As part of the Catalysing Change Week 2022, Shrishtee Bajpai, Danielle Celermajer and Lakshmi Venugopal were invited by Gijs Spoor to talk about the Voices of Nature in Human Decision making.
Find below the recording of this conversation :
The talk was well attended and brought several perspectives on this issue - not just by the presenters, but also by the participants. Several projects that are working towards this goal were shared. It was decided that we continue this conversation and create a space to invite interested participants and others to share ideas, projects, opportunities to collaborate etc.
The intention is to create a platform to network, share, collaborate and co-create projects or develop ideas that can lead to diverse, just and multicultural movements towards bringing the voices of Nature into human decision making, at a global and local scale. To this end, we have created a google group, and a google doc to share ideas and network. If you would like to be added to these, please write to [email protected]
Resources and Projects exploring the voices of nature in human decision making
Sydney Environment Institute
The Sydney Environment Institute is a national and world leader in multidisciplinary environmental research, known in particular for work in the environmental humanities and social sciences.
SEI’s purpose is to extend and amplify the scope of the engagement on environmental issues; and to bring together expertise from across disciplines to address key problems in favour of the public good.
Parliament of Things
What if we welcome all things, plants and animals to our parliament? The Parliament of Things is a speculative research into the emancipation of animals, plants and things.
Global Alliance for the Rights of Nature
The Global Alliance for the Rights of Nature is a global network of organizations and individuals committed to the universal adoption and implementation of legal systems that recognize, respect and enforce “Rights of Nature”
Rather than treating nature as property under the law, the time has come to recognize that natural communities have the right to exist, maintain and regenerate their vital cycles.
Court for Intergenerational
Climate Crimes
The Court for Intergenerational Climate Crimes (CICC) is a collaboration between Indian academic, writer, lawyer and activist Radha D’Souza and Dutch artist Jonas Staal, commissioned and developed by Framer Framed. The project consists of a large-scale installation in the form of a tribunal that prosecutes intergenerational climate crimes.
Institute for Postnatural Studies
Institute for Postnatural Studies is a center for artistic experimentation from which to explore and problematize postnature as a framework for contemporary creation. Founded in 2020, it is conceived as a platform for critical thinking, a network that brings together artists and researchers concerned about the issues of the global ecological crisis through experimental formats of exchange and production of open knowledge. From a multidisciplinary approach, the Institute develops long-term research focused on issues such as ecology, coexistence, politics and territories. These lines of investigation take different shapes and formats, including seminars, exhibitions and residencies as spaces for academic and artistic experimentation.
The Zoönomic Institute
We are a Zoöp - an organisation in which humans collaborate with other-than-human life.
Zoöp is short for Zoöperation: coöperation with zoë – (Greek for ‘life’) Together with other Zoöps we work towards the transformation of our economy into a regenerative human-inclusive ecosystem, a network of exchange of matter, energy and meaning that supports all bodies in their existence.
Embassy of the North Sea
The Embassy of the North Sea, founded in The Hague in 2018, listens to and involves the voices of plants, animals, microbes, and people in and around the North Sea. Founded on the principle that the sea owns itself, the Embassy makes political space for sea-emancipation through connection, imagination and representation. We plotted a route through to 2030, firstly learning to listen to the sea before we learn to speak with it. Finally, we will negotiate on behalf of the North Sea and all the life that it encapsulates.
Rights of Rivers South Asia
‘Rights of Rivers South Asia’ (RoRSA) is committed to representing the interests of free-flowing and healthy rivers, and their dependent communities, in South Asia. Evolving as a network of organisations, individuals, and other networks from South Asia and across the world, RoRSA is non-hierarchical, horizontal, democratic, inclusive and non-centralized.
RoRSA aims to foster dialogue and collaboration around the concept of Rights of Rivers, and to enable community empowerment, regeneration, conservation & responsible policymaking.
Earth Law Center
Earth Law is the idea that ecosystems have the right to exist, thrive, and evolve—and that Nature should be able to defend its rights in court, just like people can.
Ocean Space
Located in the Church of San Lorenzo in Venice, Ocean Space is a planetary center for exhibitions, research and public programs catalyzing ocean literacy and advocacy through the arts. Established and led by TBA21–Academy and building on its expansive work over the past ten years, this embassy for the oceans fosters wonder, engagement, and collective action.
Voice of Nature Kinstitute
Voice of nature Kinstitute is an artistic platform for Environmental Justice, based on long-term investigations dedicated to environmental crimes, ecocide and the possibilities of proposing environmental justice through artistic, juridical, ritualistic and restorative justice practices to find a collective language between humans and other than humans, focused on inter-being, intersectionality and reciprocal care.
AMOR MUNDI
Multispecies Ecological Worldmaking Lab
The AMOR MUNDI Multispecies Ecological Worldmaking Lab is an intersectional multidisciplinary research initiative in the Global South, bringing from disciplines including ecophilosophy, animal and critical life studies, geography, anthropology, political and social science, arts & humanities, together with scholars in the natural sciences into research collaborations investigating how human and more-than-human worldmaking are mutually entangled, fostering symbiopoesis with cross-disciplinary approaches, joint publications, workshops, art/science exhibitions, and pedagogy.
Interspecifics
We are a nomadic multispecies collectivity experimenting in the intersection between art and science. We embrace hybridized practices among different disciplines and living organisms, open knowledge and precarity as a challenge. Our current lines of research are based in the use of sound to understand the bioelectrical activity of different bacterial consortiums, plants, slime molds and humans using DIY and custom-made sets of hardware we call ontological machines.
We invite you to share your thoughts, ideas, projects or comments about the voices of nature in human decision making- Please leave a comment or contact us with the form below:
Catalyst 2030 is a global movement of social entrepreneurs and social innovators from all sectors who share the common goal of creating innovative, people-centric approaches to attain the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030.
Catalysing Change Week 2022 (CCW), the world’s largest event led by social innovators and entrepreneurs to share knowledge, exchange ideas and accelerate collaborative systems change saw more than 250 sessions and activities take place during the week of 9-13 May 2022.
The other videos of the Catalysing Change Week are available here
Inner Climate Academy (ICA)
ICA is a project of Social Entrepreneurship Association, a unit of the Auroville Foundation.
Inner Climate Academy 