Conference Agenda

Decision makers have a responsibility to make the right choices and take effective action in times of crisis. Environmental and social shocks affect hundreds of thousands of people worldwide. As a driving force, youth leaders have a critical role in decision-making across social, environmental, economic, and political issues. An innovative session designed in a world café format can facilitate a discussion on how decision-makers can benefit from the perspectives and potential of young community leaders.

This Youth-led and output-oriented World Café aims to co-create an inclusive environment to take a deep dive into difficult situations that challenge community ties, solidarity, social justice and collective healing in times of extreme environmental and social crises. The CIFAL Istanbul Youth Platform team at Bahçeşehir University (BAU), in partnership with York University (Canada), will lead a transdisciplinary and intergenerational exchange of ideas bringing their experiences in community-based healing following the massive earthquake that struck Türkiye and Syria in February 2023. Informed by transdisciplinary social-science perspectives, the session will probe the limits of mainstream governance approaches in situations of sudden environmental and social disruption, in search of creativity and experimentation to foster community-building and healing. Through structured but open-ended discussions, participants will identify best practices to overcome social divisions, and promote solidarity, social cohesion, accountability, resilience, inclusion, and social justice, among other concepts that lie at the core of environmental and social governance approaches to sustainable development.

The World Café format allows for idea-driven, guided discussions in small groups. It will contribute to, and amplify, the early-career activities and South-South dialogues at the conference, while promoting networking. The session will lead to a prototype replicable in different settings aligned with the themes of Earth System Governance, such as climate extremes and disasters, forced migration etc.

This innovative session aims to build a working group and will set the foundation for a collaborative project as an output. Wide participation is encouraged. Session participants will have an opportunity to contribute to the co-creation of the collaborative output.

Further information on this innovative session's format: https://sway.office.com/fHKg0SzKukO0jetR?ref=Link