Publications
Reports, analysis and policy recommendations for brave leaders and communities.
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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The European Democracy Shield is a timely and commendable initiative aimed at addressing the EU’s growing democratic challenges. However, it would benefit from a more human-centered approach focusing on citizen participation, civil society engagement, and more nuanced policies on digital regulation.
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The answer isn’t less democracy, but more. New participatory and deliberative processes aimed at involving citizens in decision-making are gaining traction across Europe, but their long-term success depends on how well they are embedded into the public administration and society.
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How can countries strengthen their capacity for long-term governance and ensure that future generations are taken into account in decision-making? In this white paper, we highlight ways to promote anticipatory governance based on the views of key Finnish stakeholders. By translating the Finnish experience into a broader context, we aim to provide universally applicable strategies for advancing long-term governance and promoting intergenerational justice.
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Experimentalism is a ‘hidden third option’ that overcomes pre-existing dichotomies and can update the governance of R&I funding while steering it towards societal transformation.
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What are the most appropriate institutional arrangements for effective governance? How can governance systems effectively operate across different levels, such as local, regional, national, and supranational? How can governments improve their capacity to evaluate policies, learn from successes and failures, and adapt to changing circumstances? By transforming the civil service, we can answer these questions.
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In this discussion paper, written together with Marcos Bonturi, former director of Public Governance at the OECD, Demos Helsinki shares the recent learnings in the field of public governance, identified four characteristics that describe a desirable future government, and presents inspirational governance innovation -cases from Finland, Brazil, Colombia and Serbia.
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While current efforts towards the smarter use of natural resources exist, raising the prospect of promising economic growth, as of today little attention is paid to the market opportunities beyond them. This paper presents a fresh approach for linking the smart use of resources with business.
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Compared to large companies, substantially less attention has been paid to mid-size companies as forerunners of strategic sustainability practices. However, there are various reasons to assume that the best examples of strategic sustainability might be found amongst mid-size companies.
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Imagining how life would look like in a sustainable world where ‘one planet living’ has been attained might be difficult. That’s why we created four potential future scenarios to describe what sustainable lifestyles in Europe might look like in 2050 and to identify the pathways towards reaching it. Our scenarios are not predictions or forecasts but instead seek to
explore the most extreme yet sustainable possibilities, in order to help e.g. policy makers and designers think of the currently “unthinkable”.
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In recent years, we have witnessed the emergence of more sustainable products, services, and experimental bottom-up initiatives. They have signaled new hope that more sustainable ways of living are achievable for all, while celebrating diversity, in post-industrial societies.
Despite these developments, existing promising sustainable living practices are not enough as they remain dwarfed by the unsustainable impacts of the average European’s current lifestyles.
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It is a common misconception that material scarcity – be it climate change or the peak production of natural resources from oil to phosphor – would lead into a similar linear development in our lives that the increased wealth and expansion of the middle classes did, except with a downward trajectory. This paper presents an alternative view; a view that takes a look at the actual material footprints of people from several European countries and the lives behind the footprints.
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The greatest opportunity for success in metropolitan regions lies in their
ability to realise the potential of their inhabitants. But how can we
create regional vitality without eroding the foundations of tomorrow’s success?
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