Workshop on Hearing Unheard Voices: Listening to future generations and nonhuman nature in Climate Assemblies

Climate assemblies make recommendations with profound long-term impacts on humans yet to be born and nonhuman nature. But these affected constituencies are typically not participants in the assembly’s deliberations and collective decision making. What would it mean for future generations, other living beings and ecosystems to have voice within climate assemblies? Is it desirable or even practically possible?

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Giving voice to future generations and nonhuman nature raises many challenges for participatory and deliberative democracy. This workshop unpacked some of these issues – both conceptual and, most importantly, practical. We learned from practitioners who have designed deliberative processes that aim to give voice to future generations and/or nonhuman nature. Foremost, we participated in a live experiment to give voice to nature with time to share our hopes and concerns as a community of practice.

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Speakers and participants included:

• Judith Ferrando, co-director of Missions Publiques
• Tatsuyoshi Saijo, CEO, Future Design
• Lucy Parry, Senior Research Associate at the Centre for Deliberative Democracy and Global Governance.
• Martina Francesca, co-founder of La Prossima Cultura
• Sara Bigi, La Prossima Cultura

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Download the presentations here:

- Presentation of Tatsuyoshi Saijo

- Exercise endpaper: How does it feel like to be? La Prossima Cultura

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