate Conversations
Deep Canvassing (on Wikipedia)
The Larger Us Podcast: How to change people's minds - with Dave Fleischer
Radical Love campaign in The Atlantic and The Alternative (I couldn't find the Book of Radical Love on the Larger Us website).
Confronting the Long Crisis of Globalization (2010)
The Long Crisis COVID scenarios
Alex's blog post on the Middle East.
Ways to Get Involved with Larger Us
The Age of Endarkenment essay by Michael Ventura
Timings
0:50 - Q1 What are you doing now? And how did you get there?
23:35 - Q2. What is the future you are trying to create, and why?
32:18 - Q3. What are your priorities for the next few years, and why?
38:40 - Q4. If someone was inspired to follow those priorities, what should they do next?
42:15 - Q5. If your younger self was starting their career now, what advice would you give them?
46:43 Q6. Who would you nominate to answer these questions, because you admire their approach?
51:11 Q7. Is there anything else important you feel you have to say?
Twitter: Powerful_Times
Website hub: here.
Please do like and subscribe, to help others find the podcast.
Thank you for listening! -- David -
Ella Saltmarshe sits "at the intersection of culture, narrative and systems change" (website, LinkedIn, twitter). She describes herself as a founder, systems change specialist, anthropologist, writer, podcaster, teacher, activist, and (as of very recently) a mother.
We recorded this interview on 31 October 2023, only a few weeks into the Isreal-Gaza conflict. Anyone who follows Ella's work will have seen her recent focus on that conflict. For the start of any International Women's Day events (8 Mar 2024), she suggested people use some acknowledgements. This one spoke to me in particular:
"Before we start, let's take a moment to acknowledge and remember the extreme suffering and terror experienced by women in Gaza, Israel and the west bank over recent months. The 195 women killed by Hamas on October 7th, the at least 14 female hostages still remaining in Gaza.The 8,570 (and growing number of) Palestinian women who have been killed by Israel. The 5500 women who are due to give birth in Gaza over the next month with no medical facilities, with 40% of those pregnancies classified as high risk.
May our actions contribute to their safety.
May we support each other in working for an immediate ceasefire. As women, may we demonstrate what international solidarity looks like, today and everyday. "
Our conversation focused on the role of culture and narrative in helping us transition to a regenerative future. In particular, how we are really messy, irrational, emotional creatures. So we need to be working at the level of emotions. The things that move us emotionally are stories.
In particular, Ella is focused on nurturing cultures that have stewardship at their core.
She suggests building communities around the questions that move you.Links
Long Time Project "aims to galvanise public imagination and collective action to help us all be good ancestors."
Long Time Academy
Inter-Narratives. Subscribe to the newsletter here.
More on my late wife's work on the use of time in child and adolescent psychotherapy here.
You can hear Steve Waygood explain Macro-Stewardship here.
Timings
0:56 - Q1 What are you doing now? And how did you get there?
9:35: BONUS QUESTION: What is it that you mean by narrative?
17:43 - Q2. What is the future you are trying to create, and why?
19:53 - Q3. What are your priorities for the next few years, and why?
22:58 - Q4. If someone was inspired to follow those priorities, what should they do next?
26:01 - Q5. If your younger self was starting their career now, what advice would you give them?
28: 59 - Q6. Who would you nominate to answer these questions, because you admire their approach?
29:41 - Q7. Is there anything else important you feel you have to say?
Twitter: Powerful_Times
Website hub: here.
Please do like and subscribe, to help others find the podcast.
Thank you for listening! -- David -
Kim Polman is Co-Founder & Chair of Reboot the Future, a fellow of the Aspen Institute and co-founder and chair of the Kilamanjaro Blind Trust (bio on the Reboot website, LinkedIn, Twitter). The purpose of Reboot the Future acts on the belief that a better future is possible if we follow the Golden Rule, that we treat others and the planet as we’d wish to be treated.
In the conversation we dive into the Golden Rule and how that is applied in Reboot The Future. Plus how Kim is a late blooming baby boomer, who didn't get in front of a microphone until she was 60. She also touches on the importance of love, almost as a practice to be resilient and attract opportunities. Plus, how we are all leaders in our own spheres, and so we can all take action.
Note: there's a moment at about 10 minutes where my connection freeze. But it is barely noticeable.
Links
The Golden Rule on wikipedia. The first book Kim co-authored on The Golden Rule: "Imaginal Cells: Visions of Transformation"
Pope's encyclical on climate change Laudato si' (wikipedia entry, English version on Vatican website).
Imaginal cells on wikipedia.
Evolutionary Leaders
Transcendence by Gaia Vince
The second book Kim co-wrote: Values for a Life Economy.
Powerful Times interview with Tim Jackson.
More on the 'Inner Game of Tennis' here.
