Local Futures Podcast

Planet Local Voices II - Jason Nardi - Solidarity Economies for Collective Power

Thu, 09 Apr 2026 03:25:36 -0600

Jason Nardi is the European coordinator of RIPESS - the Intercontinental Network for the Promotion of Social Solidarity Economy, president of RIES (Italian Solidarity Economy Network) and co-founder of Solidarius Italia. Jason is an active member of the International Council of the World Social Forum and promoter of the World Social Forum on Transformative Economies. Jason currently lives in Florence, where he promotes Community Supported Agriculture projects, mutualism and the Forum Firenze Beni Comuni (Florence Forum of the Commons).

In this episode of Planet Local Voices II, Jason defines the social and solidarity economy concepts and diverse practices including collective ownership, cooperation, sufficiency- and needs-based production and exchange, and connects these to the localization and bioregionalist movements.

Jason reminds us of our collective power and true wealth, and argues that by weaving together the multiplicity of diverse alternative economic initiatives that respect people and nature, we can change the system.

This podcast episode forms part of the Planet Local Voices II series, produced by Local Futures, an international non-profit organisation, dedicated to renewing ecological and social well-being by strengthening communities and local economies.

Watch the video here: https://youtu.be/8oil0IQVhx8

Follow the Planet Local Voices Series II series: https://www.localfutures.org/programs/planet-local-voices-series-2/

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Planet Local Voices II - Aseem Shrivastava – An Ecosophical Critique of Modernity

Thu, 19 Mar 2026 04:07:37 -0600

Aseem Shrivastava is an environmental economist, philosopher and a writer. He is the co- author with Ashish Kothari of Churning the Earth: The Making of Global India, and The Grammar of Greed, among others. He taught economics for many years in India and the US and writes extensively on issues associated with globalization. More recently he taught ecosophy, an ecological philosophy grounded in the thought of Raimon Panikkar. He writes regularly for numerous publications, and is currently writing a book bringing Rabindranath Tagore’s spiritual and ecological vision into dialogue with the ecological challenges of 21st century modernity.

In this interview for the Planet Local Voices II, Aseem delves into the philosophical roots of our present crises in the rise of modernity which effected an ‘earth alienation’ that ultimately gave rise to colonialism and today’s catastrophic obsession with economic growth and progress. The values of modernity – including individualism, instrumentalism, and mechanization – drive the dominant world system, in which we are all embedded. As a radical alternative, Aseem proposes ‘ecosophy’, an ecological philosophy that rejects the philosophical foundations of modernity and calls instead for us to return to and embrace our home, the Earth.

Watch the video here: https://youtu.be/20JPzAGCRt8

Follow the Planet Local Voices Series II series: https://www.localfutures.org/programs/planet-local-voices-series-2/

Explore our work: https://www.localfutures.org/

Planet Local Voices II - Laura Kaestele - Living Alternatives, Active Hope

Wed, 25 Feb 2026 12:35:06 -0600

Drawing on a wealth of practical experience from regenerative community building, Laura Kaestele, discusses the importance of living models of localization in keeping alive a sense of active hope and radical imagination for a more beautiful, just and nourishing world.

She calls attention to a 'mycelial network' of such alternatives, all over the world, which remains invisible in the mainstream world, but which is clearly gaining strength. Laura Kaestele works as a network weaver with ECOLISE, and has worked as designer, grower, project manager, and facilitator for the permaculture and ecovillage networks for nearly two decades.

Watch the video here: https://youtu.be/NYim2VXNJek

Follow the Planet Local Voices Series II series: https://www.localfutures.org/programs/planet-local-voices-series-2/

Explore our work: https://www.localfutures.org/

The Bristol Conversations – Bayo Akomolafe

Mon, 15 Dec 2025 04:18:57 -0600

We close the Bristol Conversations series with the much-admired teacher, poet and post-activist, Bayo Akomolafe. A public intellectual and writer, Bayo blurs the lines between the personal and the political, prompting a deep rethink of how we can act for change. He is the founder and curator of the Emergence Network and Chief Host of the We Will Dance with Mountains community. He’s involved with many other projects, some of which you will hear about in this episode.

In this conversation with Helena Norberg-Hodge, Bayo reflects on the ruptures in modernity that have sparked his own questioning. Going beyond a politics which fetishizes identity and category, he invites us to open up other spaces of power – where the immediate, the understated, and the local are more profound and more promising than grand slogans and ideas.

