Planetary Choices

Towards Planetary Politics—A Conversation with CONCITO

• Center for New Critical Politics and Governance • Season 1 • Episode 3

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In Episode 3 of Mapping the Planetary, we speak with senior advisors Andreas Lind and Cecilie Friis from the Danish think tank CONCITO about their project From Planetary Boundaries to Planetary Policies. 

They explore how addressing the climate crisis requires confronting the broader web of interconnected environmental challenges—and how Earth-system science can inform more effective and equitable policy responses. Lind and Friis discuss the urgent need to move from abstract recognition of planetary boundaries to concrete political action. 

What would it take to craft solutions that are globally viable? How can local communities meaningfully contribute to shaping policies at a planetary scale? The conversation highlights the potential of integrating planetary thinking into governance frameworks—bridging science, policy, and grassroots engagement in the face of accelerating ecological change.

Academic Reference:

Cecilie Friis, Andreas Lind, Hagen Schulz-Forberg, James Quilligan; Towards Planetary Politics—A Conversation with CONCITO. Global Perspectives 10 March 2025; 6 (1): 144301. doi: https://doi.org/10.1525/gp.2025.144301

Any Questions? Send us a text

This podcast was created and produced by the Research Center for New Critical Politics and Governance (CPG).

To watch the video version of this episode, please visit the link below:
https://cas.au.dk/en/cpg/podcast/mapping-the-planetary

Hagen Schulz-Forberg (HSF):

Welcome. Today, James and I are happy to have Andreas Lind and Cecilie Friis from Concito, Denmark's largest green network with us on the podcast. Concito is comprised of companies, researchers, organizations and individuals with extensive climate expertise. Andreas and Cecilie are both senior advisors at Concito's global division, and they work with politicians, businesses and civil society to advance climate strategy, policy, education and public behavior towards a more sustainable future. Andreas and Cecilie, welcome to Planetary Choices.

Cecilie Friis (CF):

Thank you. Thank you very much.

HSF:

Maybe to start out, we'd like to know something about the background of Concito projects. I don't think all of our listeners know who you are and what you're doing, and also maybe enlighten us about the name a little bit. What does "Concito" actually mean?

Andreas Lind (AL):

Concito is a green think tank, and we are comprised of approximately 70 individuals across a range of different units, divisions that work on a combination of current political issues in Danish and European and global climate and environmental policy. And then also on someone like us, we work on future issues or preparing for future issues and future discussions in regard to climate and environmental issues. That's why we have this planetary project that we are talking about today that we'll get back to, I assume. And then Concito also does a lot of other projects on science education, primarily in Denmark, on policy with regards to mobility, energy policy, food and agriculture, land use so, basically, policy and initiatives across the board with regards to climate. We're definitely from a climate background but moving slowly into other environmental areas.

CF:

Yeah, and if I can supplement there on your question of the name, then Concito, at least in the interpretation that our directorate uses, means put in motion. So, it's about bringing science, policy and practice into motion and working with different actors from different spheres across different sectors. And we actually recently reorganized with a sort of view to the future and are now organized along or with the purpose of thinking more systemically. so, tackling the challenges of the future in a more systemic manner. So, we have a food system division, an energy system division, a cities division that works on cities as a key system for transformation towards a climate neutral future. And then we have some cross-cutting division. so, we have the Climate Embassy that works on green, green, what's the term for that in English, actually, dannelse, a green sort of enlightenment, maybe.

HSF:

Education.

CF:

Yeah, and youth mobilization. And then we have an EU team that works on bringing these debates into the EU policy arena and a global division, which is where Andreas and I are based, which works on international policy issues, both bringing Danish and European perspectives out into the world and bringing perspectives from the world into Danish and European policy.

HSF:

That's awesome. That's great. But how did you two, how did each of you, I'm curious about that, how did you come to join Concito and what's your background? What do you bring to it? Are you physicists, biochemists or lawyers or just activists? What brings you to Concito?

