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Our latest updates, thoughts, and events — as they roll out.
As natural resources become scarcer, giant companies of the old guard are in trouble. At Flow Talks Even Heggernes from Airbnb, Minister of the Environment Ville Niinistö, Marko Ahtisaari from MIT Media Lab, and Tero Ojanperä from Vision+ shed light on how resource scarcity next turns to transform consumer markets….
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Flow Festival expands as Demos Helsinki together with Slush and Flow bring the sharpest knives from the world of startups, smart cities and social movements to Flow Talks in Suvilahti on the 8th of August. Flow Talks Smartup Summit continues a series of talks on sustainable growth organised by Demos…
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After almost ten years of existence Demos Helsinki takes a remarkable step forward: we launch Demos Effect to help businesses to reach for markets growing from wicked opportunities. “Wicked opportunities” arise from “wicked problems”, a category of problems like the climate change, natural resources scarcity, obesity and other lifestyle diseases, that differ from…
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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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Doomed to grow or ready to transform?
December 3, 2025
Economic growth used to be a cause that had effects, and the desired and expected effects were a matter of political and public debate until the 1990s recession. The meanings and expectations towards growth changed over time, and the idea of economic growth evolved within the debates and the very varied perspectives to growth. Our report “Doomed to Grow” calls for acknowledging growth’s historical recent origins and past pluralism in how economic growth has been discussed.
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20 years of trying
November 28, 2025
For 20 years, we have been fighting for a fair, sustainable, and joyful next era. These are the beginnings of our journey.
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Europe’s democratic resilience requires introspection, clear-sightedness and reimagination
September 16, 2025
The European Democracy Shield (EUDS) is being prepared to bolster the continent’s democratic resilience. If it isn’t to become one of innumerable democracy initiatives, EU institutions need to be clear-sighted about the causes and stakes of our present moment.
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