95: SPECIAL EPISODE - Launch of the Strathclyde Institute for Sustainable Communities

Matt is joined by Dr Jen Roberts as they share the launch of their brand new institute - the Strathclyde Institute for Sustainable Communities, or SISC for short. We hear from some of the attendees and also some selected highlights from the event itself.

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

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Matt: Local Zero is brought to you by the University of Strathclyde, home of the Strathclyde Institute for Sustainable Communities.

Matt: Hello and welcome to Local Zero. This is a very different episode today because today we have launched the Strathclyde Institute for Sustainable Communities. Jen and I are here, we're exhausted, we're jubilant and everything in between. For the uninitiated, long term and long time guest of the pod, Dr. Jen Roberts, who is also co director of SISC, the Strathclyde Institute for Sustainable Communities.

Matt: So, Jen, we've just been through that. Why did we do it? What was it for? And how did it go?

Jen: It went absolutely brilliantly. As far as I can tell. What did we do it for? Um, it was amazing to have so many people in the room today to contribute to be part of this launch event. We have about two thirds of people external. So from about 35 to 40 different organizations.

Jen: And the rest were internal, so from Strathclyde. And there are people here that I've not met before, and I've not heard about their work. So it's amazing to see the very purpose of this institute in action already, in that we're teasing out, we're bringing together people from across the university who are working on research and knowledge exchange to support sustainable communities.

Matt: Remind me, what is the institute about? What's the Tagline. Unlocking grassroots action for sustainable development. Okay, well, we'll try it. We'll maybe have to practice a couple of times. Yeah, really, the Institute, I guess, is set up to explore, examine, critique different grassroots, community led approaches to delivering sustainable development.

Matt: What do they look like? What do they feel like? What's frustrating them or enabling them? And crucially, how do we connect these types of activities with bigger regional, national, international governance? Like, how do we connect the bottom up to the top down?

Jen: And we want to really see good examples of where it's working.

Jen: There are so many examples where it's not working. Very frustrated, very tired communities, really, really wanting transition and change. They like it. They're having a great time outside. But we want to see where, what is working, what works well, who does it work for, and why. And what can we learn from that?

Matt: Yeah, so it's been a long time coming. This institute, I guess, was probably born in the dark recesses of my brain many years ago, but today is when we've actually launched it, and we've got real humanoids in the room, listening and hearing what we have to say. And why was it born? Well, really, it was a about this frustration that everything is so centralized and top down that we have this drive towards net zero and sustainable development without really pausing, asking and enabling communities to participate part of that decision making.

Matt: It feels very much like a process that's being done to them rather than with them. And my fear is that if we don't bring communities along with us, well, you know, we've got hell to pay along the line. Climate change won't be delivered unless it's, there's change in our kitchens, our driveways, our schoolyards, our church halls, um, and so it's people first and it's community led.

Jen: In many ways, the Institute feels brand new. It's launched today. It feels like this has already existed. Through the work and activities that we've been doing, it felt like very natural to be here today. The feeling was one that has been active for some time before the launch.

Matt: A christening more than a birth.

Jen: Yeah, absolutely, a naming ceremony. And I think, um, another thing that's been really standing out to me, and as part of the motivation for starting this institute, is the fact that sustainable futures is so much more than carbon molecules. It's not just about net zero, it's about better health, it's about better well being, it's about better planet, it's about nature, environment, it's the whole system.

Jen: This whole system approach and the stuff that Matt talks about these approaches decision making being piecemeal at the moment It's not joined up and that's part of the the issue is that we're not taking this whole system Holistic approach to what sustainable development sustainable futures mean.

Jen: What does it mean and look like to live in a sustainable world and that I've really felt has come through this morning's conversations and showcase.

Matt: So this episode of local zero will be the highlight reel You of the launch today, where we'll be hearing from guest speakers, from those involved in the Institute, some of the discussion that followed.

Matt: You'll also hear from bits and pieces from the lunch that followed after and the poster session. So we're really trying to wrap up the juiciest morsels from today's launch into a short, sharp, sweet episode.

Jen: We really hope you enjoy the episode and that you get an idea of the different flavours of activity and issues and priorities and goals and hopes and visions for this Institute.

Matt: Good morning. What a fantastic turnout. It really is a genuine pleasure to see so many people here, so many familiar faces. Today we're launching the Strathclyde Institute for Sustainable Communities. Uh, because it's such a mouthful, we're going to call it SISC, okay? Um, it's not a disorder of any type or an ailment.

