Evolving Education: Building a Doughnut School with Jenny Grettve of When!When!
Apr 3, 2024
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Jenny Grettve, a systems thinker, discusses creating a Doughnut School for sustainable education, shifting views on work, and the importance of female leaders in politics. She explores innovative initiatives in Grenoble and Minnesota, highlighting the impact of small-scale actions in creating positive societal changes.
Implementing systemic transformation through simplicity to address societal crises.
Advocating for small-scale actions to drive larger transformations towards regenerative living.
Empowering women in leadership roles for progressive change and diversity in public governance.
Deep dives
The Role of Yenny Gretva in Transformative Systems Thinking and Design
Yenny Gretva, an author, philosopher, and systems thinker, discusses the transformative work undertaken by her design studio, Huen Huen. Their focus is on systemic transformation to address the meta-crisis by implementing ideas centered on slowing down societal crises. Huen Huen advocates for simplicity as a tool to create regenerative life for all, addressing the core planetary issues rooted in human contemplations about existence and economic structures.
Challenges of Climate Action and Political Shifts in Sweden
Yenny expresses concerns about environmental action and political regression in Sweden. She highlights the detrimental effects of political shifts away from climate focus, suggesting that the country may need to face imminent disasters to drive climate action. The conversation delves into the impact of right-wing ideologies and the struggle to counteract the damaging narratives that hinder progress towards a sustainable future.
Exploring Small-Scale Systems Changes for a Regenerative Future
Yenny emphasizes the shift towards small-scale systems changes to drive larger transformations. By focusing on micro-level actions such as community engagement and daily acts of kindness and generosity, she aims to foster a paradigm shift towards regenerative living. The concept revolves around nurturing connections and behaviors that can be scaled up to create a positive impact on a broader scale.
The Urgency of Building Sustainable Societies and Challenging Traditional Architectural Practices
Yenny discusses the urgency of building more caring societies and questions society's capacity to innovate towards more compassionate systems. Addressing the architectural industry's reliance on unsustainable practices, she explores the need for circular economies and sustainable building materials. Yenny highlights the importance of shifting from traditional economic models to create more ethical and socially inclusive communities.
Promoting Gender Equality and Feminist Leadership in Public Governance
The discussion leads to gender equality and feminist leadership in public governance. Yenny spotlights the significance of empowering women in leadership roles to drive progressive change and diversity. Reflecting on the need for female representation in decision-making bodies, she advocates for inclusive and diverse voices to shape policies and initiatives for a more equitable and sustainable future.
This week's guest is one of those people whose breadth and depth is an inspiration. As you are about to hear, Jenny Grettve is an author, a philosopher, a systems thinker who takes her ideas and brings them alive in the world. She's the founder and director of When! When!, a design studio that tests and actively implements ideas and projects on systemic transformation with the goal of slowing down our speeding meta crisis. When!When! regards simplicity as a tool for innovation and create a beautiful and regenerative life for all. Those who work in and for When!When! believe that at the core of our planetary problems lie vulnerable human ponderings about why we live, what life is meant to be and how that is deeply intertwined with our economic structure. By daring to open up dialogues on economy and emotions, fear and trust, technology and using fewer resources, but also on hope and how all living things profoundly need each other, they believe they can unlock new possibilities for our shared futures.
Jenny's heart-mind is huge and deep and we explored many areas of the transformation that's coming, from the evolution of a primary school along Doughnut Economic lines to the future of architecture, to the role of systems thinking in our political, social and, in the end, human, evolution. It was a truly heart-warming conversation and I hope it helps you, too, to think to the edges of yourself.