Macedon Ranges Sustainable Living Festival, 3 March 2018

Featuring a highly interactive presentation hosted by The Rescope Project

Anthony James and co-director and debut author Keith Badger presented an interactive forum on the Project, the new systems of economy, food, energy and transport that are emerging, their experiences of living more meaningful lives with less, and how they went from corporate executive and corporate-backed scholar respectively, to join the movement for change to the systems in which we live.

Keith also signed copies of Joining Loose Ends: How a long walk revealed a new life, the new book launched the previous week to a full house at Readings in Carlton.

This was our last public event in Victoria for the summer. We look forward to seeing you there again soon!

Find more info on the festival here.

National Sustainable Living Festival, February 2018

Including the Festival 'Big Weekend', Federation Square, Melbourne

Melbourne launch of our first book

Over 100 people packed out Readings Carlton to celebrate the launch, 20 February 2018

 A travel memoir for our times. Former corporate executive and now Rescope Project director, Keith Badger, spoke with fellow director and Rescope Radio podcast host Anthony James, about his new book - Joining Loose Ends: How a long walk revealed a new life. 

It is the inspiring story of how he and his wife walked 2,801 kilometres end to end across the UK, to find their lives unexpectedly transformed. Over five gruelling and exhilarating months, Keith and Debby walked as planned. But what began as just a long walk transformed into a second, unexpected journey, to a place not shown on any maps. By the end, there could be no going back to the life they had left behind. They had slowed their lives down and discovered a new way of seeing the world and their place in it.

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Get more info on the book including how to buy it here. 

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This launch event was part of the 2018 National Sustainable Living Festival.

Grassroots Revolution

Radical experiments to regenerate land & life, Sunday 11 February 2018

Over 250 people filled The Dome for this feature festival forum with special guests Frances Jones & David Pollock from Wooleen Station, and regenerative farmer Charles Massy AO, with host Anthony James. 

Frances Jones and David Pollock’s radical project to remove income-earning livestock from their historic property, in remote Western Australia, shocked their entire district, and has gone on to produce remarkable results. Charles Massy's ground-breaking new book features a range of similar experiments. It is a comprehensive account of how a grassroots revolution can save the planet, help turn climate change around, and build healthy people and healthy communities.

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Pivoting significantly on our relationship with growing and consuming food, this powerful conversation showed how these experiments are changing the way we think and live, redefining notions of progress, and recreating our society. At stake is the future of our food supply, our Australian landscape and the planet.

David and Frances have featured on Australian Story several times now, such is their remarkable work and chance coming together. In just a decade since they began their regeneration project, the grass on Wooleen’s semi-arid mulga country, traversed by the Murchison River, is now greener and the river gums are growing for the first time in over a century. Many plants and animals have returned to areas where they were never expected to thrive.

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After more than a century of degradation, and despite nearly going broke, dealing with out-dated laws, and the politics around re-introducing a natural predator, they’re finding ways to continue their vital project.

Charles Massy AO is a regenerative farmer, author and speaker with a growing national and global reputation. Tim Flannery recently said that the reality behind his work is revealed through Google Earth: “if you search for the properties mentioned in the book, you will find oases of green surrounded by that parched devastation we have come to think of as the normal state of Australian agricultural lands.” Charles has been called an unlikely leader of the underground agricultural insurgency taking place in farms across Australia. 

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Introduced by Dr Nick Rose from Sustain: the Australian Food Network.

Hosted by Anthony James.

Supported by

Pic: Charles Massy AO

Regenerating Democracy

More than 200 people filled The Dome for this feature forum, Saturday 10 February 2018

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Dissatisfaction with democracy abounds. How do we get the leadership we need? Why is participation falling? Is it falling? Are we expecting too much? Who is responsible for making democracy work to address the ecological, economic and social crises we face? What does a thriving democracy look like in the 21st century? We unpacked these questions and more with our panel:

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• Dr John Hewson - former Federal Opposition Leader

• Mary Crooks AO - Executive Director, Victorian Women's Trust

• Chloe Aldenhoven - Co-convenor, Lock the Gate Victoria

Dr John Hewson was leader of the Liberal Party of Australia from 1990 - 1994.  He is now Professorial Fellow at the Australian National University and Chair of the Asset Owners Disclosure Project. He has worked as an economist for the Australian Treasury, the Reserve Bank, the International Monetary Fund and as an advisor to two successive Federal Treasurers and the Prime Minister. His experience spans business, government, media, academia and the financial system.

Mary Crooks AO has been Executive Director of the Victorian Women's Trust since 1996.  She directed The Purple Sage Project, a pioneering exercise in participatory democracy that engaged some 6000 women and men in community dialogue and action throughout Victoria. In 2012 Mary wrote 'A Switch in Time', to restore respect in Australian politics and critique of the 'tear-down' mentality directed towards the minority Gillard Government; the sexism and misogyny swirling around the then Prime Minister; and the efforts of climate science deniers to discredit climate science and the carbon price package. 