AL:

So, I'm a political scientist. I started in the tax agency as an analyst many years ago, it feels like now. And then I've been working, slowly working my way towards the environmental area. I went to Rambøll, a big engineering firm in Denmark, working with the green transition in Denmark from both an engineering and management consultancy perspective, basically, for a few years. And then I went to the Danish Energy and Climate Ministry for a little bit and then to Concito. So, slowly working my way towards more policy and environmental space, basically.

CF:

Yeah, and you joined Concito, I guess, three years ago or something?

AL:

Three years ago, yeah.

CF:

So, I joined Concito a year ago. I have a background in human geography. And I worked 10 years as an academic researcher, first in the Humboldt University in Berlin, actually, and then at the University of Copenhagen, working on questions of land use change from sort of a coupled human environment, social ecological system perspective, with questions of how globalization challenges local access to land and local use of land and the livelihoods for people who are living in landscapes that gets sort of targeted for production for global markets. So, that's the background I come with, with a sort of systemic perspective to this project of planetary boundaries. so, I'm really happy to have joined Concito. I wanted to work more on a science policy, science practice interface. And having joined Andreas a year ago, it's been really cool to work on this project of planetary politics.

James Quilligan (JQ):

I'm interested if you would describe your work with the DK 0 project that assists municipalities in Denmark to meet the national climate goals that are aligned with the Paris Agreement. Could you detail that? It's a very fascinating project.

AL:

We can try at least, none of us have worked on it directly. But of course, we work with colleagues who have worked on it. It's anchored in our cities division that Cecilie described just before. And has worked across, I think, all municipalities in Denmark, all 98 are on board by now. It took a while to get the last one on board, but they're all on board now. And basically, what Concito have been doing is we've been helping them with external funding. We've been helping them with developing climate plans for all municipalities that are aligned with the Paris Agreement, as you said. Basically, providing advice, being a sparring partner, a knowledge partner providing insights, and basically ensuring that the process facilitating, the process in the municipalities and in the dialogue between the municipalities so, they are aligned in what to do, how to do it, which stakeholders to involve and when. And it's all resulted in all the municipalities. It ended up with a climate, an actual climate plan that then had to be reviewed and approved by Concito as the external knowledge partner in this process.

JQ:

How is that organized? Do you do that on an ongoing basis? I mean, does, is there somebody that coordinates that? How does that work exactly?

AL:

So, it was coordinated in Concito. It's funded by a big philanthropic foundation in Denmark called Realdania. It's the money behind it, so, to speak. But Concito had the role of project manager and facilitator and knowledge partner, all in one, basically. Coordinating the process. And now that DK2020 is actually, it doesn't exist anymore as a project. It's been carried on in what's called the climate alliance, I think. Which is basically the same, but with a different role for Concito, where the municipalities now have taken much more responsibility themselves. And we are just a knowledge partner on how they actually need to implement those plans that we reviewed and approved of.

HSF:

That's fascinating. That's already very, very interesting. Do you also work with other transnational institutions or international institutions beyond Denmark and the EU, the two of you?

AL:

I mean, we work in the global division with international partners as well, both international partners and international organizations, such as UN organizations and who else, Cecilie?

CF:

Yeah, there are different tracks. So, at the moment, we have a couple of colleagues who are very deeply involved in sort of the preparations, both for the Danish upcoming presidency of the EU and the role that that is going to play in the upcoming COP 30 in Brazil. so, we have colleagues who work both on supporting the Brazilian presidency for the COP, but also colleagues who work on supporting the Danish presidency representational role of the EU in the COP proceedings. And there are different tracks around that. So, I guess the core point of the way or the core way we work is as a knowledge partner for anyone who is interested in contributing to the green transition in any meaningful way. So, there's always going to be some sort of process of weeding out those that are not serious, but we are willing to engage with anyone who is in different tracks, formally and informally in different collaborations.

JQ:

I noticed that you have a strong dependence on food data. Do you use other kinds of indicators?

AL:

We do across Concito. I think the way we work is that we don't really have our own data most of the time. I think the food database is one of the only examples of us actually having our own database in Concito, with Concito created data basically. Most of the time we rely on external data from researchers and other organizations, also international organizations, to provide us the insights we need to guide Danish and European policymakers or global policymakers. so, we don't really have our own data. We don't really create our own data either.

