The "regenerative" metaphor, as a vision for new economic and social models, is enriched at the RSA

From RSA

It’s good to find the cutting edge all the time - but it’s also worth noting when a radical concept you’ve been heralding enters the mainstream. So it is with “regenerative” economics and communities - one of our main focuses on our recent Planet A reframe.

And we’re delighted to see these principles land with such an august institution as The Royal Society of the Arts (The RSA), as evidenced by this thoughtful essay (and a body of work over the last two years).

There are mentions here for projects we have championed in the past, like the Library of Things and the Onion Collective, Earth Logic fashion, and Civic Square. The RSA minds apply themselves to distilling five principles of regenerative practice, which it’s fascinating to see through their filter. Here’s an extract:

1. From planning to experimenting

Where ideas evolve and outcomes are not predetermined

With complex challenges, there is no manual or blueprint to follow. Instead of planning and then acting, we need to experiment our way forward, trying things and adapting as a result of what we learn. Sometimes this might be about generating new ideas and sometimes the most appropriate solutions already exist but need adapting to new contexts.

Take the fashion industry, which is at present riddled with problems, creating huge volumes of waste and pollution and driving poor labour conditions for many workers. Some believe that in tackling this, automation could improve conditions. Others argue that higher wages are the way forward, while some think that the solution is to dramatically reduce the amount of clothes we buy. It is of course possible that all these ideas have a role to play; what is certain is that there is no one perfect fashion system out there for us to find. We need to figure out what works by testing and evolving along the way.

One way to do this is to prototype, or practically test ideas, early and often, gathering feedback about what is working and what is not. This learning helps to improve each iteration. For example, recipients of RSA Catalyst funding the Library of Things used this approach to develop their tool and equipment library in south London.

They started off aiming to provide a cheaper, less wasteful alternative to families buying DIY tools. The Fellows involved had a hunch that creating a service like this might also boost community relationships. Rather than planning the whole venture from start to finish, they did a series of experiments, starting with trialling the service from a high-street pop-up shop. The feedback they received from people using the service helped them to develop the next phase of the project, which saw it running near to a local waste collection site.

They have also been able to test what people want to borrow and to hone down their list of equipment. Today, the Library of Things is a self-service model housed in a public library. The team has continued to learn, share insights in the UK and further afield, and a second site has now opened in East London.

Experimentation can happen at different scales, from start-up social enterprises to larger interventions. Indeed, complex challenges are unlikely to be resolved through a single intervention, so a response to issues of scale is to take a portfolio approach to experimentation, where a handful of interventions are trialled together, each aimed towards a shared goal or outcome. 

EIT Climate-KIC last year launched their Deep Demonstration initiatives, an ambitious set of initiatives designed to show what is possible when a series of integrated and mission-led interventions work together to affect wider change. Their Healthy, Clean Cities Demonstration, for example, is working with 15 European cities to look at waste, mobility, heat, power, buildings, infrastructure, fuel poverty, skills, jobs, well-being, as a set of interrelated city challenges and not as individual problems. They believe that trialling a range of initiatives together can result in not just more evidence of the impact of individual projects but can also help to spot where changes have a dynamic impact, working well in combination.

This approach is akin to the investment world, where a venture capitalist knows that only some of her investments will pay off. The difference here is that the returns sought are insight and impact, so dedication to building in impact measures and learning is critical.

The RSA has experiments running in the fashion system, to better understand how we might move away from its damaging linear ‘take, make, waste model’. In partnership with the Ellen MacArthur Foundation, we are in the process of developing a programme of support for pioneering creatives and this year’s Student Design Awards programme has encouraged the next generation of designers to apply their skills to the challenge through a Make Fashion Circular design brief.

From a contemporary take on a high street laundrette to a service for reusing maternity clothing, the finalists have each approached the challenge from different directions, but they have all prototyped and iterated their ideas in the process.

2. From problem solving to pattern shifting

Where we look at the deeper causes behind the problems we notice

Humans have an affinity for spotting and solving problems, and this is important. But it is even more valuable to recognise patterns, as they provide information that can help prevent new problems emerging and tackle root causes. Again, the fashion industry provides a useful example.

As the problems with the industry have become more evident, people have set out to solve them, and in recent years we have seen a proliferation of brands making tweaks to their collections, from using organic cotton to recycled polyester. These are important responses, but they are insufficient and do little to address the connected issues of waste or labour conditions.

We need to shift our focus to also look at the deeper patterns; questioning the function of the industry, addressing consumption patterns and the values that link human worth to what we look like, and tackling the economic structures that incentivise businesses to make more.

For example, in their document Earth Logic: Fashion Action Research Plan, fashion academics Kate Fletcher and Mathilda Tham encourage us to shift our thinking from what they call ‘growth logic’ — where the focus is on driving economic growth at all costs — to ‘Earth Logic’, where the focus is on planetary and human wellbeing.

Another intervention encouraging this kind of shift in thinking is the Boundless Roots Community, facilitated by RSA Fellow Leila Hoballah. People from organisations such as UNEP and Transition Network are leading action inquiries into sustainable living and exploring the deeper patterns underpinning our lives, such as privilege, power dynamics and collective psychology. This form of collaborative inquiry gives space to ask questions about where there is potential to work together for more ambitious action, without assuming to provide solutions up front.