Watch the video: https://youtu.be/1vE5-yFiRUM

Find all episodes in The Bristol Conversation series: https://www.localfutures.org/programs/the-bristol-conversations/

This series is produced by Local Futures, an international non-profit organisation dedicated to renewing ecological and social well-being by strengthening communities and local economies.

Explore our work: https://www.localfutures.org/

The Bristol Conversations – Lyla June Johnston

Thu, 20 Nov 2025 06:41:14 -0600

Dr. Lyla June Johnston is an indigenous musician, scholar, and community organizer of Diné Navajo, Cheyenne and European lineages. She blends her study of human ecology, graduate work in indigenous pedagogy, and the traditional worldview she grew up with to inform her music, perspectives and solutions. Her research has focused on the ways in which pre-colonial indigenous nations shaped large regions of Turtle Island (aka the Americas) to produce abundant food systems.

In this conversation, Helena and Lyla weave together different lines of heritage and experience, getting into deep discussions about identity, psychology and culture. They focus a lot on European identities and salvaging them from cruel and inaccurate narratives of progress which have cast many as fools, and many as villains. They come out with a throughline that connects the 'ancient primitive' with 'ancient futures'.

No video available for this episode.

Find all episodes in The Bristol Conversation series: https://www.localfutures.org/programs/the-bristol-conversations/

This series is produced by Local Futures, an international non-profit organisation dedicated to renewing ecological and social well-being by strengthening communities and local economies.

Explore our work: https://www.localfutures.org/

The Bristol Conversations – Manish Jain

Tue, 28 Oct 2025 04:28:35 -0600

In another life, Manish Jain was educated at Harvard, became an investment banker with Morgan-Stanley, and worked with the UN. Since then, he has been on a journey of unlearning, deschooling and decolonizing, returning home to India to learn from his illiterate village grandmother. Manish is the founder-coordinator of Shikshantar Andolan, which has been significant in shaping the larger unschooling movement in South Asia. He's the co-founder of Swaraj University, Udaipur as a Learning City, the Indian Multiversities Alliance, the Ecoversities Network and more.

In this conversation, Manish and Helena Norberg-Hodge bounce of each other in a radical questioning of concepts like progress, freedom, wealth, empowerment and knowledge. Manish shares his personal story of disillusionment with the dominant system, sketching the profound worldview shift he had to undergo in order to come back to life, love, and local wisdom.

Watch the video: https://youtu.be/EXu2m68D5V4

Find all episodes in The Bristol Conversation series: https://www.localfutures.org/programs/the-bristol-conversations/

This series is produced by Local Futures, an international non-profit organisation dedicated to renewing ecological and social well-being by strengthening communities and local economies.

Explore our work: https://www.localfutures.org/

The Bristol Conversations – Iain McGilchrist

Fri, 10 Oct 2025 02:40:09 -0600

In the fifth episode of The Bristol Conversations, we hear from Iain McGilchrist, the author of the groundbreaking book ‘The Master and His Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World’. Iain is a neuroscientist, psychiatrist and scholar; a man who has shed light not only on some fascinating truths about our minds and our experience of the world, but also on how these truths relate to many of the seemingly intractable predicaments we find ourselves in today. He helps us see the world and its problems with a new eye.

In this conversation with pioneer of the new economy/localization movement, Helena Norberg-Hodge, the two draw connections between their seemingly quite different bodies of work. They discuss human psychology, community, connection to nature, spirituality, technocracy, and AI. They illuminate how the struggle between the brain’s left and right hemispheres relates to the global techno-economic system, the damage it’s doing, and exactly how we might change it.

Watch the video: https://youtu.be/AHKZI0HRIq8

Find all episodes in The Bristol Conversation series: https://www.localfutures.org/programs/the-bristol-conversations/

This series is produced by Local Futures, an international non-profit organisation dedicated to renewing ecological and social well-being by strengthening communities and local economies.

Explore our work: https://www.localfutures.org/

The Bristol Conversations – Camila Moreno

Wed, 24 Sep 2025 06:50:45 -0600

In the fourth episode of The Bristol Conversations, we hear from Camila Moreno, civil society’s foremost expert on the international COP climate negotiations. Since 2008, Camila has been charting the emergence of what she calls a system of ‘global climate governance’. She describes the ways in which the environmental movement is being coopted and reduced to a mandate for decarbonization and digitalization, which are in turn paving the way for the unfettered financialization of nature and the extension of technocracy.