CF:

So, it's very much in the same way that we work in the project that Andreas and I are in charge on the planetary boundaries is sort of a translation of scientific knowledge. What we do or how we work is often to go and source the most recent scientific insights on a given topic and then try and translate that in the best way possible to something that's a little bit more accessible and potentially also a bit more meaningful in a political context. It's really rather than we do our own independent analysis, but rather than them being based in sort of research processes, it's a knowledge translation kind of process in many of the projects at least, which also makes us free to draw on whatever kind of data that makes sense for the specific policy focus or specific project or that is in demand from our stakeholders or actors that we engage with.

HSF:

Now let's talk about your project. Let's talk about the planetary politics of planetary boundaries because that's also what we're curious to hear about. How do you translate all of this into politics? So, please, what is it that you're doing?

AL:

I mean, first of all, a little bit of background on the project, maybe the boring parts that we can get into the juicy parts afterwards. So, the project is funded by the Novo Nordisk Foundation for three years. We have a year, and a half left at this point. And the job is basically to translate the planetary boundaries framework from a scientific concept into something that can be used operationally at the political level, at any political level, basically from the local to the national to the European to the global level. We set out to develop a model that would allow us to align policies with the planetary boundaries. And we have throughout the project, redefined that purpose a little bit into developing a framework, what we call a framework for planetary politics, that is basically a new perspective on environmental policy and all the questions that policymakers should ask themselves when they do environmental policy to reconsider if they do it in a way that's aligned with the planetary boundaries and the Earth System science behind the planetary boundaries framework. If that makes sense. And it's Cecilie and I that does it in Concito anchored in the global division. So, it's a global project that's made not for Danish context, but made for a global audience, because we think these insights and this way of thinking, this new perspective, the planetary perspective is relevant across the globe for all kinds of decision makers and stakeholders, basically.

HSF:

I couldn't agree more. This is of course super, super important.

AL:

And I think maybe just one comment is that besides Cecilie and I, we also supported by a scientific advisory board comprised of researchers from both the natural sciences and the social sciences to provide input on our work. And amongst them, we have two of the leading authors of the latest planetary boundaries update, Katherine Richardson and Wolfgang Lucht from Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research. So, we have some good people involved in the project that can guide us and make sure that we get the science right.

JQ:

So, to be a little more specific, what are some of the science-based thresholds that are needed for Denmark or for the EU to stay within the planetary limits?

CF:

Yeah, so, maybe I can talk you through our sort of project logic. So, the way that we have framed or sort of the starting point from the project is this, you know, the very sort of illustrative fan figure with the six out of nine planetary boundaries have now been transgressed and they are moving towards the purple. All of them, the seventh are almost transgressed as well. And we need all the and the recognition that that's an Anthropocene, that's a human driven process, right? It's driven by our overconsumption of resources and our overproduction of waste and pollution that creates these pressures on different aspects of the different components of the earth system. And efforts to address it is not happening fast enough. So, we need new approaches on new way of thinking of how to address it. Also because as a climate think tank, reflecting a bit on how climate policy has been conducted, maybe over the last decades or whatever, is that you can very easily get into a sort of tunnel vision, narrow view of CO2 emissions reductions, that potentially leads to some adverse implications for other elements of the earth system or other areas of the earth system that leads to pressure on fresh water resources on land, etc. so, we wanted to take a step back and say, okay, what is it that we are actually aiming to do? We are aiming to protect the earth to be a place that we can live life well as human societies and that we don't destroy the nature that we depend on. so, that's sort of the background from the project. And how we then have done it, also because you are interested in sort of the foundation or the data ground, we draw on the big literature behind that fan diagram with the nine planetary boundaries of both the earth system science literature, but also ecological economics and resilience thinking that's sort of embedded in that way of thinking about the earth system as a whole integrated system. And then try to extract, okay, if we should go beyond those nine boundaries and thinking about what that literature actually tells us of how the earth works, we've distilled it into four logics of what we call logics of the earth system that we have to build into how we think and do policies from now on basically, guide the way we should take decisions from now on. Yeah, so, that's sort of the background for the framework. And so, in a Danish context, or with Denmark as a case, we have then tried to say, okay, what would it take to translate those logics into a national context, including those same or with a reference to those nine boundary categories, or whatever we call them that are sort of describing essential systems in the earth that we should respect and protect. That was a very long answer to your question.

