Taking a walk for sustainability
- Topics: Sustainability, Diversity, Ecological Justice, and Climate Change
- Key Actors: Researcher and Conference Participants
- Outputs: Field Estimeter
- Events: ARUA Climate Change and Inequalities Symposium 2023, Capetown; DeGrowth Conference 2024, Pontevedra
- Timespan: February 2023
Want to hear how can participatory formats promote innovative exchange at international conferences and make diverse perspectives visible?
Listen to the audio walk.
The ARUA Climate Change and Inequalities Symposium
The international climate conference in Cape Town brought together many, many scientists, primarily from African countries, to address the pressing challenges of the climate crisis and its associated inequalities: from leveling access to energy, water and waste disposal to unequal protection against the effects of extreme weather events and the resulting disasters.
High Complexity
Specialist conferences like the ARUA must pack a lot of complex content into a dense program. This often makes it difficult for participants to actively immerse themselves in the topics, which in turn impairs exchange and understanding. In response to this dilemma, we developed the interactive audio walk and the field estimator method. The audio walk encouraged participants to contribute their perspectives actively and thus integrate the complexity of their views into the conference discourse.
Unusual Insights
With the Field Estimeter, we offered participants a means of visualizing expectations and insights.
A mood board was created, via Padlet, to which everyone contributed; this brought to the fore participant diversity and the oft-overheard voices of soft-spoken or reticent individuals. This method shed light on the wide variety of cultural perspectives, but also revealed how exclusion and inequality are perceived differently. Our integrative approach promotes a multi-layered and more inclusive research practice.
KITE Project Team
Miriam Lahusen, Florian Sametinger, Alexander Müller-Rakow, and Lina Audehm