This conversation between Camila and Helena Norberg-Hodge strengthens our critical awareness of the often unconscious but undeniable hijacking of social and environmental concerns and their buzzwords. It’s a conversation that will help activists and everyday people remain impervious to co-optation and stay true to a vision of real ecological integrity.

Watch the video: https://youtu.be/lilSSoKMYm8

Find all episodes in The Bristol Conversation series: https://www.localfutures.org/programs/the-bristol-conversations/

This series is produced by Local Futures, an international non-profit organisation dedicated to renewing ecological and social well-being by strengthening communities and local economies.

Explore our work: https://www.localfutures.org/

The Bristol Conversations – Nelson Mudzingwa

Wed, 27 Aug 2025 12:51:42 -0600

In this episode we hear from Nelson Mudzingwa, a farmer and food sovereignty advocate, working with La Via Campesina. He teaches at the Shashe Agroecology School and is the national coordinator for the Zimbabwe Smallholder Organic Farmer’s Forum (ZIMSOFF).

In this conversation with Helena Norberg-Hodge, Nelson extols the benefits of local food systems that are closely connected to culture, community and the land. With firsthand experience, he highlights how local seeds and local knowledge systems offer real resilience and prosperity, especially in a time of climate change and market volatility. As a leading spokesperson for the global peasant movement, Nelson debunks the stubborn notion that we need big agribusiness – and particularly the so-called ‘Green Revolution in Africa’ – to feed the world.

Watch the video: https://youtu.be/RDHUPVN_UIE

Find all episodes in The Bristol Conversation series: https://www.localfutures.org/programs/the-bristol-conversations/

This series is produced by Local Futures, an international non-profit organisation dedicated to renewing ecological and social well-being by strengthening communities and local economies.

Explore our work: https://www.localfutures.org/

The Bristol Conversation – Michael Shuman

Tue, 05 Aug 2025 01:41:25 -0600

Welcome to the Bristol Conversations, a new podcast and video series by Local Futures featuring Helena Norberg-Hodge in conversation with some of the great minds who joined us in Bristol for the Planet Local Summit.

Today, we hear from perhaps the world's leading expert on local finance and local business, Michael Shuman. With roots in the peace movement and social justice struggles, Michael is a Harvard-trained lawyer and economist who has spent his career going against conventional economic dogmas to champion the local. Local economies, he maintains, can deliver greater justice and wellbeing in society, and greater prosperity and political power to people. He shares his wisdom across the world in talks, workshops and his publication The Main Street Journal.

In this highly informative episode, Helena and Michael deliver critical but creative takes on buzzwords like ethical investment and impact investing. Drawing on demonstrative examples, they explore how place-based institutions, economies and the policies that support them can revolutionize not only our local communities but global geopolitics, and ultimately give rise to an 'economics of happiness'.

Watch the video: https://youtu.be/axDr7nGjD5Q

Find all episodes in The Bristol Conversation series: https://www.localfutures.org/programs/the-bristol-conversations/

This series is produced by Local Futures, an international non-profit organisation dedicated to renewing ecological and social well-being by strengthening communities and local economies.

Explore our work: https://www.localfutures.org/

The Bristol Conversation – Darcia Narvaez

Tue, 15 Jul 2025 03:31:22 -0600

Welcome to the Bristol Conversations, a new podcast and video series by Local Futures. In these longer-format, meandering episodes, our founder Helena Norberg-Hodge speaks with some of the great minds who joined us in Bristol for the Planet Local Summit.

We kick the series off with Darcia Narvaez. Darcia is professor emerita of psychology at the University of Notre Dame. She studies morality, child development and human flourishing, and she does so by integrating disciplines like anthropology, neuroscience, developmental psychology and evolutionary biology. Helena, in turn, holds a very compatible perspective on human development thanks to her learnings from many years spent in the indigenous culture of Ladakh.

Their conversation explores who we really are as human beings and the kind of supports we need to develop healthily. They show how so-called 'human nature' itself is molded by the economy and culture, and give anecdotes that illuminate some fundamental differences between modern Western (i.e. globalized) culture and more land-based communal cultures. How deep does the damage of disconnection go in the modern world? And how might we begin to reverse that damage through care, touch, play and vulnerability?

Watch the video: https://youtu.be/Vg4DS_PbmsQ

Find all episodes in The Bristol Conversation series: https://www.localfutures.org/programs/the-bristol-conversations/

This series is produced by Local Futures, an international non-profit organisation dedicated to renewing ecological and social well-being by strengthening communities and local economies.

