Thackara: the pandemic and a new Relational Ecology

John Thackara is a writer and a bioregional designer. In 2016 he held an amazing lecture for the Meet the Media Guru series – watch Thackara’s lecture – focused on the concept of Bio Region as a new pillar for a truly sustainable design.

While the Covid-19 crisis is hitting Italy, John sent us a video sharing some insights on what we’re coping with. Is there anything we should master after the pandemic? “I personally am learning from the practical limitations of the pandemic about slowing down personally as well as slowing down the economy that we have to do so as we learn to live in slow motion connected, but together was physically apart” says Thackara.

“The other thing I’m learning is that large scale problems don’t require large scale solutions. They’re about small actions on millions of different situations connected together” adds the British expert, popping out the sharp idea of “Relational Ecology” as to say “the fact that in our politics as well as in our daily lives, we need to rethink our relationship to place reinvent politics and daily life based on ecological relationships, not economic ones”.

John Thackara with MtMG’s director, Maria Grazia Mattei in 2016