Global Dimension.
Executive Masterclass on the Golden Rule.
Timings
0:56 - Q1 What are you doing now? And how did you get there?
17:16 - Q2. What is the future you are trying to create, and why?
27:50 - Q3. What are your priorities for the next few years, and why?
31:05 - Q4. If someone was inspired to follow those priorities, what should they do next?
33:01 - Q5. If your younger self was starting their career now, what advice would you give them?
35:33 - Q6. Who would you nominate to answer these questions, because you admire their approach?
36:53 - Q7. Is there anything else important you feel you have to say?
Twitter: Powerful_Times
Website hub: here.
Please do like and subscribe, to help others find the podcast.
Thank you for listening! -- David -
Jonathon Porritt is a sustainability campaigner and writer (website, Twitter, Wikipedia). After years in the Green Party (while working full-time as a teacher), in 1984 he became director of Friends of the Earth in Britain and then co-founded Forum for the Future in 1996. (One of the other co-founders was Paul Ekins, who I interviewed for Powerful Times here. I worked with Jonathon when I was at Forum, 2003-2016.)
Jonathon was also Chair of the UK Sustainable Develop Commission for nine years (2000-2009) and Chancellor of Keele University (2012-2022).He has been at the forefront of sustainability, in business and also government, for the last 30 years. We spoke in November 2023, just after he had, in his own words, extricated himself from the roles which had been very present in that time, including stepped back from any role in Forum.
For Jonathon, at the heart of sustainable development is this very simple, but massively powerful notion of intergenerational justice. That is still provides the rationale for everything that he does and allows him to envision ways in which 8 billion today and 10 billion people in the future could live reasonably good lives in the future.
One telling reflection: a focus on positive solutions for the last 30 years has put Jonathon's anger on hold, and he now feels that has been problematic. He's moving back into campaigning, being less reasonable with those who deserve our anger, and also still constantly absorbing in the solutions to the problems we face.
Links
Brundtland Commission definition of sustainable development:
"Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs."
Jonathon's latest book, Hope in Hell.
Grist Imagine 2220
Timings
00:56 - Q1. What are you doing now? And how did you get there?
3:55 -Q2. What is the future you are trying to create, and why?
7:35 - Q3. What are your priorities for the next few years, and why?
10:31 - Q4. If someone was inspired to follow those priorities, what should they do next?
14:00 Q5. If your younger self was starting their career now, what advice would you give them?
19:37 - Q6. Who would you nominate to answer these questions, because you admire their approach?
22:36 - Q7. Is there anything else important you feel you have to say?
More details here.Twitter: Powerful_Times
Website hub: here.
Please do like and subscribe, to help others find the podcast.
Thank you for listening! -- David -
Dave Snowden (Twitter, LinkedIn) is Founder and Chief Scientific Officer of The Cynefin Co.
The Cynefin Co is "the world leader in developing management approaches (in society, government and industry) that empower organisations to absorb uncertainty, detect weak signals to enable sense-making in complex systems, act on the rich data, create resilience and, ultimately, thrive in a complex world". The Cynefin Framework is a decision support framework, a way of determining what method to adopt in this particular situation.
Dave is a thorough-to-brusque practitioner and thinker using Complex Adaptive Systems (a dynamic network of interactions where the behaviour of the ensemble is not predictable from the components, and which is able to adapt to changing circumstances).
Two key points I take from our conversation:
-Don't focus on changing people (for which there is little evidence of success). Instead, focus on changing the connections people have with other people opens up more possibility for the whole assembly.
-From a complexity view, the world is constantly changing and the information you have is partial. Better to be responsive to what's happening around you, rather than having aplan which will be immediately out of date.
Links
Probably the most recent full explanation of the Cynefin Framework and how to us it is here. "Managing complexity (and chaos) in times of crisis. A field guide for decision makers inspired by the Cynefin framework" published by the EU.
SenseMaker® is a distributed ethnographic approach to understanding a situation. By allowing respondents to give meaning to their own experience, it avoids the epistemic injustice of third-party of algorithmic interpretations.
"SenseMaker® allows the powerful combination of vast amounts of data, with the rich context of narrative, based on the anecdotes of real people going about their real lives. Very importantly, SenseMaker® places the voices and interpretations of people at the centre, instead of privileging those in power."
Camino de Santiago
Timings
0:50 - Q1 What are you doing now? And how did you get there?
6:03 - Q2. What is the future you are trying to create, and why?
11:52 - Q3. What are your priorities for the next few years, and why?
20:58 - Q4. If someone was inspired to follow those priorities, what should they do next?
22:46 - Q5. If your younger self was starting their career now, what advice would you give them?
25:52 - Q6. Who would you nominate to answer these questions, because you admire their approach?
26:58 - Q7. Is there anything else important you feel you have to say?