Matt: Um, this is an institute that Jen and I have been, been really developing for some time, and it's been through the support of the Dean of the Business School, David Hillier, who you'll hear from shortly, and also the Dean of Engineering Department. Many of you will be familiar with Stephen McArthur.

Matt: We've been able to make this happen, and today I'm going to begin and tell you a little bit about why the Institute is needed, why it's important, and I get the impression some of you might feel the need for an institute like this, otherwise we wouldn't have had selling out in the way that we have. So I really appreciate you coming here, and I do think this is the right time for this institute.

Matt: The right university in the right city and more broadly, the right country that the timing feels absolutely 100 percent right. So, so please, you know, very, very warm welcome. Um, and I, you know, I guess our tagline, I'm going to unpack this term, but unlocking grassroots action for a sustainable future.

Matt: There's, there's a lot in that to pick apart. And if you commit me in a few minutes, I will.

Malcolm: Hi there, my name is Malcolm Coombe. I'm a Senior Lecturer at the Law School at the University of Strathclyde, focusing mainly on property law and housing law, but I've got quite a big interest in land reform as well. And it's been great to be here at the Strathclyde Business School today. Delighted to be at the launch event of the Institute for Sustainable Communities.

Malcolm: I've done some work with Matt and Ian in the past. Ian's work on retrofitting tenement buildings, I was part of that actually, to look at some of the legal regulation around that. But today I was mainly speaking about some of the land reform work that I've done in the past. Helping out maybe community bodies with requests as to how the legislation that we've got in Scotland works.

Malcolm: And also pondering some other issues. We've got a new land reform bill that's going through the Scottish Parliament just now. I think it's really about crystallizing some of the work that's going on in, I won't say silos, because I don't think we're completely closed off at the university, but actually bringing together academics who might not otherwise work together, um, and showcasing what we're working with, trying to make new connections, but also, um, without meaning to sound trite, you hear a lot about universities and ivory towers.

Malcolm: Strathclyde to me has never been about being an ivory tower, but an institute like this can absolutely bring us to players in industry, players in the third sector, local community actors, and that's going to be far more effective than a paper in an academic journal.

Malcolm: Uh, so hopefully something like this will give a platform and may actually lead to concrete, is that the right word, change in the future.

Matt: Hello,

Justina: my name is Justina Kardash and I'm Vice President Community at Strathclyde Students Association, also known as Strath Union. I came along today to know more about sustainability and how community interacts with it because of my personal interests in it because I'm, I'm honestly, I'm leaving the role quite soon and I'm kind of branching out to see where I fit in and where I can go next, but also in my role as VP Community, I see still care about students and spreading the student awareness and agenda into these conversations is very important because when you look at Strathclyde itself, there's 25, 000 students and 4, 000 staff.

Justina: So that's already quite a big, big gap to bridge. Um, and if there's half Strathclyde people in this room, half externals, where do the students fit in? That's my big question.

Matt: This really relies. upon, in my view, an acknowledgement that a lot of this action, this energy, this passion, and also, frankly, the ideas in the capital is going to come from citizens.

Matt: If we leave them behind, well, we can't accomplish what we're setting out to achieve. And a lot of this boils down to a more decentralized decision making model where citizens feel empowered. But also enriched, and I don't believe we have that today. And I fear, I think, for the trajectory that we're on in terms of realizing our broader objective, not just environmentally, not just economically, but socially too.

Matt: So the next phase of this transition is going to be more challenging. The second, I often hear it referred to as the second half of the football match, right? The first half, we know we've accomplished those kind of 50 percent reduction in emissions, but the next half is going to be really challenging.

Matt: Some of the sectors that we've got to dig into, much, much more complicated, much more demand side than supply side, the power is your supply side, demand side, we're starting to involve citizens, communities, consumers, and this will involve more decision making. And I often use this term often to rolling eyes of colleagues, but I say that we're kind of shifting, I think a little bit from the decisions made around the boardroom table to the kitchen table.

Matt: Or indeed the town hall table, whatever that may be or whatever form that might take. But the decisions that we now need to make aren't necessarily going to be able to be achieved in the way that they have currently. I'm not saying businesses aren't important, they're absolutely integral to this. If I was saying anything else in a business school, the dean in the corner there would throw something at my head, but I think we're missing the bigger picture here.

Matt: So communities are on the frontline of the transition to sustainability. They're also critical to its success. They can frustrate or enable this, and we've seen this recently through things like the ultra low emission zone in London, the low traffic neighborhoods in many of your homes and neighborhoods, the deposit return scheme.

