FEASTA and EHFF

Cristina Ciampaglione, originally from Italy, is an artist and arts manager who has worked on a range of arts projects in Ireland and is a Project Manager with The Walls Project, which uses street art as a tool of engagement between communities and artists. She recently coordinated - and spoke at - an event on Art and Climate Change at the Italian Institute of Culture in Dublin. In this podcast, s...

In this month’s podcast, David Somekh, the network director of the European Health Futures Forum (EHFF) who often co-hosts our podcasts, spoke with Caroline Whyte. Topics discussed include the challenge of breaking down silos and employing systems thinking and scenario thinking, the importance of health literacy, the need to move away from 19th-century models of healthcare, and the challenge of pe...

Seán Ó Conláin speaks with ecologist Julien Carlier about his research, including his doctoral thesis on mapping the ecological benefits of greenways, his current work on mapping High Nature Value farmland and forestry, and his impressions of the new CAP programmes which aim to pay farmers for restoring biodiversity on farmland.

Caroline Whyte and David Somekh of the European Health Futures Forum speak with Davie Philip about Communities of Practice. Davie is a community catalyst, climate coach and facilitator at Cultivate, the Sustainable Ireland Cooperative. Since 1997 Davie has been active in Ireland promoting sustainability, community resilience and cooperative approaches to meeting our needs. He was a founding member...

Our guest this month is Professor Theda Skocpol, who is the Victor S. Thomas Professor of Government and Sociology at Harvard University, and the founder and director of the Scholars Strategy Network. Professor Skocpol has extensively researched the social and political dynamics that can bring about major changes in social policy in the US. Her most recent book, co-authored with Caroline Tervo, is...

Seán Ó Conláin and Caroline Whyte spoke with Chris Smaje. Chris is based in Somerset in the UK and worked as an academic sociologist and anthropologist for some time, but then changed focus to the practice and politics of agroecology. He now coworks a smallholder farm. He has written several books, including, most recently,' A Small Farm Future: Making the Case for a Society Built Around Local Eco...

To kick off our 2022 series, Caroline Whyte of Feasta and David Somekh of the EHFF spoke with Isabel Carlisle, the director of the Bioregional Learning Centre in Devon in the UK. Isabel spoke about her earlier career as an archaeologist and in the art world, and how she became involved in the climate movement and bioregionalism. She described a collaborative community project which the Centre is w...

Caroline Whyte and Seán Ó Conláin speak with Gerry McGovern, who is a specialist in identifying and reducing digital waste and the author of the book 'World Wide Waste: how digital is killing our planet and what we can do with it'. Gerry has written eight books about digital design and has appeared on numerous media including the BBC and CNN. The Irish Times has described Gerry as one of five visi...

Bill O'Dea, a specialist in mycology, talks with Seán Ó Conlaín and Caroline Whyte about the immense contribution that fungi make to the biosphere, their nutritional value, the threats they are facing, the complex symbiotic relationship which they have with each other and with other species, and how this relationship could help to provide inspiration for the societal and economic changes that are...

This podcast includes two interviews/discussions, one with Jakob Hafele of the Zoe Institute for Future-Fit Economies and the other with Lars Münter of the Nordic Health 2030 Coalition. Both of their organisations are members of the global Wellbeing Economy Alliance, but have come to it from different angles. Jakob talks about his work on the EU level to help enable the economy to function indepen...

In this podcast we look at potential ways to get beyond the time-consuming, and sometimes quite heated, arguments between those who believe that aggregate ‘green growth’ is possible and those who believe that environmental constraints will oblige us to adopt a different economic goal. Beth Stratford, an economics researcher who is a fellow at the New Economics Foundation and the co-author of the r...

This podcast continues with the theme of transformation catalysts which we also explored in last month’s eán Ó Conlaín interviews Steve Waddell, who is the lead steward of the global Bounce Beyond movement which accelerates initiatives working to make regenerative, life-centered economies realizable at scale as “next economies” communities. Steve has a Ph. D. in sociology and a Masters in Business...

