Sustainability: sharing values, creating communities – equity, economy, environment
Thursday 30th June, 2022
To register for this free, in-person event through Eventbrite, click here.
- Pastries and coffees from 09.00**
- Opening session 9.30
- Closing Plenary concludes at 17.15 followed by drinks
Academics, policy makers, and lay people together explore values, roles and commitments at a time of ecological emergency.
This is a free event, including lunch, refreshments and post conference drinks. Note that this event will not be streamed live online.
This year, the 150th anniversary of the foundation of Southlands College, the Susanna Wesley Foundation is joining with our colleagues in the University of Roehampton, and in particular its Faculty of Business and Law, to contemplate questions around sustainability. We will explore ways of thinking about the environment, the economy and society, and how we can organise ourselves in order to care for our common home and enable the flourishing of all.
Drawing on members of the Southlands community and from elsewhere, both academics and practitioners, we will consider the values which inform our different approaches, and hear from those who have taken action to bring about change. Participation and conversation will be at the heart of the conference, as we all seek to come to understand and to ‘live’ what it means to be fully human in an interconnected and ever-evolving universe.
Speakers/contributors will include:
Prof Robert Beckford is Director of the Institute of Climate and Social Justice at the University of Winchester, having taught previously at Queens Foundation and the University of Birmingham. He is a prolific author and TV/radio presenter in the areas of social criticism and theology.
He writes:
I am planning to present a short historical reflection. The focus is a case study of the entanglement of Anglican Christian mission, environmental degradation and racial capitalism in the 18th Century West Indies. I will parse this history for resources for new decolonial, intersectional and compensatory approach to Christian motivated sustainability at Anglican founded Institutions.
Dr Alastair McIntosh is a land reform pioneer and honorary professor at the School of Education, College of Social Sciences, University of Glasgow in nonviolence, spirituality and environment. He is the author of Soil and Soul (2004), Spiritual Activism: Leadership as Service (2016) Riders on the Storm (2020), and more, and a founding trustee of the GalGael trust.
His abstract:
In 1991, I led research for the Environmental Education for Adaptation report of the Principal’s Environmental Initiative at Edinburgh University. The report influenced many other universities in the run-up to the Earth Summit in Rio, thirty years ago this month. What did it say about the role of a University in time of climate change and wider ecological emergency? How does such a message sit with current forms of education that are often shaped towards a competitive world with high material consumption? And how might education’s relationship to spiritual values reflect on our ontology (our sense of what a human being is) and our epistemology (our sense of what knowledge is) as we step into the role of educators for an emerging world?
Prof Molly Scott Cato is a Professor of Green Economics in the Faculty of Business and Law at the University of Roehampton. She is a former Green MEP and author of The Bioregional Economy: Land, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness (2012), Sustainable Finance (2022), and more.
Dr Steven van den Heuvel is Director of the Institute of Leadership and Social Ethics at Evangelische Theologische Faculteit, Leuven, Belgium, researching for a just and sustainable society. Recent books include Relational Anthropology for Contemporary Economics: A Multidisciplinary Approach (2022) Historical and Multidisciplinary Perspectives on Hope (2020) and Leading in a VUCA World (2018 – SWF review).
Prof Sunitha Narendran is Dean of the Faculty of Business and Law at the University of Roehampton and member of the Roehampton Climate Network. Her recent research focuses on decision-making and risk.
Prof Jérémie Gilbert is a Professor of Human Rights in the Faculty of Business and Law at the University of Roehampton, specialising in the rights of minorities and indigenous peoples. His books include Natural Resources and Human Rights (2018, OUP).
Prof Anne Robertson is a Professor in the Centre for Integrated Research in Life and Health Sciences at the University of Roehampton. Her research focuses on freshwater community ecology and she is part of the Roehampton Climate Network.
Hannah Brown is the Campaigns and Church Engagement Officer for the Joint Public Issues Team: Churches working for Peace and Justice (JPIT), engaging the local and national church, and faith groups, in transformative action and advocacy around climate justice and a just future.
The Revd Dr Martin Poulsom is a Senior Lecturer in Theology at the University of Roehampton specialising in theology of creation and in the work of Edward Schillebeeckx. He is also a Roman Catholic priest and a member of the Salesians of Don Bosco. He is also a Trustee and Board member of Operation Noah.
Dr Neil Williams is a Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Roehampton. His main areas of research are American pragmatism, post-Kantian idealism, and environmental philosophy.
Johnny is a leadership coach, mentor, retreat director and experienced social entrepreneur. He is the founder of Becoming, a practice focused on transformation, Wayfarer, a professional development pathway that reimagines human ecology and transformation through nature-based inquiry, and The Paradise Cooperative, a community enterprise learning through working with nature and the land.
Ollie Cem is Coordinator of Growhampton, an award-winning project at the University of Roehampton to grow fruit and vegetables and keep chickens to supply campus with locally-grown organic food and provide learning opportunities for Roehampton and the local community.
Prof Stephen Drinkwater is Deputy Dean of Faculty in the Faculty of Business and Law at the University of Roehampton. Based in the Centre for Sustainability and Responsible Management, his micro economics research focuses on areas that include labour market discrimination, self-employment, industrial relations and migration.
Parallel breakout sessions will include contributors from the University’s Faculty of Business and Law. There will be opportunity, too, to join a session in which practitioners will be sharing their work around engaging with environmental issues in church settings.
For those who would value a period outdoors in contemplation, the Revd Morna Simpson will be leading people around the campus in a contemplative photography session, helping them to see their environment afresh through God’s lens.
**Conference attendees will be able to enjoy locally grown produce, from Growhampton, a sustainability programme delivered by the Students’ Union at the University of Roehampton, and from Paradise Cooperative, which also farms land in the London Borough of Wandsworth. Representatives from these initiatives will talk about local, sustainable food production.
The Susanna Wesley Foundation has adopted a ‘default veg’ policy, whereby vegetarian food will be offered by default at catered events. ‘Default Veg’ is an initiative by CreatureKind.
Register here.
For enquiries contact Liz Pickett.
