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Our latest updates, thoughts, and events — as they roll out.
Demos Helsinki is currently involved in 14 Horizon Europe projects. From exploring the societal impacts of new technologies to tackling climate challenges, these projects reflect a growing demand for research that sparks systemic change. Discover how we are working across disciplines to shape fairer, more sustainable futures.
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These three research projects are: 1) Reducing polarisation via material participation (MaDem); 2) Coastal waters under pressure – safeguarding a healthy Gulf of Finland in a changing geopolitical and environmental landscape (CoWup); and 3) Safe Water for All (WaterFall).
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We are pleased to announce that the UNDP’s Istanbul Innovation Days (IID), taking place in March 2025, will focus on shaping the next generation of public institutions for a secure and prosperous world.
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While substantial efforts have been made to identify and address issues of environmental justice in urban areas, the question of how to consider and plan for the concerns of humans and other species remains a major challenge. This paper provides a conceptualisation of what ‘justice’ might mean from a multispecies justice (MSJ) perspective within the contexts of nature-based solutions (NBS) and urban sustainability planning. We offer a wider conceptualisation of representation, distribution and agency compared with dominant framings in NBS scholarship and provide exemplar cases on how to integrate these concepts in planning discourse. We critically discuss some of the challenges and opportunities of considering MSJ when confronted by established procedures and practices in NBS science and decision-making, focusing on (i) moving beyond existing standards for biodiversity conservation; (ii) embracing MSJ as a process and practice; and (iii) building the capacity of NBS planners to work with MSJ.
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The report provides insights into how the dominant ways of thinking about growth have taken shape and become entrenched: What has changed over the decades? And what might the future look like? Finnish discourse is also placed in the broader context of international societal and scientific debates, as well as global shifts in the operating environment.
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With the increasing culture of applying piloting as part of technology innovation, the need for understanding its societal implications is becoming more crucial. With the aim of understanding better the power relations, tensions and agencies pivotal to negotiating and embedding ethics across processes, we consider utilizing a framework of “design logics” to the data.
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Learning about the Future through Scenarios
February 12, 2016
What use are scenarios? The word scenario is derived from drama, meaning a sketch of the plot of a play. In foresight, a scenario is a story with plausible cause and effect links that connect a future condition with the present, while illustrating key decisions, events and consequences throughout the…
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Speculating radical futures: a Post-voting society?
February 4, 2016
Imagine that government tracks your every move. Frankly, they can already do that, so this should not be an immense stretch of imagination. Then imagine that the establishment does the same for everyone you know. Does this wield an absolute power of those in control over the typical citizens? Not…
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Sustainable growth replaced the welfare state
January 12, 2016
In the future the years 2013-2015 will most likely be referred to as a turning point in Finnish political history. Before this time, the crux of the political consensus was in maintaining the welfare state, whereas after this point it will been seen as building sustainable growth. Demos Helsinki has analysed the recent…
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