by Solferino Academy…“We are too often still operating from fixed mindsets and with fixed responses rather than recognising the interconnected nature of issues we are facing”
Reasons for hope in 2025
by Suzette Brooks Masters in Fulcrum…My way of not giving in to despair and apathy amid all this uncertainty is to look for sources of hope, to find in uncertainty itself reasons for hope. Happily, once you look for the places where hope and imagination live, you find it in ample supply. As part of the research I conducted for Democracy Funders Network’s Imagining Better Futures for American Democracy report, I talked to dozens of visionaries who were imagining and creating new and better ways of being with one another, with nature, with technology, and with the planet. The final section of that paper, titled Inspiration, is my curated compilation of examples of what better futures could look like in real life and in the imagination. Whenever I feel the pull of pessimism, I turn back to those examples.
Certainty is boring
by Jeanette Bronee in her blog…We may never know exactly what to do to meet the future and its constantly changing reality, but aligning with what matters becomes our North Star. To avoid getting stuck on the hamster wheel of FUD (fear, uncertainty, and doubt), we must learn to pause more. These moments of pause allow us to reconnect with our intention and align with our strategy, giving us the courage to move forward with clarity and confidence. After all, change and growth are essential to life—that’s why certainty is boring.
Rediscovering harmony: How Chinese philosophy offers pathways to a regenerative future
By foregrounding relationships — between individuals, communities, and the natural world — we can build systems that prioritize wellbeing and resilience.
Wanted: An early-warning system for the end of the world
by Charlie Cooper in Politico…Some experts believe we could hit catastrophic climate ‘tipping points’ in a matter of years. The U.K. government, with a bit of help from Dominic Cummings, is trying to prepare.
Policy brief: Nature for resilience
From UNDRR….Healthy and resilient ecosystems are key to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals as well as the objectives of the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015–2030 (Sendai Framework) and the Paris Agreement. However, there are noticeable gaps in terms of specific data, pathways and evidence regarding the ways in which changes in ecosystem functions and services contribute to vulnerability or resilience building.
More in this category
Crazy Town: Episode 74. Prepping for the apocalypse: Elites’ foolish fantasies for surviving a collapse of their own creation
by Asher Miller, et al., in podcast Crazy Town: Meet Barrett Moore, the bunker-building bullshit artist who helps capitalists survive the apocalypse with beans, bullets, and bravado. Please share this episode with your friends and start a conversation.
The Seven Shifts
in Horizon 2045…We safeguard the wellbeing—and the promise—
of future generations.
We realign our human experience around propelling humanity forward
Friction is growing
by Bill McKibben in Resilience.org…The past decade of global natural catastrophes has been the costliest ever. Warmer temperatures have made storms worse and contributed to droughts that have elevated wildfire risk. Too many new homes were built in areas at risk of fire.
Mark Zuckerberg spent $187 million secretly buying 1,600 acres of Hawaii land, and now he is reportedly building a massive self-sustaining apocalypse bunker
by Caleb Naysmith in Yahoo Finance…Alongside the sprawling farm and ranch, the compound is being designed to be self-sustaining. From underground bunkers to its own energy and water supplies, the compound has nearly everything you would need to survive for months at a time.
How to thrive in an uncertain world
by Maggie Jackson in The New York Times…Humans naturally need answers and so typically find uncertainty aversive. With a presidential election, war erupting in multiple zones, rising climate volatility and myriad other types of flux, it’s easy to feel overwhelming angst for the future and see certainty as a beacon in a darkening time.
Global Risks Report 2024
from the World Economic Forum….As we enter 2024, 2023-2024 GRPS results highlight a predominantly negative outlook for the world over the next two years that is expected to worsen over the next decade
Embracing local knowledge is the key to resilience in northern Kenya, not project box-ticking
by Ian Scoones in The New Humanitatian…‘In the welter of jargon-heavy policy documents promoting ‘resilience-building’, the big question remains – what is ‘resilience’, and for whom?’
Donella Meadows recommendations for how to dance with and intervene in systems
Wahl writes……Donella makes the crucially important point that the most transformative and effective leverage points are addressed by acting at the level of paradigm-change, by addressing the culture change that would shift the dominant believes about the system. Even more effective, according to Meadows, is the ability to transcend paradigms and acknowledge the wisdom that diverse, possibly even conflicting perspectives can bring to a situation in full recognition that each paradigm also brings with it, its own limitations and blind spots.
A global resilience index: supporting climate adaptation of global infrastructure systems
by Prof Jim Hall of Oxford University….A new Global Resilience Index, developed by researchers at the Environmental Change Institute, is helping policy makers understand climate risks to global infrastructure systems and plan appropriate investments and interventions.
Advancing the conversation around building a resilient future
Answer from Nathanial in the interview…..Innovation, knowledge and policy are key interlinked areas for GRP to ensure that we advance and strengthen resilience. Embracing resilience encourages innovation in finding new and flexible solutions that can adapt to changing circumstances. This fosters a culture of experimentation and learning, which is essential for addressing complex challenges effectively. A strong scientifically-backed understanding of resilience, including measuring and testing resilience is also fundamental. This includes ensuring that resilience encompasses more than just “bouncing back” to the status quo, but that it also encompasses adaptive and transformative capacities and allows systems to continue to evolve in spite of shocks and stresses.
The Nose Is For Eating Too
by Gita Viswanath in On Eating….Defying the doctor’s predictions, mother recovered sufficiently enough to get rid of the NG tube. Alas! She insists she cannot taste anything now!
Weaving solidarity and hope: stories of regeneration and resilience
From Global tapestries of alternatives…..we learn that art is an important mode of everyday
resistance that can offer healing possibilities from the trauma of war, occupation
and destruction. It gives a sense of hope in most dire situations, the possibility
of creation and building collective solidarity
Why 2% is the most dangerous number no one is talking about
We’ve had a summer from hell, with July 2023 temporarily claiming the title of hottest month on record. But while the klaxons of Earth’s climate system have riveted nearly everyone’s attention, something else is silently happening to us and other species that could...
Finding the trickle
Idah Murithi shares a captivating tale of a young girl’s journey to restore a river and educate her community about the power of collective action in safeguarding natural resources. This is one of the five winning stories from the Resilience Perspectives storytelling contest.
The bold idea to move millions to climate havens
The race against time to plan for climate migration has begun. In 2022, climate change and climate-related disasters led nearly 33 million people to flee their homes and accounted for over half of all new numbers of people displaced within their countries, according...