Twitter: Powerful_Times
Website hub: here.
Please do like and subscribe, to help others find the podcast.
Thank you for listening! -- David -
Prof Jacquie McGlade (Twitter, Wikipedia) is an administrator, academic, advocate and more besides. Currently she is Professor of Natural Prosperity, Sustainable Development and Knowledge Systems at UCL (which is how I know her) and a lecturer at Strathmore Business School in Nairobi, which is where she lives. She is married to a Maasai village chief.
In a frankly amazing career, Jacquie has been a scientist, the executive director of the European Environment Agency, and the Chief Scientist at UNEP. She is also a co-founder and Chief Scientific Officer of Downforce Technologies, a pioneer in science-led, data-driven land management solutions focused on optimising soil health, soil organic carbon levels, and biodiversity (I had a small part in setting up Downforce Technologies).
Jacquie has a rare combination of (Western) science and indigenous knowledge. She is like the fish she studied for her PhD, able to travel into the oceans and back into fresh water.
The striking themes are on:
-The need for high quality data people trust so they can make new decisions.
-The importance of having enough people in society trying something new, so society can evolve.
-Ensuring her village can thrive without Western tourism income.Links
UCL Institute for Global Prosperity
UNEP
UNDP
Ilya Prigogine, Nobel prize-winning chemist, was one of the foundational thinkers of what is now called complex systems,because of his discoveries of self-organisation.
UCL Citizen Science Academy
Wellbeing Economy Alliance
Chris Smaje -- A Small Farm Future
Jacquie's Gresham Lectures are at the bottom of this link.
Achim Steiner
Crispin Tickell
Vincent Ogotu
Vandana Shiva
Timings
0:50 - Q1 What are you doing now? And how did you get there?
13:39 - Q2. What is the future you are trying to create, and why?
22:22 - Q3. What are your priorities for the next few years, and why?
25:36 - Q4. If someone was inspired to follow those priorities, what should they do next?
28:35 - Q5. If your younger self was starting their career now, what advice would you give them?
31:25 - Q6. Who would you nominate to answer these questions, because you admire their approach?
36;12 - Q7. Is there anything else important you feel you have to say?
Twitter: Powerful_Times
Website hub: here.
Please do like and subscribe, to help others find the podcast.
Thank you for listening! -- David -
APOLOGIES FOR SOME SOUND ISSUES RIGHT AT THE START AND END OF THIS RECORDING.
Amy Twigger Holroyd is Associate Professor of Fashion and Sustainability at Nottingham School of Art & Design (website). Through design-led participatory research, she explores plural possibilities for post-growth fashion systems: alternative ways of living with our clothes that meet our fundamental human needs and respect ecological limits.
Her main project pursuing this is Fashion Fictions, which invites you to to imagine, explore and enact enticing alternative fashion worlds. Stage One: Worlds is to write an enticing, possible parallel world (as I type, there are 213 which you can still add to here). Stage Two: Explorations is to generate visual and material is to prototypes of those worlds (eg a mocked-up WhatsApp chat). Stage Three: Enactments is to try and experience the prototyped Worlds.
Our conversation covers:
-How fashion (the clothes people wear, and how those are created) are an expression of society.
-Her motivation: using participatory fiction to expand the sense of possibility, because so many people feel hemmed in.
-She's currently excited by the realisation that we can write stories, and then, by enacting them, we can make them real. It is a sort of magic.
By the way, the sound problems come from having to use the back-up recording. I hope they don't interfer with your enjoyment too much.
Links
Keep & Share
Book Amy co-authored: Historical Perspectives on Sustainable Fashion.
Arturo Escobar -- Designs for the Pluriverse: Radical Interdependence, Autonomy, and the Making of Worlds
The Great Transition Initiative, expressed in a book called 'Journey to Earthland' by Paul Raskin.
Diana Wynne Jones' series with numbered worlds is Chrestomanci.
Kate Fletcher
Timings
0:51 - Q1 What are you doing now? And how did you get there?
12:43 -- BONUS QUESTION: What is your project, Fashion Fictions?
22:41 -- BONUS QUESTION: What are the themes in your findings from Fashion Futures?
29:41 - Q2. What is the future you are trying to create, and why?
33:58 -- Q3. What are your priorities for the next few years, and why?
41:10 - Q4. If someone was inspired to follow those priorities, what should they do next?
44:31 - Q5. If your younger self was starting their career now, what advice would you give them?
46:12 - Q6. Who would you nominate to answer these questions, because you admire their approach?
48:02 - Q7. Is there anything else important you feel you have to say?
More details here.Twitter: Powerful_Times
Website hub: here.
Please do like and subscribe, to help others find the podcast.