Chloe Aldenhoven is one of three Co-convenors of Lock the Gate in Victoria. Along with her colleagues at Friends of the Earth she built a coalition of environmentalists, farmers and grass roots mums and dads which Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews recently described as "the greatest political coalition we have seen in public policy for a very long time". Together they secured the first permanent ban on fracking in Australia and an extension of the moratorium on drilling for onshore conventional gas in Victoria. 

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Hosted by James Tonson, Facilitator of Democracy Programs with The Rescope Project.

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All part of the 2018 National Sustainable Living Festival. 

Book launch: Sharing Cities for Urban Transformation

A full house in the 'Off the Grid' festival tent helped launch this 'how to' book that's generating widespread acclaim from around the world, Friday 9 February 2018

From community composting to makerspaces, repair cafés and platform co-operatives, people are coming together in cities everywhere to develop solutions for the common good. Find out about Sharing Cities: Activating the Urban Commons, the new how-to guide for community based solutions to a range of city challenges. Learn how sharing stuff, space and skills creates abundance.

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Darren Sharp (Shareable) with host Anthony James (The Rescope Project) and special guests Jose Ramos (Footscray MakerLab) and Lizette Salmon (Repair Café Albury-Wodonga) discussed examples of Sharing Cities from around the world.

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Get more info for this event here. 

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Part of the 2018 National Sustainable Living Festival.

Stall & talks at the Groat St. Festival in Perth, 28 Oct. 2017

Stall from 9.30am to 3pm

Featuring a small exhibition with materials such as articles, postcards & illustrations. Books by Rescope Project folk were also available for sale at a discounted price. And a range of sustainability tips and advice were offered free of charge.

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We also had a bike at the stall, with child trailer attached, to help people get a tangible idea of how it is possible to live car-free (or at least reduce car use) as a family in Perth.

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A computer was also on hand to calculate people's ecological footprints online & talk about how they might reduce them.

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Most of all, there were friendly folk on hand to chat about how we can all live more healthy, meaningful lives within a flourishing planet.

The Rescope Project made its first festival appearance in Perth at the popular Groat St. Festival in North Beach. Thanks to everyone who filled the room for our talks and made the dialogue so rich, and for dropping by our stall for more terrific chats. 

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12pm: How to live a more meaningful life with less?

Live More with Less – how to reduce your eco-footprint & live more healthy, free, meaningful lives

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Including how to live car-free in Perth (even as a family), down-size, declutter and simplify, travel without flying, and generally reduce energy use, waste, living costs & debt, dietary impacts & more.

Featuring:

• Anthony James – speaker, facilitator & host, sustainability expert & Executive Director of The Rescope Project

• Olivia Cheng – Chinese Medicine practitioner & Shiatsu therapist, passionate whole food cook & mother

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2pm: Alternative Housing

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Live More with Less – how to reduce your eco-footprint & live more healthy, free, meaningful lives

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Building on our first session with a special focus on housing, including co-housing, shared ownership, down-sizing, tiny houses & more.

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Featuring:

• Anthony James – speaker, facilitator & host, sustainability expert & Executive Director of The Rescope Project

• Meriam Salama – co-housing expert & founding Director of The Henry Project (affordable homes through shared ownership) 

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Saturday 28 October 2017

Henderson Environmental Centre

Groat St, North Beach

FREE ENTRY

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Get more info about the festival here

From the Consumer Machine to the New Economy 

3-4pm on 2 September 2017, Brisbane @ the 2nd National New Economy Conference

The Rescope Project is collaborating in the development of the New Economy Network of Australia. So we were in amongst it at the 2nd national conference in Brisbane, where around 300 people gathered from a range of different fields and locations around Australia and the world.

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Part of our contribution was hosting a terrific panel discussion, with a full room of around 50 people joining a high quality panel to explore how we transition from the 'consumer machine' to the new economy. 

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PANEL DISCUSSION - How do we redefine progress? 

From the Consumer Machine to the New Economy: How do we redefine progress and transition to an economy based on quality rather than quantity? 

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Hosted by Anthony James, Rescope Project Director

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With co-panellists:

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• Professor Geoff Woolcock, Australian National Development Index (ANDI)

• Sabrina Chakori, founder of the Brisbane Tool Library 

• Stephen Briggs, Project Coordinator at the Australian Earth Laws Alliance (AELA)

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Get more info on the conference here​.

Sustaining the Good Life

Bargoonga Nganjin, the new North Fitzroy Library, City of Yarra, 19 July 2017

More and more people are becoming deeply concerned about the future, and realising it’s increasingly important for each of us to make our lives and societies sustainable, and more fulfilling. Now's the time to leave the unsustainable consumer machine behind, and focus on what’s really important in life.

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Anthony James, Director of The Rescope Project, was joined by a wonderfully thoughtful and involved audience for this booked out interactive session featuring recent research, plenty of ideas, and a range of examples of things we can do – personally, at home, at work, and in society generally – to help make it happen.

