February 24, 2022  /  Leave a comment

From What If to What Next: Episode Thirty Nine

Sorry, I thought I had posted this at the time! This episode was released just 6 days before the beginning of COP26. The world’s governments came together for 2 weeks to try and, as it turned out, largely fail to reach some kind of binding agreement that might give the world at least a fighting chance of preventing runaway climate change.

A few weeks before the summit, this podcast drew attention to the fact that, on a planet where over half the population is female, the leadership team put together by the UK government, who hosted the talks, was almost exclusively male. Yes, you heard that right. And yet, climate change is an issue that impacts women more than men. It disproportionately impacts their livelihoods, the levels of violence they face, their educational opportunities and much more.

Yet we know that involving the diversity of a population in making big decisions that affect them can lead to far greater public support, not to mention better ideas. Research also shows that women understand climate change better than men, are more open to change and to big ideas, and bring a more compassionate approach to decision making.

For this episode I was joined to explore this by the fabulous Nameerah Hameed and by Bianca Pitt, both of, among other things, #SheChangesClimate.