Thank you for listening! -- David -
Sandrine Dixson-Declève is Co-President of The Club of Rome (LinkedIn, Twitter, Wikipedia). She divides her time between leading The Club of Rome, advising, lecturing, and facilitating difficult conversations. She currently Chairs the European Commission, Expert Group on Economic and Societal Impact of Research & Innovation (ESIR) and sits on the European Commissions Mission on Climate Change & Adaptation.
We speak a lot about the latest findings of systems dynamics modelling as expressed in the book Sandrine co-authored, Earth for All: A Survival Guide for Humanity.
The major finding is the need to address inequality and poverty, in order to avoid a graver social backlash and to make action on environmental challenges easier politically.
This is a reversal of many environmentalists over the last decades, who have said: yes, inequality is important, but if we don't address climate change first then any improverments in poverty will be wiped out anyway.
Sandrine turning that logic around: the only way to have an environmental transition is to have a just transition.
The other finding in Earth for All is that all this can and must be done through economic growth, just a growth decoupled from impact. Sandrine explains how from 22:29.
Links
Club of RomeMore on Jay Wright Forrester, pioneering systems scientist at MIT, here and builder of the first World Dynamics modelling which fed into the Limits to Growth report.
Earth4All is a vibrant collective of, co-convened by The Club of Rome, and builds on the legacies of The Limits to Growth and the Planetary Boundaries frameworks. In effect the website, background papers and book are the 50 year update to the Limits to Growth report.
Amitav Ghosh's The Nutmeg's Curse
More on Inflation Reduction Act, or 'IRA', here.
More on Amartya Sen's claim on democracy and famines here.
The red dotted-line of GDP still grows in the Giant Leap scenario:
This diagram: Callegari B., Stoknes P.E., People and Planet: 21st- century sustainable population scenarios and possible living standards within planetary boundaries. Earth4All, March 2023, version 1.0.
EU Expert group on the economic and societal impact of research and innovation (ESIR) here.
I have now put the chapter from the unpublished book on my website here. It explores 'security through protection' vs 'security through renewal'.
More links hereTwitter: Powerful_Times
Website hub: here.
Please do like and subscribe, to help others find the podcast.
Thank you for listening! -- David -
Prof Tim Jackson is a British ecological economist and professor of sustainable development at the University of Surrey (personal website, twitter, wikipedia). He is the director of the Centre for the Understanding of Sustainable Prosperity (CUSP), a multi-disciplinary, international research consortium which aims to understand the economic, social and political dimensions of sustainable prosperity. He is also a successful playwright.
It was an extraordinarily rich and honest conversation, covering (and this is just a taste):
Moving from playwright to accidental economist because of the Chernobyl disaster.Allowing the playwright aspect to explore the conflicts within himself on the economics of prosperity.The struggles of being an outsider pushing at the mainstream.Trying to create a society based on the vastness of meaningful relationships and purposeful lives, rather than the flat, narrowness of economic growth.The need for partnership culture, rather than a domination one, though still with some role for competition that encourages us all to raise our game, without fearing we'll lose everything.Providing capability to the next generation, so voices of today have the space to speak, while having respect for how the past generations helped created that space. The importance of following your north star, and treating challenges to you from the status quo as the crucible that forms you.I make an quotation error. it was Max Plank (not Thomas Khun) who said that scientific revolutions proceed one funeral at a time. Towards the end, Tim makes a similar error: Ode: Intimations of Immortality was Wordsworth, not Tennyson.
Tim uses one swear word (f*ck) as part of a story about being rejected by mainstream economists.
LinksLatest book: Post-Growth -- Life After Capitalism
Previous book: Prosperity Without Growth (must read, by the way).
Riane Eisler
Herman Daly
Mary Douglas
Timings
0:55 - Q1 What are you doing now? And how did you get there?
9:37 - BONUS QUESTION: Do you feel that you've combined that storytelling of being a playwright into the analytics of being an economist?
21:00 - Q2. What is the future you are trying to create, and why?
27:27 - BONUS QUESTION: The future Tim is trying to create, inspired by past thinking, is a society based on meaningful relationships. But has it existed in practice? And is there a practical way of getting from where we are now?
43:04 - Q3. What are your priorities for the next few years, and why?
51:14 - Q4. If someone was inspired to follow those priorities, what should they do next?
54:50 - Q5. If your younger self was starting their career now, what advice would you give them?
57:26 - Q6. Who would you nominate to answer these questions, because you admire their approach?
58:40 - Q7. Is there anything else important you feel you have to say?
Twitter: Powerful_Times
Website hub: here.
Please do like and subscribe, to help others find the podcast.
Thank you for listening! -- David -
Dougald Hine is author and co-founder of Dark Mountain, a cultural movement of people who have "stopped believing the stories our civilisation tells itself" and a School Called HOME, a "a gathering place and a learning community for those who are drawn to the work of regrowing a living culture" (personal website, Substack, wikipedia).
