Planet: Critical Folgen

Jon Alexander is the co-founder of the New Citizens Project and author of Citizens: Why The Key To Fixing Everything Is All Of Us. A former award-winner in the advertising world, Jon advises companies and communities on the power of narrative, helping them reclaim and restructure the stories they tell to in order to empower the shift from consumer to citizen. Jon joined me to discuss this very problem: How do we shift the paradigm from consumer to citizen? Building on his book, he explains how how human history has shifted from the subject paradigm, to consumer, and the necessary move to a collective and community-based citizen world. He gives riveting examples of this happening all around the world today, revealing the power of the stories we choose to tell—and which we choose to suppress. We also discuss deliberative democracy, the theory of narrative, and the framework of systems. Jon’s powerful message is: If you want to build a new system, you must simply begin. We cannot know where we’re going exactly, but we’ll never get there if we don’t start. * Listen on Apple or Spotify* Watch on YoutubePlanet: Critical investigates why the world is in crisis—and what to do about it.© Rachel Donald Get full access to Planet: Critical at www.planetcritical.com/subscribe

Phoebe Barnard is a biologist, global change scientist, and policy analyst with decades of experience confronting some of the most pressing problems of our time, bridging the gap between academia and government. She’s also CEO of the Stable Planet Alliance, a coalition of scientific, legal, social, health, media, policy, leadership, faith, culture, and grassroots organizations tackling the overpopulation and hyperconsumption problem.Phoebe joins me to discuss overpopulation—its effects, our trajectory, and the difficult decisions we face as a species. She argues we must reduce our population to 3 billion in the next century if planet earth is to survive, and us along with it, warning that population reduction policies may be forced on citizens in the future if we do not choose for ourselves now. We discuss the morality and politics of overpopulation, addressing the West’s all-too-recent history of eugenics and ethnic cleansing. We then explore population reduction as an intergenerational right: There may be less of us in the future, but those future people may be better off for it. Listen on Apple or SpotifyWatch on YoutubePlanet: Critical investigates why the world is in crisis—and what to do about it.© Rachel Donald Get full access to Planet: Critical at www.planetcritical.com/subscribe

Robbie Watt is a Lecturer in Politics at the University of Manchester, researching climate change politics, carbon markets, global governance, and critical theory. His article, The Fantasy of Carbon Offsetting, was runner-up for Environmental Politics journal's best article award 2021.Robbie joins me to discuss the moral economy of offsetting schemes, the politics of climate change, and how power depoliticises spaces to maintain control. This is an episode all about power dynamics—where they hide and how to reveal them.Join us as we blast through psychoanalysis, postmodernism and Marx to find the right words to describe the greatest problem humankind faces: Critical Climate Theory (you heard it here first).Planet: Critical investigates why the world is in crisis—and what to do about it.© Rachel Donald Get full access to Planet: Critical at www.planetcritical.com/subscribe