Linking Scientific Knowledge on Biodiversity Loss to Concrete, Hopeful Action: Insights from the 'Navigating the Anthropocene' Conference
By Tamalone van den Eijnden
On January 30st, Esther Turnhout, Tamalone van den Eijnden and Iris Poels from the initiative Voedselpark Amsterdam joined the “Navigating the Anthropocene” conference at the VU Amsterdam. One central question was about the role of science in the face of climate change and biodiversity loss. Is it possible to have ‘value-free’ knowledge on these complex and entangled issues? In the closing keynote of the conference, reporting from her Participatory Action Research with the IPBES, Esther Turnhout powerfully showed how knowledge is not neutral. Importantly, this does not relativize knowledge. Instead, it is a call for action and a call for solidarity for better worlds.
Perhaps some of the urgently needed action and solidarity was happening, when members of Voedselpark Amsterdam, throughout the day, were conducting their sunflower protest, an artistic and regenerative action for which Voedselpark Amsterdam is currently crafting seed-bombs from clay and sunflower seeds from the Lutkemeerpolder to protest against building distribution centres on fertile soil. In doing so, Voedselpark Amsterdam was also showing the academic audience how scientific knowledge on climate change and biodiversity loss needs to be tied to concrete and hopeful actions.
“Voedselpark Amsterdam was showing the academic audience how scientific knowledge on climate change and biodiversity loss needs to be tied to concrete and hopeful actions”
In the panel “Making a collage for commons-friendly value translations” Anna Kooi, Ciska Ulug and Tamalone further thought about how values feature in the production of knowledge. And also, how knowledge about values can be produced and shared. Commons are often dismissed as not being financially profitable. Yet, this is a narrow perspective, because we know that the commons allow to produce a plurality of values far beyond financial terms. How can we tell this story? After a round of small presentations on their experiences with working with food commons, Anna Kooi, Ciska Ulug and Tamalone van den Eijnden made a collage together with the audience/participants. The result was a partial and fractured collage. It shows how values can be thought and represented differently. For them, this collage is not done. Rather, it is a starting point to further rethink value beyond financial indicators and how to develop a language to share these values with others.