His latest book is "At Work in the Ruins", which we discuss at length in the conversation. At the beginning Dougald describes himself as "using words, and sometimes silences, to shift the space of possibility", which I think underplays his role as curator and community builder.
One way of understanding Dougald's response to these powerful times is that he sees them as showing that our world, the world of modernity, is ending.
Rather than moving into denial or a desperate fixing, Dougald is making 'good ruins' for whatever might be next, through creating pockets of living culture. He is trying to contribute to the possibility of presently-unimaginable futures, which starts with clearing away the stuff that has colonised the currently-imagined future.I have read the book and heartily recommend it. To buy the book, and find the latest on Dougald's tour in Feb 2023, follow this link.
Links
'Hospicing Modernity: Facing Humanity's Wrongs and the Implications for Social Activism' by Vanessa Machado de Oliveira (aka Vanessa Andreotti).
Paul Kingsnorth
Climate Optimist
More on Dougald's partner, Anna Björkman, here.
A Small Farm Future: Making the Case for a Society Built Around Local Economies, Self-Provisioning, Agricultural Diversity, and a Shared Earth by Chris Smaje
Ivan Illich
School of Everything
Timings
0:50 - Q1. What are you doing now? And how did you get there?
7:53 - BONUS QUESTION: Tell us something of the genesis of Dark Mountain?
12:00 - BONUS QUESTION: Tell us something about the start of a School Called Home?
18:11 - BONUS QUESTION: Give us a pen portrait of the book, At Work in the Ruins.
32: 54 - BONUS QUESTION: What are the strongest good faith arguments against what you are saying?
37:00 - Q2. What is the future you are trying to create, and why?
42:20 - Q3. What are your priorities for the next few years, and why?
46:42 - Q4. If someone was inspired to follow those priorities, what should they do next?
49:55 - Q5. If your younger self was starting their career now, what advice would you give them?
52:30 - Q6. Who would you nominate to answer these questions, because you admire their approach?
52:46 - Q7. Is there anything else important you feel you have to say?
More hereTwitter: Powerful_Times
Website hub: here.
Please do like and subscribe, to help others find the podcast.
Thank you for listening! -- David -
Andrea Hartley is Founder and CEO of Skating Panda, a creative social impact consultancy (Twitter, LinkedIn).
DISCLOSURE: I do some work for Skating Panda as 'Senior Associate -- Strategy and Sustainability'. In the 12 months to April 2023, that work comprised about 18% of my income.
We speak about Andrea's three priorities
Unlocking those individual and organisational impact journeys, Finding ways to communicate big issues so that they can better have real impactShifting the nature of consulting so that it acknowledges and acts for positive impact as much as possible.Links
B-Corp, a certification scheme so that people can trust when companies claim they are 'for-benefit' (in contrast to being exclusively 'for-profit').
Sky Ocean Rescue
Stand Up To Cancer
Planetary Boundaries
Women's Equality Party
Climate Quitting - here is KPMG saying that "One in three 18–24-year-olds have rejected a job offer based on ESG record"
Jonathon Wise at Purpose Disruptors - mission: catalyse the advertising industry's climate transition to align with the 1.5C degree IPCC global warming target.
Effective Altruism is a "research field and practical community that aims to find the best ways to help others, and put them into practice." It is worth knowing there are some very important and strong critiques of Effective Altruism. For instance, here (£) The Economist shows how the commitment to "strong long-termism can also lead people to disregard common-sense moral commitments to living people".
My view: while a commitment to rigour on impact and getting 'bang for buck' is laudable, too often Effective Altruism is used as a cover for today's billionaires to perpetuate a status quo that they are successful in, rather than a better world for billions. As such, whatever the intentions of the founders and participants, I fear it has become an intellectual justification for on-going oligarchy, and so for preventing fundamental change.
Timings
0:48 - Q1 What are you doing now? And how did you get there?
8:57 - Q2. What is the future you are trying to create, and why?
12.01 - Q3. What are your priorities for the next few years, and why?
21:29 - Q4. If someone was inspired to follow those priorities, what should they do next?
26:55 - Q5. If your younger self was starting their career now, what advice would you give them?
30:09 - Q6. Who would you nominate to answer these questions, because you admire their approach?
34:21 - Q7. Is there anything else important you feel you have to say?
Twitter: Powerful_Times
Website hub: here.
Please do like and subscribe, to help others find the podcast.
Thank you for listening! -- David -
Robin is an executive coach, facilitator, a mediator, an organisational consultant, works in leadership development and sometimes known as a mystic (Twitter, LinkedIn, Website).
