Latest content
Our latest updates, thoughts, and events — as they roll out.
Would you like to tackle climate change with entrepreneurship? Do you have an idea related to energy sector, consumer behaviour, smart mobility, food? We have great news for you, the world’s biggest cleantech business competition Climate Launchpad is here again! Apply here! Climate Launchpad is for early stage teams and…
→ Continue reading
THE LATEST THINKING FROM THE NORDIC THINK TANK This is Demos Helsinki’s bulletin on the thoughts and ideas shaping our futures. This month we look at where cleantech is heading next, and why it’s a very Nordic phenomenon. CLEANTECH IS DEAD. LONG LIVE THE (CONSUMER) CLEANTECH We asked leading economists to have…
→ Continue reading
Almedalen is an annual week-long political festival unlike anything else in the world. Held on the gorgeous island of Visby, the event brings together the greatest thinkers in everything from politics to business to activism. Some 30,000 people gather to hear the talks. Fores and Demos Helsinki will stage an inspirational…
→ Continue reading
The Circular Design Toolkit helps policymakers move beyond recycling by focusing on upstream design decisions that shape sustainable value chains and industrial transformation.
→ Continue reading
Drawing on almost five years of Cities Mission implementation, Demos Helsinki and its partners from Dark Matter Labs and the Mission Board argue that mission governance has reached policy readiness. Its mechanisms have been tested, its governance infrastructure is in place, and it offers a transferable model for delivering on EU strategic priorities at scale.
→ Continue reading
Finland managed the Covid-19 pandemic comparatively well. Yet the longer the crisis lasted, the more visible the limits of the governance system became. This brief examines what a prolonged crisis revealed about institutional strength, societal vulnerabilities, and the kind of governance future crises demand.
→ Continue reading
- All
- AI
- Business
- Cities
- Civil service
- Construction
- Democracy
- Economy
- Foresight
- Health & Wellbeing
- Industry & innovation
- Justice
- Public governance
- Research
- Skills & work
- Society
- Sustainability & climate action
- Sustainability governance
- Technology
What does a stronger Europe actually require? Demos Helsinki’s comments on the State of the Union.
September 18, 2026
Drawing on three EU-funded research projects, we examine the tensions behind von der Leyen’s State of the Union address. Technological sovereignty risks deepening the dependencies it aims to reduce; climate resilience requires funding architecture that lets mitigation and adaptation reinforce each other; and Europe’s strength cannot be measured by economic indicators alone. A stronger Europe, we argue, depends less on ambition than on governance capable of delivering it.
→ Continue reading
The next frontier for circularity is governance
September 17, 2026
For cross-cutting policy issues, like the transition to circularity, Demos Helsinki has developed a model that works: beating uncertainty through action, empowering relevant stakeholders with autonomy in problem solving, building a shared coordination structure, and adapting through learning what works. The model has been proven to move the circularity agenda forward, despite its complexity and fluctuating political significance.
→ Continue reading
Governing with cities: Europe’s overlooked governance infrastructure
July 21, 2026
The Cities Mission functioned as a natural experiment that revealed an overlooked property of European governance: cities do not merely implement policy more effectively; they generate governing capacity and governance knowledge that Europe should intentionally incorporate into policy design through a revised multilevel governance architecture.
→ Continue reading