Arne: I'm Dr. Arne Verhoeven. I'm from the University of Edinburgh. I am the Director for Sustainable Development for our Art College, the Edinburgh College of Art. Part of that interest in coming to this event today is, uh, is multiple. One is the idea of sustainability, and the other is the idea of communities.

Arne: What constitutes a community? How do communities form? How do communities operate? How do communities govern themselves? But also, how do communities mobilize in order to take action towards making change? So, how do they develop sustainable action plans? How do they identify what needs to be done in terms of sustainable action plans?

Arne: And how do they eventually become agents of change so that they can live those sustained action plans. Boundaries and barriers are very interesting phenomena. So how do you, A, how do we circumscribe a community? So some people will be in and some people won't. Uh, we've got two institutions with Strathclyde taking the way.

Arne: And one of my questions was, well, how do other institutions, uh, academic institutions partner? Uh, there's this notion of Scotland. But we're right on the doorstep of three other major nations who are also having agendas to decarbonize and, and become sustainable. Yeah, we live on a single planet. Uh, the, the impact that we're having is going to require a a concerted approach that's ultimately all of us have to do it together.

Arne: Uh, so I'm very interested to stay plugged in to everything. I think what's happening in Scotland is very, very interesting. Uh, it's very exciting. I think it's very forward. And hopefully there's something that we can learn by working together that we can also export to other, uh, significant parts of the world, like our southern neighbors or our eastern and western partners.

Shahesteh: Hello, my name is Shahesteh Moghaddas. I'm a PhD student in the Strathclyde Business School in the marketing department, and then the topic which I'm working is sustainability in the hotel industry. And I found these, uh, institutions. is a place that we need, especially for the PGR students that are doing a PhD in sustainability in different areas of the research.

Shahesteh: We need somewhere that we can refer to and then be engaged and contribute to the community. I'm so glad for having this and I have this opportunity that I had it during my time here. I hope that our PhD thesis don't only show up in the library, or only be published in a paper, in a journal, or conferences.

Shahesteh: We wanted to contribute to the community, as I mentioned, and I think that this is what a lot of PhD students wanted, to make sure that they have a, there will be a bridge between the academia and the industry, and the PhD students research can help for these matters. So, I think that, uh, this can be very useful for us, that make sure that, even though it's helping for employment matters, so when we engage with the industry, then there are a lot of opportunity for the students to be employed.

Shahesteh: Not only we just focusing on the research, focusing on the paper and conference, and forget about the community. And what is our contribution to the community.

Matt: New approaches are really needed around decision making. So how we make decisions needs to change. This is a line I've lifted from my, my deputy director, co director. Jen, how we make decisions needs to change. I think there's nothing more profound than that. It's not necessarily what we're doing, but how we're doing it.

Matt: And unless we bring communities along, unless they feel this way, they will resist rather than embrace. And at the moment, that might seem like a mild inconvenience. Well, you just wait until that hits the ballot box. You just wait until that hits your bottom line, and people start voting, not just with the ballot, but with their wallet.

Matt: It becomes problematic. There is much to be learned. There's some fantastic examples of best practice across Scotland and beyond, about how we can make this happen. But I want to go beyond. I want to ask, well, how do we stop this? scale that up, connect together and coordinate. And that's bigger questions about how we rewire this decision making governance framework, where all of a sudden we're putting organizations between the local and the regional, we're connecting the activities that are happening locally.

Matt: And here there's a two way, more balanced flow. Because I'm not saying we should live in some decentralized nirvana. I'm not suggesting that for one minute, but what I am saying is it's lopsided and that there needs to be a greater balance here and a connection between the scale and the, the centralized coordination that top down affords us and the energy, the excitement.

Matt: And the empowerment and enrichment that that bottom up provides. Today is about enjoying and connecting. So, listen, thank you for coming. I'm going to hand over to Professor David Hillier. Thank you, David.

David: Thanks, Matt. What a turnout today. It's absolutely incredible when you, when Matt came to me with Jen and Ian to pitch the idea of an Institute for Sustainable Communities. You never ever know if it's going to be something that will take off or not. You know, we've got a lot of activity and sustainability at the university, and there's always a concern that having a new sustainability initiative, does it cannibalize?

David: Other work that we're doing in the rest of the university, and that that that was a real concern. It's a real concern that we have to make sure that any new initiative is complimentary to what we're doing already, and I think I sincerely believe that this, um, institute is complimentary and it adds so much value to what we do as a university, the university, for those of you who are not from Strathclyde, we've got a motto of being a place of useful learning.

David: Our very origins is about reaching out into the community and bringing people that wouldn't otherwise have access to higher education into a university. And that's what, that was one of the purposes from the very beginning of this institution back in 1796. And, and right at the very beginning of our vision is the idea of communities, of improving communities.