Our conversation concentrates on the importance of feeling present, and being fully open to what is happening in that moment. Only then can we integrate the past, and not be unconsciously driven by it. Only then can we hear the calling of the future, and act courageously towards something different. Only then can we act in alignment with a deeper ethics.
This is all very much at the spiritual end of acting in these powerful times. You can read about my own experience on a previous version of Robin's course, Leading from the Future, is in this blog 'Facing the Future'. Here is the current one (as at Jan 2023) Leading from the Future programme (starts 14 Feb 2023).
Links
Findhorn Foundation (and on wikipedia here).
Eileen Caddy
Thomas Hubl
Olivier Mythodrama
Robin's course on The Art of Facilitating Transformational Fields.
Otto Scharmer on wikipedia
When Robin talks of 'the bottom of the U' he's referring to Scharmer's Theory U.
Open Circle Consulting
Timings
0:58 - Q1 What are you doing now? And how did you get there?
21:19 - Q2. What is the future you are trying to create, and why?
25:45 -- BONUS QUESTION: What values are embedded in taking the next evolutionary step?
27:46 - Q3. What are your priorities for the next few years, and why?
30:02 - Q4. If someone was inspired to follow those priorities, what should they do next?
34:02 - Q5. If your younger self was starting their career now, what advice would you give them?
36:11 - Q6. Who would you nominate to answer these questions, because you admire their approach?
37:33 - Q7. Is there anything else important you feel you have to say?
More hereTwitter: Powerful_Times
Website hub: here.
Please do like and subscribe, to help others find the podcast.
Thank you for listening! -- David -
Liam Black has a long history of leading social enterprises (including Jamie Oliver's Fifteen), and is now 'Chief Encouragement Officer' and mentor to many (website, Twitter, LinkedIn).
In his own career, Liam has made many jumps into the unknown. His view is if you are clear about the work you want to be doing, then taking the jump gives others the chance to recognise what your'e trying to do and to offer you help (including, maybe a job).
Also that "if you do things with good intention, with enough advice from the right people, you can always come back from whatever mistake you make". Putting it another way, in the long-term it is better to try than not.
Liam's book is "How to Lead with Purpose: Lessons in life and work from the gloves-off mentor". Buy it here.
Links
Furniture Resource Centre is now known as the FRC Group have a "social mission to reduce and ultimately end furniture poverty".
Book: There's No Business Like Social Business: How to Be Socially Enterprising (with Jeremy Nicholls).
Background on Jamie Oliver's Fifteen here.
Wavelength executive education business.
Together All is "a safe, online community where people support each other anonymously to improve mental health and wellbeing".
The Conduit is "a new workspace for changemakers in the heart of London".
Friar Tom Cullinan
"Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards." Soren Kierkegaard
The iron law of megaprojects: over budget, over time, under benefit. -- Bent Flyvberg
Timings
0:50 - Q1. What are you doing now? And how did you get there?
8:27 - BONUS QUESTION: Is there a way you can tell in advance that you're ready to make that jump? is how can you have the confidence to jump? How did you get there?
15:47 - BONUS QUESTION: To make the leap, you are saying you need the direction and guide rails but not lots of constraining details?
17:58 - BONUS QUESTION: One of the recommendations in the book is to have alignment between your platform and your purpose. What do you man by 'platform'?
26:00 - Q2. What is the future you are trying to create, and why?
33:00 - Q3. What are your priorities for the next few years, and why?
35:17 - Q4. If someone was inspired to follow those priorities, what should they do next?
40:11 - Q5. If your younger self was starting their career now, what advice would you give them?
41:18 - Q6. Who would you nominate to answer these questions, because you admire their approach?
42:25 - Q7. Is there anything else important you feel you have to say?
More here.Twitter: Powerful_Times
Website hub: here.
Please do like and subscribe, to help others find the podcast.
Thank you for listening! -- David -
Clare Farrell is a co-founder of Extinction Rebellion, as well as fashion designer and lecturer (Twitter, website).
Clare had a lot of deeply interesting things to say across a broad range of topics. So, this episode is the longest yet at 57 mins. I make no apology, as every minute is worth listening to. Just want to give you a heads up.
She speaks about the coming together of Extinction Rebellion as a magical time: "It's a huge honour really. So too, in like, basically, I feel the universe sort of collided the right people at the right time. And enough of us were like crazy enough to go: oh, yeah, like, whatever. Let's try and do that."
Clare is trying to create a different approach to politics, here "ordinary people have agency, and the ability to take part in the way decisions are made". On the need for deep change to address the climate emergency, Clare believes that "ordinary people are way ahead of the people in power".
As you will pick up, I hugely admire Extinction Rebellion for many things, including the core message: a positive future possible if only we were willing to tell the truth on the challenges we face and act for it. For the most part, the first wave of XR was successful in creating a sense of a festival, which modelled a more vibrant, more inclusive, positive future, where we will still have to deal with the consequences of our actions up to this point.