Explore our work: https://www.localfutures.org/

World Localization Extravaganza! Part 3: A TOUCH OF GENIUS

Wed, 02 Jul 2025 01:31:13 -0600

The final episode in the World Localization Extravaganza counters the “bigger, more complex and more violent” logic of the dominant system with a bottom-up approach built on peoplepower, local sovereignty and small-scale economies. The episode stresses how, even and especially in the face of global crises, localization simply makes sense.

VISIT OUR CAMPAIGN PAGE: www.worldlocalizationday.org to get active, and follow @localfutures_

This third and final episode visits six leaders practicing on-the-ground work as well as building coalitions for systemic change in Europe, Africa and Australia:

Ruby van der Wekken – Finland – Food systems activist and social solidarity economy networker with Oma Maa and Ripess Europe
Anisa Rogers – Australia – Campaigner and practitioner, Degrowth Network Australia and New Economy Network Australia
Million Belay – Uganda – General Coordinator, Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa
Laura Kaesteele – UK/Germany – Network weaver, ECOLISE
Juan del Rio – Spain – Network weaver and filmmaker, ECOLISE
Margarita Barcena – Mexico/Ethiopia – Food systems activist and storyteller, A Growing Culture

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World Localization Extravaganza! Part 2: THE POTENT PARADOX

Sun, 22 Jun 2025 02:05:12 -0600

On World Localization Day, 2025, we celebrate a planet-sized paradox – a GLOBAL movement for LOCALization.

VISIT OUR CAMPAIGN PAGE: www.worldlocalizationday.org to get active, and follow @localfutures_

This second episode in the trio offers shining examples of localization-in-action in the USA, Brazil, Bangladesh and Nepal, while also stressing efforts to build up broad-based, international coalitions for strategic policy change. You will hear from:

Debra Efroymson – USA/Bangladesh – campaigner, public health advocate with Institute of Wellbeing https://instituteofwellbeingbd.org/
Thais Mantovani – Brazil – educator, reformer, campaigner with EcoUniversidade @ecouniversidade
Michael Shuman – USA – economist, lawyer, leading expert on local finance https://michaelhshuman.com/
Shail Shrestha – Nepal – Public policy advocate and cofounder, Digo Bikas Institute https://digobikas.org/
Rutendo Ngara – South Africa – indigenous knowledge keeper

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World Localization Extravaganza! Part 1: THE BIG STORY

Sat, 21 Jun 2025 02:40:19 -0600

On World Localization Day, 2025, we come to you with a very big story. It’s a story played out across every continent, told by 15 different voices, over three upbeat super inspiring podcast episodes. It’s the story of a global turning towards all things local and life-affirming.

VISIT OUR CAMPAIGN PAGE: www.worldlocalizationday.org to get active, and follow
@localfutures_

This first episode defines and depicts localization as it manifests in parts of Asia, Africa and Australia. It features five awe-inspiring activists, storytellers and thinkers:

Aimee Wallin – Ghana – food systems activist and leader, Ghana Food Movement @aimee.wav @ghanafoodmovement / https://www.ghanafoodmovement.com/
Keibo Oiwa – Japan – renowned teacher, author, activist, networker @theslothclub_japan
Vu Truong – Vietnam – youth leader, education reformer with VCIL
https://www.vcil.community/
Rutendo Ngara – South Africa – indigenous knowledge keeper
Morag Gamble – Australia – Permaculture leader and educator with Permaculture Education Institute https://permacultureeducationinstitute.org

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A review of history, future and self: Towards deep transformation

Wed, 16 Apr 2025 01:53:39 -0600

Described as "one of the greatest thinkers of our age," Jeremy Lent is an impassioned researcher and speaker who investigates the underlying causes of our civilizational metacrisis, and explores pathways toward an ecological civilisation. He is the author of The Patterning Instinct and The Web of Meaning, and the founder of the Deep Transformation Network – an online global community where people can engage in facilitating a deep transformation toward a life-affirming future on a regenerated Earth.

To watch the video of this series, visit: Planet Local Voices interview series.

The music for this series is ‘Pines and Violet’, by Sky Toes.

Strategizing the local food economy – Christian Jochnick

Wed, 02 Apr 2025 06:19:46 -0600

Christian Jochnick, a Swedish entrepreneur, started his career in social projects for urban youth. After experiencing the challenges around finance in the philanthropic world, he decided to go back to university to get an MSc from the London School of Economics. He then worked as an analyst in the investment banking division of Goldman Sachs before becoming an entrepreneur and venture investor. Today, Christian utilizes his broad experience to support the transition towards a small scale, diversified, organic and regenerative food system, primarily through his project Juntos Farm in Ibiza.