David: And this for me really, like really addresses something that I don't think society. is, is currently considering. And Matt talks about, is this something that we've forgotten? But in actual fact, I would want to put it back to you and say, well, this whole idea of subsidiarity where the communities have the power is enshrined in European law.

David: It's from the, the beginning of the European Union, we, we pushed forward the principle of subsidiarity where communities should be trying to solve problems for themselves and where they can't solve them. They then bring in a higher level of organization. And that's what for me, the Institute for Sustainable Communities is all about how do we get communities to start exercising subsidiarity?

David: How do we get 'em empowered? How do we get 'em to feel that they can make a difference? And by having that feeling of making a difference. They can then enact meaningful change. And for me, that's why this is so important.

Finlay: My name's Finlay Baincare. I'm a PhD researcher here at Strathclyde. I've been helping set up today's event and sort of being involved in the kind of process of like launching this institute.

Finlay: I think today's gone, gone swimmingly really. It's gone brilliant. Just, we weren't sure on, you know, numbers and turnout, how enthused people would be, but we had like almost no dropouts. Almost everyone came that said they wanted to be here. Um, and yeah, there's just been a real brilliant energy and sort of enthusiasm.

Finlay: I think most importantly, it's not about, you know, today people aren't coming here to get solutions and uncover new knowledge necessarily, because it's a lot of informed people that are here. But what is allowed us to have is a space for connection and conversation and just to like reprint, you know, On the agenda, the right, maybe the right questions and the right direction of travel.

Finlay: And people seem to be in broad agreement with a lot of the things that, you know, we've said and that we want to explore. So, so that's really exciting and I guess, yeah, the process of putting this together has just allowed us to To connect with so many people and find out what's happening in Scotland and, and more widely, um, in this kind of community, uh, sustainable community space.

Finlay: It would be brilliant if we could, you know, look back in a couple of years and, you know, demonstrably look at communities that we had worked with and had improved some aspect of their, their wellbeing and how they live their lives. Whether it's, you know, related to the, the range of issues we've talked about here, energy, transport, housing, health.

Finlay: Just how to live well in community that we've in some way played a role in, you know, improving their lives and in the way that they want their lives to be improved. And hopefully on that journey we've brought in different partners and connected people that otherwise might have not been able to to connect or know about each other.

Finlay: So thank you so much for asking me to speak here today and a huge congratulations to Matthew and Jen and the team for creating this institute, the need for which could not be more urgent. The Scottish Government is committed to becoming net zero by 2045, but in recent weeks, Scotland's aspiration to be a global climate leader has experienced a major setback with the decision to drop the 2030 net zero target.

Miriam: This should be a rallying cry for action. We need credible, um, urgent plans to decarbonise key sectors, particularly in areas like transport, agriculture, heatings and buildings, some of which I know you're working on already. Delivering net zero is not only a climate imperative, it is also Scotland's single greatest economic opportunity.

Miriam: As it stands, however, much more needs to be done to ensure that communities benefit from the wealth generated in the transition to net zero. How we decarbonise, who benefits from it and who is in the room making those decisions really matters. Some people point to the fear of workers and the communities they support losing their livelihoods as a rationale for inaction or slow action to tackle climate breakdown.

Miriam: Importantly, however, the origin story of a just transition is rooted in the worker movement, specifically in the fight to protect future jobs and livelihoods of workers and communities supported by carbon intensive industries. I think it's particularly vital to remember that origin story in Scotland as deindustrialisation are still visible today.

Miriam: In our former steel mining and coal communities, the presence of which should serve as a reminder. That the seismic shift in our labour market and industrial base to achieve a climate resilient economy must be centred on a thriving future for workers and communities. At Future Economy Scotland we advocate for three key priority areas which I've mentioned before.

Miriam: Decarbonising the economy, democratising the economy and decommodifying the economy. I've seen quite a bit of news recently and it's something that I know Miriam's colleague Laurie will comment on in terms of rent controls have been in the news quite a lot at the moment. We've got the new housing bill.

Miriam: The consultation for that finishes later this week, uh, there's a lot going on. Um, a lot of people have been saying things like, oh, rent controls never work and what have you. It's not quite as simple as that. I've done some work with Peter Robson, formerly of this parish, in terms of research. So it's, the wrong rent controls don't work, sure, but there's a lot more to it than that.

Miriam: And if you end up getting questions of housing wrong, um, then you can end up with changes to local communities and you're, you're seeing gentrification. And I know, I mean, as someone who was here renting a place in Denniston in the noughties, it was a very different place to what it is now. Um, so we need to think about bigger questions as well as, um, just sort of the, the nuts and bolts support the legislation.