Clare ends with this:
"This work that we do is absolutely made of love....Whatever your opinion about me...[It] absolutely comes from ..the best possible intention to try and make something better out of a wholly depressing and heartbreaking, tragic situation."
Clare occasionally swears (a*-holes, sh*t, f*cked that kind of thing).
Links
Penguin publishers book with Extinction Rebellion: 'This is Not A Drill'.
More on the Extinction Rebellion symbol and how since inception it has always been a strictly anti-consumerist project.
For criticism of David Attenborough, see George Monbiot's piece.
More on situationism on wikipedia.
Nafeez Ahmed on the flawed social science behind XR's change strategy.
Merchants of Doubt on wikipedia.
One way into the material found by the US Congress on the Oil and Gas companies' lipservice to Net Zero.
Just Stop Oil
An exploration of the evidence base behind radical tactics by James Ozden. In a second post, James also explores how he could be wrong.
More here.Twitter: Powerful_Times
Website hub: here.
Please do like and subscribe, to help others find the podcast.
Thank you for listening! -- David -
Helen Henderson is a Commissioner of the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission (NIHRC), combined with a long history of community education in Derry/Londonderry.
We explored Helen's work on peacebuilding and non-violence. For instance, how do you build peace between communities that have been in conflict for decades? Two things: spaces to discover common humanity; and growing critical literacy.
My reflection is that I've not had to worry about security. But that's a privilege others haven't had. And how important that work is, because so much else relies on feeling secure.
Links
Educating the Heart programme from Children in Crossfire, aims to "nurture compassion and emotional literacy alongside critical thinking and critical literacy".
Ethical and Shared Remembering at The Junction. "Ethical remembering will mean asking critical and ethical questions about violence, change, justice and peace in the context of the present and desired shared future. One hundred years on there will be no ethical remembering without remembering the future, and without an ethical and concrete commitment to building it together."
Timings
0:50 - Q1 What are you doing now? And how did you get there?
3:23 - BONUS QUESTION. Can you give us some examples of the peace-building work you have been involved with?
7:15 - BONUS QUESTION. How do you build peace between people whose families and communities have been in conflict for literally decades?
15:15 - BONUS QUESTION. What does a trauma-informed approach mean?
18:31 - Q2. What is the future you are trying to create, and why?
21:35 - Q3. What are your priorities for the next few years, and why?
24:59 - Q4. If someone was inspired to follow those priorities, what should they do next?
29:30 - Q5. If your younger self was starting their career now, what advice would you give them?
31:45 Q6. Who would you nominate to answer these questions, because you admire their approach?
33:55 Q7. Is there anything else important you feel you have to say?
Themes and quotes
- The role of the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission is to hold the state to account or duty bearers to count on who they are, they uphold the human rights of people in Northern Ireland.
-Future trying to create:
"I am recommitting myself to peace and non violence at this time, not just because of Northern Ireland and Ireland, but what's going on the world. Feeling that sort of the simplicity and language and binary kind of stuff going on around wars is very much alive."Also, amplifying some of the hidden voices that haven't been heard. It's also time to facilitate the people with the voices that are silent, especially from the woman sector. It has been the woman have been on the ground and in the communities holding the fort. But generally, I've heard that voice in an official or political level.
More hereTwitter: Powerful_Times
Website hub: here.
Please do like and subscribe, to help others find the podcast.
Thank you for listening! -- David -
Richard Sandford is Professor of Heritage Evidence Foresight and Policy at the UCL Institute of Sustainable Heritage (Twitter, LinkedIn). He interested in how we think about the future and how we connect it to the past.
We discuss in depth how heritage can be a source of useful and productive stances towards the future. Key line from Richard for me:
"Change s coming...If you're looking at the future, perhaps our job now is to preserve that sense of identity that allows us to act without reifying the things that we do need to let go."
Links
Richard's key paper (£) laying out how he thinks lived futures should be the focus of futures researchers and heritage, rather than history, offers the context for developing lived futures.
UNESCO (UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) on Futures Literacy.
Hawaii Research Center for Futures Studies.
Stuart Candy on Design and Futures.
Rodney Harrison and "future-making".
Rupert Read on the need "to build lifeboats to carry as many as possible of us through the storms that are coming".
Gillespie and Zittoun -- Imagination in Human and Cultural Development
More on Three Horizons method here.Courses at UCL Institute for Sustainable Heritage.
Link to get Richard's email address.
More on Tony Hodgson here.
Timings
0:50 - Q1 What are you doing now? And how did you get there?
11:10 - Q2. What is the future you are trying to create, and why?
27:33 -- BONUS QUESTION: Is the rise of imagination activities a sign that we have run out of road and trying to imagine something different?
