Austrian-born, New York–based graphic designer Stefan Sagmeister talks with us about the media’s proclivity for negative news, why progress often stems from complexity, and how recognizing humanity’s historical long-term successes can help encourage a more rationally optimistic perspective.
Policy expert and equity advocate Ifeoma Ozoma, founder of the Santa Fe–based consulting firm Earthseed, discusses how companies use nondisclosure agreements as a means of ensuring indefinite constraint on their employees, the effects that the #MeToo and Black Lives Matter movements have had on the ways in which NDAs serve as corporate cover for illegal behavior, and why holding executives liable for their businesses’ criminal offenses could help facilitate change.
Writer and producer Katie Engelhart, author of the new book “The Inevitable: Dispatches on the Right to Die,” speaks with us about the underground euthanasia movement, the differing perspectives on assisted suicide in countries around the world, and the problems with the media’s portrayal of the elderly.
Austin Whitman, founder and CEO of the climate certification nonprofit Climate Neutral, talks with us about the economic benefits of helping brands reduce their environmental impacts, the difference between facts and strategy, and the importance of holding companies of all sizes accountable for offsetting and reducing their carbon emissions.
Doug Bierend, author of the new book “In Search of Mycotopia: Citizen Science, Fungi Fanatics, and the Untapped Potential of Mushrooms,” discusses using fungi to clean up pollutants, how mycology can guide conversations around the climate crisis, and mushrooms as a gateway to new ways of thinking about food, nature, and society.
Kim Hastreiter, co-founder of Paper magazine and creator of the pop-up “public service” newspaper The New Now, speaks with us about her friends’ pandemic-induced workarounds, the importance of documenting history, and why New York City may be on the verge of a creative explosion.
Danny Dorling, author of the book “Slowdown: The End of the Great Acceleration—and Why It’s Good for the Planet, the Economy, and Our Lives” and the Halford Mackinder Professor of Geography at the University of Oxford, talks with us about geography as a means to understand culture; how and why, despite our sped-up modern lives, the world has been in a global slowdown since the late 1960s; and the ways in which this slowdown illuminates women’s aptitude for leadership.
London-based artist, author, and master potter Edmund de Waal, whose work is currently on view at the British Museum and Gagosian’s galleries in London and Hong Kong, discusses the psychological value of human touch, the intimate relationship between pottery and poetry, and the importance of kindness as a societal response to the pandemic.
Boston city councilor at-large Michelle Wu, a progressive Democrat currently running in the 2021 Boston mayoral race, speaks with us about transitioning cities to a “community-based” leadership model, why governing bodies need to reflect the people they serve, and the role that local administrations can play in the global climate-justice conversation.
Melissa Harris-Perry, the Maya Angelou Presidential Chair at Wake Forest University and co-host of The Nation’s new System Check podcast, talks with us about the camera’s monopoly on shaping public conversation, having the courage to be wrong, and why personal experience is an apt way to develop hypotheses, but the wrong way to test them.
Dominican artist, curator, and activist Lizania Cruz, whose latest project, “Obituaries of the American Dream,” was commissioned by El Museo del Barrio for “Estamos Bien: La Trienal 20/21,” discusses the difference between integration and assimilation, storytelling as a means for understanding, and why traveling between states in the U.S. should be considered migration in the context of the climate crisis.
Turkish-born, Copenhagen-based activist and former politician Özlem Cekic, author of the new book “Overcoming Hate Through Dialogue: Confronting Prejudice, Racism, and Bigotry with Conversation―and Coffee,” speaks with us about friendship as a vaccination against prejudice, the importance of remembering that people are more than their opinions, and why being on the receiving end of hateful language is opportunity to initiate a meaningful exchange.
Scott Smith, founder and managing partner of the Netherlands-based futures consultancy Changeist and author of the new book “How to Future: Leading and Sense-Making in an Age of Hyperchange,” talks with us about why President Trump is a covert futurist, the problems with taking a passive approach toward tomorrow, and why the next generation of leaders will be people who use pragmatic, real-life experiences, not necessarily advanced educations, to make change in the world.
Environmental journalist Amy Westervelt, founder of the Critical Frequency podcast network and co-host of the Hot Take podcast, discusses what President-elect Joe Biden should prioritize when addressing the climate crisis, why forgiveness doesn’t entail giving up on justice, and how President Trump, his family and associates, and the mass media—including The New York Times and The Washington Post—have all furthered the agendas of fossil-fuel giants.