When spotting patterns, what you choose to notice and what you choose to ignore matters greatly. Assumptions and bias can influence individual and collective thinking, so it’s essential to be alert to gaps and drill into assumptions. As we look to accelerate the circular economy, for example, how can we ensure we focus attention on potential social, as well as environmental impacts? Might more rental of products encourage consolidation of power in the hands of the better off or some businesses, or might we find sharing and rental models which instead build community cohesion?

Choosing what information is noticed, and who is involved in spotting and shifting patterns, brings us to the third shift in mindset needed.

3. From single to multiple perspectives

Where more views build a more useful picture

We often look to a specific kind of expertise to solve problems. This can work well for challenges where deep knowledge of a particular domain is critical. But for complex problems, a diversity of ideas is also needed. Complex problems look different from different perspectives; no one person can see the full picture and by missing certain perspectives we may end up addressing perceived rather than real challenges.

This is especially important when those working on the problems are not the people who are experiencing them, as is often the case with work on social and climate justice. To have the best chance of creating a more equitable and sustainable future, it is important to proactively embrace different perspectives, experiences and ways of seeing the world.

Involving diverse perspectives can be achieved in many ways, from the light touch, where communities might take part in exercises to map or capture experiences, through to more structured and formal frameworks and methodologies.

Consider the UK government’s commitment for the country to reach net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. How should we do this? Climate scientists can tell us how global temperatures are changing, engineers can tell us how renewable energy can be created and architects can tell us the energy efficiency of the housing stock. But none of them alone can tell us how we should become net zero. They can only bring their specific expertise to bear.

For the commitment to be realised, we need the behaviours of a whole country to change. Individuals, companies, communities, need to see the role they can play and commit to that role. In the UK, it is reassuring then to see six Parliamentary Select Committees addressing these issues, not only asking for evidence and advice from experts, but also commissioning a citizens’ Climate Assembly.

Over 100 citizens were selected via sortition and met at the start of this year to hear from a range of speakers, discuss the challenges and reach conclusions. The outputs from these discussions will form the basis of the Select Committees’ future work. Rather than mandating hierarchical change, this form of leadership creates a space for discussion among a group with diverse perspectives.

4. From place-agnostic to place-based

Where identity and context guide outcomes

Best practice can assume that the conditions everywhere are the same. We know, of course, that this isn’t true. The character and conditions of a place are the result of physical and cultural features weaving together over generations.

When thinking of our own neighbourhoods we recognise this readily, yet when it comes to interventions in the built environment, or economy or culture, too often solutions are dropped into a place because they have worked elsewhere. Instead of being agnostic on place, then, how can initiatives grow from and respond to the characteristics of a locality?

The Fibershed initiative started by Rebecca Burgess in California, is founded on growing from place. It asks how plants and animals suited to the habitat of a region can be harnessed to create a local textile system which brings benefits to the local society and economy and regenerates the local ecology. Much more akin to traditional textile cultures, this approach is a stark contrast to the globalised and homogenised supply chains of the fashion sector today.

In the South West of England the ambitions of the affiliate Fibreshed community are brought to life by the Bristol Cloth Project, which has seen a wool fabric grown, dyed and woven within 15 miles of the city of Bristol. What might a Leeds or an Edinburgh cloth look like?

Another example which is setting out to grow from place is the Civic Square (2020–2030) initiative based in Birmingham. The next generation of work emerging from the Birmingham Impact Hub, this is an ambitious project to create both civic space and buildings, nurture existing and new ventures which enhance neighbourhood life and create a learning lab to capture and share insights into these changes in neighbourhood economics.

From extractive to generative

Where building capacity is a purpose of the process

It’s easy to focus on the outcome of work without seeing the process of doing the work as a key route to impact. When we seek to work regeneratively, building capacity means nurturing the conditions which can help an individual, community or system to continuously adapt and evolve as needed. It challenges us to think carefully about how each stage of the work can enable and not disempower those involved.

Governance models and organisational structures contribute to this capacity for change. We may speak of a project as being enabling, but if it has a command and control leadership model, we have a bottleneck in decision-making that quickly disempowers.

Sometimes the intention to build capacity is explicit, through learning experiences or support. The School of System Change, as an example, is generating systems leadership capacity within different sectors, and last year the RSA and ALT/Now ran the Economic Security Impact Accelerator in partnership with Mastercard, which helped build the individual and collective capacity of a cohort of entrepreneurs, all working on ventures to address economic insecurity and together creating a new 21st century safety net.

But the path to capacity building can be more implicit, woven into the approach of projects and organisations. Onion Collective, alumni of the Community Business Leaders Programme, (itself designed to build capacity) are putting this into practice in their latest venture.

Working with their community in north Somerset they have partnered with a leading bio-tech company to seed a new mycelium-based packaging industry in the town, as a focal point for sustained local skills building, economic regeneration and environmental improvement. From the reinvestment of profits to the open community meetings and Community Panel, each stage of this project is designed to build long-term local capacity to respond and adapt to new challenges as they emerge…

More from the essay here. They’ve also provided a great list of links to further reading at the end of the piece.