31:10 - Q3. What are your priorities for the next few years, and why?
38:14 - Q4. If someone was inspired to follow those priorities, what should they do next?
41:45 - Q5. If your younger self was starting their career now, what advice would you give them?
43: 34 - Q6. Who would you nominate to answer these questions, because you admire their approach?
46:06 - Q7. Is there anything else important you feel you have to say?
More hereTwitter: Powerful_Times
Website hub: here.
Please do like and subscribe, to help others find the podcast.
Thank you for listening! -- David -
Zahra Davidson is Chief Executive and Design Director of Huddlecraft, a Community Interest Company that uses the the practice of combining people to unearth and multiply potential (Zahra's Linkedin, Twitter and Medium). Huddle craft asks: 'What if everyone could multiply their potential by the power of their peers?'
We talked about how collective learning is so necessary for global transformations, but how to contribute at the necessary scale while keeping the important relational, often local, character of individual peer learning groups.
LinksI think Huddlecraft's About Us page is a Masterclass in formulating and communicating an organisation's strategy (it covers: landscape, north star, puzzle focused on, alchemy that gives hope (ie methods), ecosystem, outcomes, compass to guide decisions).
Ummah -- "Arabic word that means 'community', ...it is commonly used to mean the collective community of Islamic people."
More on microclimates in Huddlecraft.
Example Huddles:
-Sheffield Pioneers: place-based leadership.
-Father Figures: exploring 21st century fatherhood.
-Makers' Marathon peer group.
Zahra's blog on creating a surge of peer-to-peer movements.
Upcoming Huddles to join.
Huddlecraft 101
Timings
0:45 - Q1 What are you doing now? And how did you get there?
6:40 - BONUS QUESTION: What does Huddlecraft mean by microclimate, and what makes for a good microclimate?
11:48 - BONUS QUESTION: Can you give us some examples of some of the inquiries people have taken off some of the peer learning that has happened within Huddlecraft so far?
17:30 - BONUS QUESTION: is it fair to say that HUddlecraft has taken for a very distributed approach which mimics living systems and nature?
20:45 - BONUS QUESTION: How do you get right combining intimacy with scale?
22:28 - Q2. What is the future you are trying to create, and why?
29:30 - Q3. What are your priorities for the next few years, and why?
31:26 - Q4. If someone was inspired to follow those priorities, what should they do next?
31:26 - Q5. If your younger self was starting their career now, what advice would you give them?
33:21 - Q6. Who would you nominate to answer these questions, because you admire their approach?
34:45 - Q7. Is there anything else important you feel you have to say?
More here.Twitter: Powerful_Times
Website hub: here.
Please do like and subscribe, to help others find the podcast.
Thank you for listening! -- David -
Daianna Karaian is co-founder of Today Do This, which aims to empower everyone, every day (Today) to take action on (Do) what matters to them (This) (LinkedIn, personal website, Twitter).
The theme was people being able to take meaningful action in their work. Why?
First, "The scale of the change that's needed is only going to happen if social and environmental considerations are woven into the daily decisions and responsibilities of everyone in the company at every level in every department."
Second, "I think there's this really common misconception that action is reserved for those in power, that sort of only a few people, in powerful positions can do anything that makes any difference in the world. And I think that's nonsense. I think power is accumulated by those who take action."
Third, taking meaningful action also makes people happier and more productive.
With that in mind, some things you can do after listening to this interview:
-Subscribe to the Today Do This newsletter, which "revisits one major headline each week and suggests a simple, practical action you can take that day to make a difference".
-Contact Daianna through this link.
Links
Business In The Community
Futerra
Powerful Times Podcasts referred to in to interview: Ed Gillespie (the very first!) and Rowan Conway.
Dr Martin Luther King's Six Steps for Non Violent Social Change:
Information GatheringEducationPersonal CommitmentNegotiationDirect ActionReconciliationUN Sustainable Development Goals
B Corp Certification
Timings
0:50 - Q1 What are you doing now? And how did you get there?
10:57 - BONUS QUESTION: How do you support people so social and environmental considerations are woven into the daily decisions?
16:32 - Q2. What is the future you are trying to create, and why?
21:00 - Q3. What are your priorities for the next few years, and why?
22:37 - BONUS QUESTION: Can you unpack what you meant when you said you don't like the word purpose compared to impact on?
24:40 - Q4. If someone was inspired to follow those priorities, what should they do next?
29:16 - Q5. If your younger self was starting their career now, what advice would you give them?
31;45 - Q6. Who would you nominate to answer these questions, because you admire their approach?
32:33 - Q7. Is there anything else important you feel you have to say?
More hereTwitter: Powerful_Times
Website hub: here.
Please do like and subscribe, to help others find the podcast.
Thank you for listening! -- David - Show more