Economist Sakiko Fukuda-Parr, a professor of international affairs at the New School and recipient of a 2019 Grawemeyer Award for her co-authorship of the book “Fulfilling Social and Economic Rights,” speaks with us about the danger of vaccine nationalism, the challenges with the U.N.’s Sustainable Development Goals, and why having access to life-saving medication is a human right.
Marion Weiss and Michael Manfredi, co-founders of the New York–based architectural design firm Weiss/Manfredi, talk with us about creating environments that encourage slowing down, why all five senses matter in architecture, and the surprising ways in which public spaces serve and support people in times of crisis.
Somerset, England–based farmer Chris Smaje, author of the new book “A Small Farm Future: Making the Case for a Society Built Around Local Economies, Self-Provisioning, Agricultural Diversity, and a Shared Earth,” discusses incentivizing a new generation of farmers, the problems inherent with cheap food, and how reconnecting people with nature could impact the “bullshit jobs” phenomenon.
Jess Scully, deputy lord mayor of Sydney, Australia, and author of the new book “Glimpses of Utopia: Real Ideas for a Fairer World,” speaks with us about bringing indigenous knowledge into modern society, how increased citizen participation in politics could transform government policy, and why caring and creating are the economy’s most future-proof skill sets.
Poet and essayist Elisa Gabbert, author of the new book “The Unreality of Memory: And Other Essays,” talks with us about why the 24-hour news cycle fuels a demand for disasters, how false memories are created, and the emotional difficulty of responding to big, invisible threats like the climate crisis.
Ben Adida, executive director of the nonprofit Voting Works, discusses how to build more resilient voting systems, the reason for paper ballots, and why the best response to digital warfare is a slower, more considered approach to consuming information.
British philosopher Kate Soper, author of the new book “Post-Growth Living: For an Alternative Hedonism,” speaks with us about why people reject the idea of an absolute truth, how alarmist narratives fail the climate conversation, and slowing down and downsizing as a means for a more satisfying life.
Walter Hood, founder and creative director of Hood Design Studio and co-author of the forthcoming book “Black Landscapes Matter,” talks with us about how his new proposal for Washington, D.C.’s National Mall Tidal Basin could facilitate unity, why spaces that elicit discomfort are a step toward reconciliation, and the importance of investing in people and places that society takes for granted.
London-based economist Paola Subacchi, author of the new book “The Cost of Free Money: How Unfettered Capital Threatens Our Economic Future,” discusses the financial impact of the coronavirus, similarities between trade and currency, and how wealth inequality is fueling the United States’s current political climate.
Regan Ralph, founding president and CEO of the Fund for Global Human Rights, speaks with us about the importance of “trust-based philanthropy,” funding decentralized movements, and what social-change organizations can learn from local activists.
Cuban-born, Los Angeles–based artist, author, and former scientist Enrique Martínez Celaya talks with us about the problematic relationship between the art market and artists’ practices, the consciousness-raising power of science, and finding clarity in moments of uncertainty by looking in the mirror.
Gregg Buchbinder, CEO of the American furniture maker Emeco, discusses the motivation behind the company’s recently launched carbon footprint calculator, why planned obsolescence should be illegal, and how his team transformed plastic bottles into a series of recyclable chairs.
Self-described “fermentation fetishist” Sandor Katz, author of the new book “Fermentation as Metaphor,” speaks with us about how the pandemic has revealed our food systems’ vulnerabilities, why fermentation is integral to human culture, and what he learned from eating “stink heads” in Alaska.
Composer, artist, and writer Paul D. Miller talks with us about social media’s “computational propaganda,” the need to trust science over belief, and how his multimedia project “Quantopia” unpacks the history and evolution of the internet.
Artist, aesthetics expert, and writer Leonard Koren, author of the new book “Musings of a Curious Aesthete,” discusses the psychological benefits of bathing, how “action intellectuals” harness life’s experiences, and the enlightenment that comes from looking at things from a new perspective.
Physicist and climate researcher Dr. Friederike Otto, author of the new book “Angry Weather: Heat Waves, Floods, Storms, and the New Science of Climate Change,” speaks with us about the nuances of understanding real-time weather data, why climate change is a social issue, and how suing fossil fuel companies can help change their business models, regardless of the legal outcome.