AL:

If I may add, and as a part of that process, we are now currently looking at the absolute boundaries for Denmark, the threshold she was talking about, James, trying to downscale the global planetary boundaries to a Danish level, to see how can you actually look at the thresholds and the absolute boundaries of the earth system at a national level. And we haven't published any of the results yet, we probably can't share them. But I think not surprisingly, it shows that Denmark is transgressing basically all of the boundaries, as would any modern Western country, I think, if we did the same exercise.

HSF:

Sorry to jump in here, I would just, even though we have a very long answer Cecilie, it was very informative. But you mentioned those four guiding goals for guidelines, maybe you could elaborate on those, and what they are. And I would also like to know, Andreas now mentioned, okay, the final threshold, if you wish, or the absolute threshold and how Denmark is measured against that. Have you found a way how any kind of regional population could actually stay within those ecological limits?

CF:

Okay, I'm going to start with the first one first, because that's already a big one. And then we can jump on from there, I think. so, yeah, so, we formulate those four logics that we think are essential for our understanding of the earth system, basically. And we describe it in this report, that's also a link on our webpage, in this round model framework, where we sort of describe four logics, and that's impossible in the video, never mind. And 12 principles that go with them. So, the first logic is that the earth is a complex system, all of the different components of the system are interacting, they're interlinked, and there's complex feedback mechanisms that mean that if we change something or increase the pressure over here, probably, and a response is going to pop up somewhere else. so, if we increase the emission of greenhouse gases, it's going to have an effect on the oceans. There are these linkages that we have to take into account. so, that's the first logic. The second logic is then that this earth system has absolute boundaries for the sustainable use of resources and waste disposal. so, basically, there are limits to how many resources we can extract from the earth system in a sustainable manner, and how much waste and pollution we can emit. And by waste and pollution, we mean greenhouse gases, novel entities, plastics, etc. All of these different components that change how ecosystems work. Then the third logic is that the earth system has uneven geographies. so, basically, there are these different earth system components, but they're not sort of distributed in the same way across the world continents. Resources are located in different areas, but access to those resources is also very unevenly distributed. And we also see, of course, that the consequences of global environmental change hit very differently around the world, and often the most vulnerable populations or the most vulnerable ecosystems experience the most severe consequences. And then the final of the four logics is a temporal dimension. So, basically, the earth system has both time lags and tipping elements. There are fast processes and slow processes, and the risk of tipping the system beyond irreversible change. And that has implications for how we should think policies as well. So, basically, that whatever we do today, or whatever we don't do today, will have long lasting implications on how the earth system works for the future. So, those are the four core logics of our framework. And then we have tried to formulate what that then should mean for principles for planetary politics. And I won't go into describing all 12 of them here. I don't think that's helpful. But basically, we try and take one step down the abstraction ladder and go into something a little bit more practically operational and describe different principles that we could start when we discuss what should we do in a new way in relation to climate and environment impacts.

JQ:

One thing that I think people are really interested in is examining the differences between the planet's resource, capacity, and consumption, and particularly how it means that we could measure climate change and the problems with the climate. And we can also examine biodiversity goals. But have you found a way of integrating the climate and biodiversity goals so, that Earth's biophysical limits are not exceeded? Is there some approach that you have to doing that? Or is your research, does it kind of keep them uncoupled?

AL:

The whole point of this exercise is to couple them, basically, or at least a part of this exercise is to couple them. Because we think that climate policy, I mean, we come from a climate policy background and climate policy starting point, at least. And as Cecilie said, when she was describing the framework just before, our one purpose of doing this project is also to make climate policy makers focus more on the adverse consequences of climate policy on the other environmental areas, including biodiversity, land system use, freshwater resources, and so, on. Because the goal of climate policy and the goal of environmental policy is to protect the environment as a whole, protect the Earth system, and not just solving climate in isolation, because it's not possible in the way that the Earth functions and the Earth system processes work and interlink. so, we don't have a solution, unfortunately. What we can do is point out for policy makers that it's important to focus on those interlinkages and the feedback mechanisms and the negative consequences.