In this episode, Christian explains a bit about how he came to understand the paramount importance of local food economies for genuine social and ecological regeneration. He speaks pragmatically to the question of how best to streamline community resources and actually build such economies. He talks strategy, investments and infrastructure, and offers a holistic understanding of how a local food economy actually works.

To watch the video of this series, visit: Planet Local Voices interview series.

The music for this series is ‘Pines and Violet’, by Sky Toes.

A Rightful Place in the Web of Life – Nathalie Kelley

Wed, 12 Mar 2025 05:58:17 -0600

Nathalie Kelley is a Peruvian-Australian actress of Quechua descent who has starred in Hollywood films like ‘The Fast and the Furious’ and Netflix’s ‘Dynasty’. Over the last five years, however, she has switched from acting to activism, speaking out for indigenous peoples, regenerative agriculture and localization. She is a graduate of Kiss The Ground's Soil Advocacy program, is on the board of the Fungí Foundation, and has narrated Local Futures' films ‘Closer to Home’ and ‘Trade Gone Mad’.

In this episode, Nathalie recounts how she walked away from her “success” in the dominant system in favor of using her platform to tell stories that might inspire activism, reconnection, and a radical worldview shift. She draws learnings from her indigenous roots and speaks unapologetically about the need to re-sacralize our approach to economics and the wider world. Through sharing her own story, she invites all of us – indigenous and non-indigenous alike – to rediscover our rightful place in the web of life.

To watch the video of this series, visit: Planet Local Voices interview series.

The music for this series is ‘Pines and Violet’, by Sky Toes.

Localization: Rootedness, Beauty and Wellbeing – Satish Kumar

Wed, 26 Feb 2025 02:41:19 -0600

Peace-pilgrim, life-long activist, and former monk, Satish Kumar has been inspiring global change for over 60 years. In 1962 he undertook a pilgrimage for peace, walking for two years without money from India to America for the cause of nuclear disarmament. In 1991, he co-founded Schumacher College, a renowned center of ecological education, and is a Visiting Fellow of Schumacher Wild. Now in his 80s, Satish has devoted his life to campaigning for ecological regeneration and social justice. He is a world-renowned author and international speaker, founder of The Resurgence Trust and Editor Emeritus of Resurgence & Ecologist – a change-making magazine he edited for over 40 years.

To watch the video of this series, visit: Planet Local Voices interview series.

The music for this series is ‘Pines and Violet’, by Sky Toes.

Localization and direct democracy in Forest Row, UK – Kate Taylor-Smith, Patricia Patterson Vanegas and Ben Christie

Fri, 14 Feb 2025 04:05:30 -0600

How can we make our local communities healthy and resilient, and make sure that the voices and concerns of local people are heard? In this episode of the Planet Local Voices Series, Kate Taylor-Smith, Patricia Patterson Vanegas and Ben Christie, share their experience from Forest Row - a small town of 5000 people in East Sussex in the UK. They talk about localization and the process of building direct democracy, with genuine community representation in local, county and state-level governments.

It all started with FROCAL - a grassroots project that explores what the Forest Row might be like if they all lived and acted more locally. What would it mean for the sourcing of food, water and energy, for the local economy and livelihoods? Overall, the aim is to care for the land and each other to improve collective wellbeing.

To watch the video of this series, visit: Planet Local Voices interview series.

The music for this series is ‘Pines and Violet’, by Sky Toes.

Living simply, slowly and more intentionally – Bill Powers

Wed, 15 Jan 2025 03:13:40 -0600

William (Bill) Powers is an author, speaker and teacher whose essays and commentaries on global issues have appeared in the New York Times and the Atlantic and on National Public Radio. Powers has also spent several decades exploring the American culture of speed and its alternatives in some fifty countries around the world. He is the author of five books that probe issues of sustainability and the need for a new, bio-centric paradigm, and lives in a Transition Town in Bolivia where principles of a "sweet, slow life" are being put into practice.

In this interview for the Planet Local Voices series, Powers questions the colonial categories of language and thought behind conventional 'development' models that are pushing globalization and urbanization onto the whole world. Powers argues that the antidote to the seeming invincibility of this destructive mainstream direction is by coming home to our senses, re-embedding ourselves in the fabric of Nature and life, and re-building interdependent communities and local economies.

To watch the video of this series, visit: Planet Local Voices interview series.

The music for this series is ‘Pines and Violet’, by Sky Toes.