Learning from Scotland’s Climate Assembly

The Scottish Government funded a citizens’ assembly on climate change, from Oct 2020 to March 2021. Over 100 people – broadly representative of the Scottish population – deliberated on the question “How should Scotland change to tackle the climate emergency in an effective and fair way?”. See the extensive presentations they heard here.

The assembly reported to Parliament in June 2021, and the Government published their response in Dec 2021.

This online event will discuss research findings published this March on the climate assembly process, outcomes and impact. The research was conducted by Scottish Government social researchers led by Dr Nadine Andrews in collaboration with Dr Stephen Elstub from Newcastle University.

It will explore the implications of these and the growing interest in deliberative and participatory democracy in Scotland. Tackling climate change will be set within the wider social and economic systems of which it is a symptom.

The session starts with a panel discussion and opens up for questions and contributions from the audience.

Panel Members:

Dr Nadine Andrews is a Principal Social Researcher in the Scottish Government, and a Visiting Researcher at the Pentland Centre for Sustainability in Business at Lancaster University. She is also a mindfulness and nature-based coach / trainer. Nadine’s article on the emotional experience of the assembly members is published in Frontiers in Climate.

Dr Stephen Elstub is a Reader in British Politics in the School of Geography, Politics & Sociology at Newcastle University, and was the lead researcher on Climate Assembly UK and a member of Scotland’s Climate Assembly research team.

Justin Kenrick is an anthropologist working on reclaiming democracy with Grassroots to Global Assemblies, and on community land rights in Africa with Forest Peoples Programme and in Scotland with Action Porty. He writes extensively, and was on the Stewarding group of Scotland’s Climate Citizens Assembly for Extinction Rebellion until XR decided it had to leave.

Eva Schonveld is a climate activist, writer and process designer and facilitator. She is co-founder of Heartpolitics, which is currently working on a fractal Grassroots to Global process aiming to connect open-hearted listening and creative culture re-design with collective decision making processes that enable meaningful change locally, nationally and internationally.

Book your ticket here