Get more info here

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From the Consumer City to the Ecocity 

Ecocity World Summit at the Melbourne Convention Centre, 12-14 July 2017

The Rescope Project featured across the 3 days of this global summit, from director Kate Auty's hosting of the opening, through a range of sessions outlined below, including our feature forum 'From the Consumer City to the Ecocity'.

Feature forum: From the Consumer City to the Ecocity

How do we redefine progress & transition to an economy based on quality not quantity?

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Given evidence of diminishing wellbeing in many parts of the over-industrialised world, and a growing call in powerful places for such a new narrative and economic system, there is a great opportunity for demonstrating how we may navigate our way to the new economy, as part of moving from the consumer-city to the eco-city. The question is, how do we do it?

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A full room of over 100 people joined this terrific panel in dialogue: 

• Anthony James - The Rescope Project

• Amanda Cahill - The Next Economy

• Sharon Ede - Commons Transition Coalition & Post-Growth Institute

• Jose Ramos - Founding Director of Action Foresight

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Click on Sarah McConnell's illustration above for a large version of her depiction of what happened on the day. And click on the one below for her depiction of the Energy Descent forum outlined further down.

Other sessions featuring The Rescope Project included:

Women Leading Sustainable & Resilient Cities 

Panel featuring Professor Kate Auty

Regional Just & Sustainable Transitions (listen to this podcast on Rescope Radio #011)
Anthony James chaired this panel in what became an outstanding interactive discussion. Featuring:

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• Harry Troedel and James Troedel - Seacombe West Regeneration Project 

• Wendy Farmer and Ron Ipsen - Pres. & VP of Voices of the Valley 

• Sam Alexander - University of Melbourne & Simplicity Institute

• Nick Aberle - Environment Victoria

• Amanda Cahill - The Next Economy & The Centre for Social Change

Creating resilient & sustainable cities - Key directions & priority actions 

Panel featuring Professor Kate Auty 

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Retrofitting the suburbs for the energy descent future (see illustration above)

Panel featuring:

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• David Holmgren, Co-founder of the Permaculture Concept

• Sam Alexander, University of Melbourne & Simplicity Institute

• Kate Dundas, City of Melbourne

• Josh Floyd, The Rescope Project's Energy, Systems & Society Fellow

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Get more about the Ecocity World Summit here

The Regenerating Society Series

The Rescope Project launched in February 2017 with the Regenerating Society Series of public forums - 3 forums, 7 special guests and 700 people in attendance. The forums explored the multiple major crises facing human societies, the systems and stories that need to change, and how we can make it happen.

Satyajit Das - Beyond growth as we know it

How can we stop consuming our future?

State Library of Victoria, Melbourne, 4 February 2017

Recent economic growth and understandings of prosperity have been based on excessive debt, environmental damage and overuse of non-renewable resources.

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In an effort to sustain an unsustainable model, problems and costs are being pushed into the future to feed current consumption and lifestyles. But the transfer of wealth from the future cannot go on forever. The process robs the generations to come – our children.

In his final public appearance, best-selling author and former financier, Satyajit Das, presented a compelling and vivid overview of the converging economic, ecological, energy and political crises to a sold out audience of 200 people.

Das presentation was followed by conversation and Q&A hosted by Rescope Project Director Anthony James. It was the first Regenerating Society Series forum, launching The Rescope Project.

The event was introduced by Mike Hirst, CEO of Bendigo Bank, and broadcast on the ABC's Big Ideas​. 

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Check out the wonderful illustration of this event here, with thanks to Sarah McConnell.

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Get more info about the event here.

Redefining Progress

How do we redefine progress beyond the consumer economy?

Sustainable Living Festival, Federation Square, Melbourne, 11 February 2017

Film by Ben Moore.

It has long been recognised that Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is an inadequate measure of society’s success and development. Yet it and our focus on economic growth driven by wasteful consumerism persist, despite the range of crises they cause and the growing recognition that limitless consumption doesn’t make for healthy, meaningful human life.

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Around 300 people gathered with an expert panel featuring Tim Costello, Dr Melissa Weinberg and Dr Mike Salvaris, hosted by Anthony James, to explore how to change the narratives, systems and measures to guide us to a sustainable economy geared towards quality of life, rather than quantity of stuff.

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Check out the wonderful illustration of this event here, with thanks to Sarah McConnell.

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​Get more info about the event here.

Renewable Energy & Beyond

How do we transition to a renewable society?

Sustainable Living Festival, Federation Square, Melbourne, 12 February 2017

In the final event of the Regenerating Society Series, globally renowned energy expert, Richard Heinberg, beamed in from the USA to put the case for changing the way we use energy, as well as the ways we supply it. 

He was joined by Rescope Project Fellow, Josh Floyd, energy and psychology researcher, Dr Andrea Bunting, host Anthony James, and another full house of 200 people to explore switching to a new kind of society and how can we get there as smoothly as possible.​

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Check out the wonderful illustration of this event here, with thanks to Sarah McConnell.

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​Get more info about the event here.

The Regenerating Society Series of forums was presented in partnership with the Melbourne Sustainable Society Institute, the Ecocity World Summit and the

18th National Sustainable Living Festival.