Miriam: But the haves are also part of the community as well as the have nots. So, people like that need to be engaged as well. So, that's a challenge for us, it's a challenge for the community. Uh, I can't just stand up here and go, land reform isn't it great, but there are lots of things that we need to think about.

Miriam: Um, so, Jen's walking forward, I'll stop talking and I'll walk away.

Miriam: Thank you so much for these challenges in communities, come back to land. Fidgeting around, looking around the room. Who's expensive lawyers? Any expensive lawyers in the room? No? Does anyone in the room work on land, land access, land management?

Miriam: A couple of hands. Okay, look around to check each other out. And chat over lunch. Can I have a show of hands with the people that have been on the Local Zero podcast? Because I think there's a lot. That's tiny. Okay, come with the hands a bit higher.

Francesco: Hello, my name is Francesco Sindico. I work at the law school here at Strathclyde. I'm a professor of international environmental law. As always, we have several hats. So I'm also working for the International Union for the Conservation of Nature, and I collaborate with the International Water Resources Association and the Climate Change Legal Initiative.

Francesco: But interestingly, also in the context of this institute, for three years, almost three years, I was in secondment with the Scottish Government, where I led the Carbon Neutral Islands Project, a commitment to support six islands in Scotland to become carbon neutral by 2040. I very much look forward to working with the Institute.

Francesco: Uh, I feel there's a need to better understand the three words, as I said in the, in the session. Uh, who are the communities? What does sustainability mean for the communities? And what can an institute do for the communities? So I emphasize the for the communities a lot. A lot of times researchers sit in a university and think on behalf of communities without being that community.

Francesco: And Often that comes from the good heart, uh, good part of your heart, but it's not the right way. So how to embed communities into the institute, that's going to be a big challenge. Communities, members of communities, whatever that may mean, are super busy, have a life, have priorities, so how do you bring them in to co shape, co drive an institute for sustainable communities?

Francesco: I think that's going to be one of the biggest challenges for the institute. To me, if you speak to a community it would be nice to have a person who speaks on behalf of that community. And I say this to many of my colleagues often that, uh, although I haven't lived in Italy for many, many years, but in other countries, you go to the mayor.

Francesco: You may hate the mayor, most people do hate the mayor, but the mayor is the democratically represent, elected of the community, be it of a small island or a small village or of a big city. And often we don't have that here. Yeah, we have community counselors, but it's not exactly the same thing. So that to me is also a big challenge in the context also of the institute, uh, where you cannot or you should not go and speak to 433 members of the community.

Francesco: Who do you speak to? That's a big challenge.

Laura: Hello, my name is Laura Major. I'm a Research Fellow and Anthropologist, um, and I'm embedded in the Civil and Environmental Engineering Department at the University of Strathclyde. The popcorn event was a chance to hear from a range of different people, Who are, um, involved in research that relates to the issues of sustainable communities.

Laura: Um, and so it was very grateful to be asked to, uh, speak, um, at that, uh, session. And about, uh, water and its significance for communities in rural Scotland and its great significance for the issue of sustainability. Um, and it's something that hasn't been in public consciousness. It's not very often discussed as an issue.

Laura: Um, but it should be because there are lots of challenges. Um, and there are also lots of opportunities to use, um, lots of really fantastic expertise and enthusiasm for water and water infrastructure that's out there amongst rural communities and could really help address some of those challenges. It was a fantastic opportunity just to get more of a sense of the Strathclyde.

Laura: Institute for Sustainable Communities and what it's going to be all about. Um, so not just the nuts and bolts of things but to get a sense of what the character of the institution is going to be like based on who's in the room and what they were talking about and the energy of the space. Um, and that was fantastic because it just felt like There are so many people working in this area who can come together under the Institute umbrella and who've got so much enthusiasm for this and knowledge and, um, expertise that will be really critical in coming up with the solutions that we need for some of the issues that were discussed today.

Laura: Um, so it was very, it was very inspirational. I think, I think one of the things that struck me was it is one of the first events that I've come to recently, in which there was such a great representation and distribution of people from both within Strathclyde and from institutions and organizations external to Strathclyde.

Laura: Um, so if that's something If those kind of relationships and the presence of those people are something that Institute can build on, that's going to be an enormous strength because it's very difficult to do that.

Matt: Thanks so much for dialling in, listening to the pod and understanding a bit more about the Institute and its launch. We look forward to welcoming you back shortly. See you again soon.

Matt: Produced by Bespoken Media.