CF:

Yeah, and just to exemplify then those principles I was talking about earlier, so, this would fit into our complex system logic. So, basically, the need to take into account how these things interact. So, we formulated a principle there that you should start out by examining and trying to avoid problem shifting. So, that's a core focus of the work around the complex system. So, basically, when you try and do something good for one of the environmental areas over here, then you have to make sure that you don't push the pressure somewhere else. And we haven't gone very deep into analyzing different examples yet, but there's a lot of examples around some of the climate policies that are based on land use or biomass use that basically try and tackle a climate pressure and as a result increase the pressure on the land system, potentially also fresh water. And if it's based on agricultural production, also the biogeochemical flows of nitrogen and phosphorus, because you need more fertilizers. So, maybe we then reduce the climate pressure in some way, but we end up creating other kinds of pressures and maybe undermining the ecosystem resilience that we also rely on to take up greenhouse gases somewhere else. So, that's something you should keep in mind. So, that's one of the principles. And then the reverse would be to look for the synergies. So, basically, there are also many areas where we could look at better integrating goals. So, we don't do climate policy solutions over here and biodiversity solutions over here and drinking water or freshwater protection over here, but we should try and identify the areas where we can create synergies, which is the second principle in the complex system box of our framework.

AL:

We haven't gotten to it yet, but we'll be spending most of fall this year and maybe a little bit of next year, looking into synergies and feedback mechanisms and problem shifting and trying to get more concrete and specific and provide examples on what to do and what not to do in terms of thinking these environmental areas together when you do policy. Because right now, we are really good at talking about it in the abstract, but in the fall, we'll get better talking about it in the concrete and the specific examples. And how? Because most of environmental policy has a negative effect on other areas, but there are always ways to mitigate those externalities and there are always ways to enable and allow for synergies. And in fall, we'll be providing maybe a catalog, maybe brief research on how to do that, providing an overview for policy makers.

HSF:

That's great. And it kind of bridges to what formed in my head as a question is, when you make these difficult policy choices or when you translate what you're doing into advocacy for certain policies, I imagine you run into some difficulties because they often mean scaling down, reducing, respecting limits. And all of that doesn't really have a lot of, there's not much fun in that. There's not much, you know, build the future and grow and all these narratives that we find somehow sometimes used by the more populist stance of the policy and politicians. So, I wonder, in your assessment, how realistic is it that Denmark actually embraces all of your great policy advice and that we actually stay within the planetary boundaries by lowering our consumption of resources?

AL:

I think if you look at this project in isolation, very unrealistic. Even though we believe we provide great insights and a great new framework and great new perspectives, policymakers aren't really listening. Currently, we are affecting stakeholders around the policy environment in Denmark. so, we are hoping that these ideas form and kind of cascade through the system and then slowly move upwards towards the political decision makers. When they hear the things enough times, maybe they'll listen. But I think another important point is that not to look at this project in isolation and look at it at all the, like a project portfolio of Concito, where this project works with the biophysical limits and the planetary boundaries and the science behind it. Whereas we have a bunch of other projects working with possible futures and climate attractive futures and how to get there and what's a positive vision of the future. And I think the combination of those two, like obviously we have to do policy that's aligned with the biophysical limits and the science of our planet, but we also have to get people on board. And that's what those other projects try to do. So, it's a combination of approaches.

JQ:

Yeah, those are really challenging policy difficulties. I'm wondering to be more specific about that, to take an example, so, I'm just curious, what are some of the trade-offs, for example, in using land to produce biofuels rather than food or afforestation without protection for biodiversity or producing more food on less land? What are some of the difficulties you've had in translating that into policy among your constituents?