Seán Ó Conláin interviews Dr Sandra Waddock on her decades-long research into the role that certain organisations can play in bringing about societal change on a profound level.

Sean O'Conlain and Caroline Whyte speak with Mary McManus, who has worked in the Welfare Rights Advice sector in Belfast for over 20 years, and from Seán Mc Cabe, the Executive Manager of the Climate Justice Centre of TASC, the Irish-based Thinktank for Action on Social Change, about the potential offered by Community Wealth Building.

David Somekh of the EHFF interviews Professor John Drury of Sussex University and Cormac Russell of Nurture Development. They talk about their research into collective behaviour in terms of crisis, ways in which communities can come together when the circumstances call for it, and how a sense of solidarity can be encouraged to take root rather than fade away over time.

The latest instalment of our podcast series ‘Bridging the Gaps’ begins with an interview by David Somekh of the European Health Futures Forum of Tsvetelina Filipova, who is involved in All Policies for a Healthy Europe, an intersectoral initiative that brings together a diverse group of NGOs, think-thanks, associations, companies, and individuals. Tsvetelina is chairing the initiative's environmen...

Seán O’Conlaín and Caroline Whyte speak with Mark Garavan, a lecturer in social care at the Galway Mayo Institute of Technology. Mark has a doctorate in the sociology of environmental activism and is the author of the book Compassionate Activism, and he is also a Feasta Director. Topics covered include the environmental and economic pressures behind the COVID-19 pandemic, the social effects of the...

Seán O·Conlaín and Caroline Whyte speak with Mark Garavan, a lecturer in social care at the Galway Mayo Institute of Technology. Mark has a doctorate in the sociology of environmental activism and is the author of the book Compassionate Activism, and he is also a Feasta Director.  Topics covered include the environmental and economic pressures behind the COVID-19 pandemic, the social effects of th...

We interview Argentianian economist and Wellbeing Economy Alliance member Mariana Mirabile, who has a PhD in development economics and is a partner of Systems Innovation, on the reasons behind her shift in orientation away from a neoclassical approach to economics and towards ecological economics, and the potential for using narratives to achieve system-level economic change in order to help addre...

We hear from Oonagh Duggan, who is the head of advocacy for the conservation of birds and their habitats at Birdwatch Ireland and is on the Steering Committee of the Environmental Pillar, and also from Easkey Britton, who is a prominent and highly skilled surfer, as well as an academic with a PhD in Environment and Society.

In this podcast we explored the effects of the COVID 19 pandemic, and of the general economic context in which lockdown is occurring, on young people. We heard from Jonathan Laszlo, a health care researcher living in Belgium; Tommy Hickey, a law graduate living in the Dublin area; and Amber Wilmott, an A-level student in southern England. David Somekh joined Caroline Whyte as co-interviewer. Topic...

This podcast features Feasta's summer intern, Nadia Hansen, interviewing Dundalk-based social worker Dr Washington Marovatsanga on cultural competence, enforced absence, the relationship between power and knowledge production, the problematic history and orientation of social work, and how a Global South philosophy of collectivism could help us to overcome the environmental and social challenges w...

David Somekh of the European Health Futures Forum interviews Stewart Wallis, Chair of the Wellbeing Economy Alliance, about the need to change track economically so as to optimise societal well-being, and how such a change might be brought about.

Governments around the world are currently rethinking their approach to the economy and reflecting on their overall goals, and this is triggering many questions about how best to structure organisations, large and small, so as to improve our chances of achieving those goals. This podcast includes interviews with people at an international gathering organised by the NGO Metaphorum. They are working...

We interview Manuel Grebenjak of the Stay Grounded network, and Professor James Faulconbridge, head of the Organisation Work and Technology Department at Lancaster University, about the future of tourism and business travel in the wake of Coronavirus - bearing in mind the need to urgently reduce travel's environmental impact - and the effects of the Coronavirus on the cultural norms associated wit...