Welcome to the Bristol Conversations, a new podcast and video series by Local Futures. In these longer-format, meandering episodes, our founder Helena Norberg-Hodge speaks with some of the great minds who joined us in Bristol for the Planet Local Summit.

We kick the series off with Darcia Narvaez. Darcia is professor emerita of psychology at the University of Notre Dame. She studies morality, child development and human flourishing, and she does so by integrating disciplines like anthropology, neuroscience, developmental psychology and evolutionary biology. Helena, in turn, holds a very compatible perspective on human development thanks to her learnings from many years spent in the indigenous culture of Ladakh.

Their conversation explores who we really are as human beings and the kind of supports we need to develop healthily. They show how so-called 'human nature' itself is molded by the economy and culture, and give anecdotes that illuminate some fundamental differences between modern Western (i.e. globalized) culture and more land-based communal cultures. How deep does the damage of disconnection go in the modern world? And how might we begin to reverse that damage through care, touch, play and vulnerability?

The final episode in the World Localization Extravaganza counters the “bigger, more complex and more violent” logic of the dominant system with a bottom-up approach built on peoplepower, local sovereignty and small-scale economies. The episode stresses how, even and especially in the face of global crises, localization simply makes sense.

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This third and final episode visits six leaders practicing on-the-ground work as well as building coalitions for systemic change in Europe, Africa and Australia:

• Ruby van der Wekken – Finland – Food systems activist and social solidarity economy networker with Oma Maa and Ripess Europe
• Anisa Rogers – Australia – Campaigner and practitioner, Degrowth Network Australia and New Economy Network Australia
• Million Belay – Uganda – General Coordinator, Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa
• Laura Kaesteele – UK/Germany – Network weaver, ECOLISE
• Juan del Rio – Spain – Network weaver and filmmaker, ECOLISE
• Margarita Barcena – Mexico/Ethiopia – Food systems activist and storyteller, A Growing Culture

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On World Localization Day, 2025, we celebrate a planet-sized paradox – a GLOBAL movement for LOCALization.

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This second episode in the trio offers shining examples of localization-in-action in the USA, Brazil, Bangladesh and Nepal, while also stressing efforts to build up broad-based, international coalitions for strategic policy change. You will hear from:

• Debra Efroymson – USA/Bangladesh – campaigner, public health advocate with Institute of Wellbeing https://instituteofwellbeingbd.org/
• Thais Mantovani – Brazil – educator, reformer, campaigner with EcoUniversidade @ecouniversidade
• Michael Shuman – USA – economist, lawyer, leading expert on local finance https://michaelhshuman.com/
• Shail Shrestha – Nepal – Public policy advocate and cofounder, Digo Bikas Institute https://digobikas.org/
• Rutendo Ngara – South Africa – indigenous knowledge keeper

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