AL:

I can start, and you can help me out Cecilie. So, basically the issue in Denmark, and I think in a lot of other European countries with regards to agriculture and land use, is that it has a lot of social consequences if we suddenly scale down on agriculture as we know it in Europe today. There's a lot of local communities that depend on agriculture, at least they believe they do, and there's a lot of people who lose their jobs basically. So, that's one of the issues we run into that obviously it's hard to solve because we don't go beyond the science, it's about people, it's about social, where people want to live what kind of life they want to have, rural identities, norms and culture. And I think we can't change all of it, of course, and I'm not sure climate policy needs to change all of that and needs to address all of that. I think sometimes we put unrealistic expectations on climate policy and environmental policy that it needs to solve all of these issues all at once, otherwise it's not good climate policy or not good environmental policy. What if we turn things around and say that social policy should tackle climate issues? That sounds preposterous, right? But that's basically what we do with regards to climate change and climate policy.

CF: And also, just to jump in here, I think one of our... so, at the moment we are working this spring, as Andreas said a bit earlier, with that absolute boundaries box and trying to downscale and operationalize that in a Danish national context. And that runs up against every time we present it. It's very easy to get people on board with the overall premise. There are limits to how many resources we can use. But as soon as we want to get more concrete, what does that then actually mean? It's very difficult to think in terms of practical solutions that don't run into a lot of "but what ifs" kind of, then how should we do it? so, it's very difficult for stakeholders to engage within a more practical level. And it's been the part of the framework that we've had the most pushback on, because it's very difficult for people to imagine what that would look like. And I guess that's one of the main issues that we should tackle. But so, one of the core things that's coming out of this work is that it should also be a discussion of prioritization, basically. So, if we agree to the premise, okay, there are limited resources, we should be able to have a more transparent and more open discussion of how do we prioritize those resources. And that should be democratic. So, it's beyond the scope of our project to come with specific solutions for how to do trade-offs between agricultural food production, biomass for energy production, etc. We can show what the effects of those trade-offs would be on different parts of the environment. We can show if that would lead to increased nutrient pollution or not, or reduced pressure on other parts of the system. But basically, our mandate is to make those trade-offs transparent so, that there can be a better political discussion of how we would then prioritize those limited resources we have available rather than policy prescribe:

We should all go in that direction. That's beyond also our capacity. And we're not that smart. I mean, no one's solved that question. Basically, to look back to your question a while ago, no one solved the issue of how can we live sufficient lifestyles within planetary boundaries. It's not been done there, but we need to be able to have discussions on what that could look like. And at the moment, that's what we're trying to do. We're trying to say, okay, with these logics, how can we change the rules of the game? Because there's a lot of the policies, the politics of today is embedded with a lot of guiding rules already. And we are trying to formulate different kinds of rules for that playing board that's politics, for the environment and for the climate.

AL:

And maybe just to link it to the project portfolio of Concito that I was talking about before, the different approaches that all then push us in the right direction. We currently have another project called Living Well Below Three Tons, where we do explore what it means for young people to live within the boundaries of the planet. And ask them to, first of all, ask them to envision a positive future. What does that entail? What do they want? What are their needs? How do we satisfy those needs? And then provide them with the data and challenge them. Okay, maybe you can't have all those needs satisfied within the boundaries of the planet. What are your priorities? And what are the trade-offs? How do we negotiate with you between generations to make sure that you can live a good life as well? Like how do we improve? so, it's not just a question of giving up things to live within the threshold of the planet. It's also about getting new things, but maybe things that doesn't put a pressure on the planet as current consumption patterns do.

HSF:

I think this is a fundamental question to link the more, let's say, hard science-based limits discussion to make it socially viable and politically viable, and to be able to disagree on things. How can we disagree on planetary activities or on our planetary lifestyles when it seems to be either right or wrong? You mentioned democracy, Cecilie. I think this is really important to think about how can we get various ideas. I think it's fascinating, Andreas, that you have this project where young people try to live a life which is meaningful, promising, and yet within the boundaries. And they probably have different versions and hopefully find out different ways and contesting ideas of how to stay within this. Because to make this come alive from a social point of view, I think is absolutely fundamental. If we don't want to give up that democratic element of the societies that we have or lose out to easily grasped populist stance on planetary politics as being top-down based on wrong science anyway. That was just me with a bit of a stream of consciousness. Sorry, Cecilie.

