Resilience Lab Day One Summary
“The Lab was launched by Youssef Nassef, Director, Adaptation Division of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Secretariat, and moderated by Tia Kansara, Government Advisor on Net Positive Environmental Impact in Cities. In his address, Nassef emphasized the need to look at the future through a transformational lens.
Following Nassef’s opening remarks, the audience took part in a sensory experience, triggering a creative flow of ideas. Participants in this exercise were Kotchakorn Voraakhom, CEO, Porous City Network, Kim Stanley Robinson, Science Fiction Writer, Hindou Oumarou Ibrahim, expert on mitigation and adaptation of Indigenous Peoples, and Andrew Zoli, Chief Impact Officer at Planet. The session allowed participants to realize their impact on the greater environment and recognize that humans are usually missing from perspectives on nature.
During the Futur/io wake-up call session, the panelists shared their thoughts on the shift towards resilience after 2030. The panel was chaired by Harald Neidhardt, Curator and CEO of Futur/io Institute, and panelists including Tia Kansara, Marc Buckley, UN Advisor and Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) Advocate, and Professor Dianne Dain, Chief Innovation Officer at the World Humanitarian Forum. They concentrated on the need to become conscious of the inner senses while still connecting with the surrounding nature. On a societal level, regeneration and global unity were said to have a central role in a resilient future.
During the session on ‘Awareness-acceptance-action,’ panelists and participants addressed the question of what is required to generate behavioral change. The panel was chaired by Professor Michael Weisberg from the University of Pennsylvania and welcomed to the stage Kim Stanley Robinson, Vanessa Berlowitz, award-winning wildlife documentary producer, Wolfgang Blau, international journalist, and Kian Bakhtiari, Founder of The People. They address the challenges of underrepresented voices, and the fundamental disconnect between humans and nature, which hinder adequate action.
The final session explored how we can think in the present moment with the future in mind. It was chaired by Marc Buckley and featured Stephen Reicher, Psychology Professor at St Andrews University, and Kim Stanley Robinson. The session considered how society operates through an economic and psychological lens, and underscored how neoliberalism and an economic system that is based on incorrect societal assumptions, dismantle community solidarity. The panel concluded that to move away from destroying the planet we live on, we need to fundamentally rethink who we are. (Resilience Frontiers, 2021)”
References
Resilience Frontiers, 2021. Day 2 of Resilience Lab: Transforming humanity’s relationship with nature.
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