CF:

No, just following up on that. So, yeah, different perspectives of what that means, but also a recognition that that will look very differently across a very uneven, unequal world. so, basically have a global perspective of that as well. So, our framework and a lot of the discussions we've had so far has been framed around the fact that we are a Copenhagen-based climate think tank, and we use Denmark as our case. So, that leads to a certain set of discussions. But sufficiency discussion wouldn't look very differently in other parts of the world where it's about getting people access to enough resources to live well within planetary boundaries. so, basically different discussions in different contexts that are necessary to have as well.

HSF:

James, do you have any final question because I have something that...

JQ:

Yes, I would like to ask you about your work in carrying capacity and how far you've gone in looking at carrying capacity as a way of differentiating the different situations that people are facing across the world based on the differences between what they're locally producing and what they're consuming, which is different in all places.

CF:

Yeah, so, maybe I can start and you can jump in. so, the work that we're doing right now that Andreas was talking about a bit earlier as well with downscaling the planetary boundaries, we use Denmark as a case and discuss both the global sort of carrying capacity that's built into the notions of the planetary boundaries and those global thresholds and global control variables that describe a global carrying capacity, but then also the Danish national context. So, what's a meaningful indicator? What's a meaningful threshold for freshwater use in a Danish context? So, especially for freshwater, a country like Denmark doesn't import any of the drinking water. We source it all here and we have basically enough groundwater resource stocks, at least nationally, but we still have even local issues with overuse of our drinking water capacity. So, then there's a whole sort of scalar approach to how would a threshold for freshwater use look in a country like Denmark. And we try and have those discussions in the report that we're working on right now, both for the territorial pressure that we have in Denmark, but then also we've worked with researchers at the Danish Technical University who are very skilled in life cycle assessment or environmentally extended life cycle assessments and they have done a consumption based analysis for us on sort of input output trade data looking at Denmark's consumption based pressure to also have that sort of angle and to discuss. And of course, that's not so. The granularity of that data doesn't allow us to say, okay, we have a high pressure in India because we import a lot of cotton or whatever. But it does indicate, okay, we have a substantially higher consumption based freshwater pressure than we have a territorial freshwater pressure, for instance, and the same for climate and several of the other boundaries to try and address that.

AL:

And then I think a big part of our work is also just explaining to politicians that carrying capacity is a word. That means a specific thing and that has imposed some consequences on the way we do politics. Like a large part of our work is basically translating what we as researchers and analysts and advisors know very well in our little bubble, but that politicians and the public does not know the consequences of, basically. so, a lot of it is a translation and communication exercise.

CF:

And then an exercise, I guess, also in selecting the right illustrative examples to also make it visible or sort of comprehensible for people who are not experts. So, in Denmark, we have very high nutrient pollution loads in our both marine and freshwater ecosystems. And that's been a major political debate in the last year and a half, two years, which is an excellent example on the sort of the massive transgression of our aquatic ecosystem carrying capacity locally and sort of can open a discussion of what's the drivers for that, what can be the solutions for that, which we have a team in Concito that's worked a lot with.

AL:

I think we're talking a lot about planetary boundaries and planetary politics. And it all sounds very supranational and international and global. But I think a point of our work is also to tell that all of these logics, they also apply to the local and the national level. It's not planetary politics doesn't mean it has to be done at a planetary level. Because the logic to science is the same, irrespective of the level of governance, basically. But some of the boundaries, obviously, are best handled at different levels. And I think now we are discussing freshwater and biogeochemical flows. And they are handled very well at the local, national, regional level, where the pollution is and where you can define a carrying capacity and an ecosystem affected. But something like climate change, ozone layer protection, they require international governance, global governance, or some sort of coordination, at least. They're also different levels to it. That is what makes it very complex at times.

HSF:

Yeah, I have a question here, again, to jump in. When you mentioned these various levels, and also these various approaches to how to bring planetary change about or changes that, you know, our societies and how we do economics and how we live within the planetary boundaries, I think I have a lot of sympathy for lobbying or going into and having advocacy done on the levels that you know and with the people you know and within the institutions you know. There are approaches out there that suggest new planetary institutions for very specific things. What's your take on some of the planetary, let's say, proposals that are out there? Do you find them realistic? Do you find them maybe not democratic? Or what are you inspired by?

AL:

Would you like to start Cecilie?

CF:

I think from our perspective, our starting point is that that might be necessary at some point, but we can't wait for that all to happen. We basically need everyone on board. And that's what I meant before with sort of our logics being rules of the game. So, we need to change the rules of the game across all these levels. So, yes, for some of the global scale issues, we might need a lot more international coordination. I don't know, we probably don't have an official view of anything like a planetary stewardship council or something like this, but personally, I find the idea a bit troubling maybe. It's the most diplomatic word I can think of, but that's basically because we have this anchoring in the fact that we are knowledge partners for democratic processes and actors that work in different levels. So, that's sort of a core foundation for us.

AL:

That doesn't mean of course that we still don't need those coordination institutions across governments. I think the reason we focus on the national level is also because that's where most decisions are being made in a modern world. So, that's where we can impact the most. And like even through global institutions, it's still national interests that kind of pile up and define the game. So, if we affect the national level, we affect all levels, we assume one way or another.

HSF:

Yeah, that's right. I understand that and that you can act right now. I would like your assessment about those suggestions who would say that you need to slice off part of your sovereignty, let's say particularly concerned with big city spaces or particularly concerned with coastal areas. There is a planetary institution for coastal areas or for these things and you slice off the sovereignty of a democratic nation state and make sure that a planetary institution coordinates policy. What do you think about that?

AL:

I mean the main issue is legitimacy, right? And getting the citizens on board. I think it's the, I mean even if those global institutions could solve the crisis, I don't think people would let them. It's the main issue we were talking about before how our project has a hard time with the recommendations that we give actually making a difference because there are social issues that are more present. And I think creating big technocratic global institutions that should then go and define how you can treat your coastal area in a little rural part of Denmark. It just wouldn't fly even if it was the most efficient way of doing it. Because how do you create a chain of legitimacy from those citizens to the technocrats sitting in that global institution? I've open questioned. I mean if it would work, I'd be all in for it. But I don't think it works.

HSF:

Oh, I agree. Sorry Cecilie.

CF:

No just another perspective on that there as well because what would you need to sacrifice in terms of people's well-being in order to do that? So, basically again if we return to the question of like taking a step back and remembering why we are doing what we're doing basically. So, we're doing what we're doing in order to try and ensure that people can live meaningful good lives within a stable climate that can provide for sort of the natural resource base that we have to live with. And I don't know if sort of sacrificing your autonomy or your right to decide what makes a good life for you or these other kinds of elements is the right way to go in that perspective. Though I understand the counter arguments of sort of the time pressure and the need to act fast and the need to act decisively. But I think we should really consider and by we, I mean a sort of political we what that means in terms of what is sacrificed along the way.

HSF:

Thank you, Andreas, and Cecilie for this great discussion. I give you the opportunity - did we talk about everything, or do you have anything on your mind that we should talk about now? Otherwise, I would say your work in sustainability is just really awesome and important. Makes a crucial part for new narratives. We've identified tensions here. We've identified a lot of things to work on. Is there anything we forgot for now?

AL:

I don't think so. I think we covered the most important parts. Like obviously for everyone who ends up listening to this I would advise them to go on our website and find our briefs and analysis and reports and look up our framework and see if it gives them a different perspective on how they think about the environment and climate and climate-environment policies and decisions. Because that's basically our theory of change. Slowly pushing people in the right direction implementing these logics in everyday life and policy making and decision making at all levels. And if we can make people think differently and change the logics that guide their actions and decisions, we've made a change and an impact.

HSF:

That's great and if you don't want to go, dear audience, if you don't want to go to Concito's website you can just go on our website on Planetary Choices where you will find a link to Concito's website. So, we're working on this on you know finding some systemic answer here.

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Hagen Schulz-Forberg

Host
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James Quilligan

Co-host
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Andreas Lind

Guest
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Cecilie Friis

Guest