Category Archives: New Utopia

Seven years ago Elizabeth Kolbert wrote The Sixth Extinction. In her new book about climate, Under a White Sky, she finds a middle ground between optimism and apocalyptic bleakness.

Soon it would be too hot J G Ballard, The Drowned World (1962)

The real problem is the sun. It warms the earth which is nice, the basis of all life but over the past 200 years weve altered our planets atmosphere so that it captures too much warmth. And weve failed to reduce our carbon emissions, or even slow their rapid growth, and it seems obvious that well continue to fail, that the problem defies our economic and political systems. So the atmosphere will continue to capture more and more warmth with increasingly dire consequences.

The solution is obvious. Dim the sun.

Elizabeth Kolbert is the climate reporter for the New Yorker. She won the Pulitzer prize for her 2014 book The Sixth Extinction, a collection of essays describing the accelerating mass extinctions of the modern era, comparing them to previous large scale extinction events in our planets remote past, caused by super volcano eruptions and meteor strikes. The book helped popularise the term the anthropocene, an informal description for our current geological era, a period in which human activity is the most significant actor on the planets ecosystems.

Most climate writing takes an activist approach. It wants to influence politics and policy, and it does this by warning people what might happen if humanity doesnt change our ways in the next six months or 18 months, or three years or 12 years. Those warnings are usually apocalyptic. But the public has remained unpersuaded, and even elected politicians who described themselves as progressive on climate delivered very little action, preferring to set emissions targets for dates decades in the future, which would then get pushed even further out by their replacements.

So The Sixth Extinction wasnt an activist book. It was journalism; calmly and objectively describing a global mass extinction event that was already well underway when it was published seven years ago. Under a White Sky is Kolberts equally detached attempt to imagine the future in a climate changed world; a future that is now inevitable. And she does this by reporting on the present.

In 2019 the journalist David Wallace-Wells published The Uninhabitable Earth, a book that peered beyond scientific reticence by outlining the most dire imaginable consequences of climate change: a planet that is incapable of sustaining human life, a state that Wallace-Wells predicted wed arrive at very soon. No matter how frightened you are of climate change, he warned, you are not nearly frightened enough. Then, in late 2020 the science fiction author Kim Stanley Robinson published The Ministry for the Future describing the next stages of the climate apocalypse millions dying in heat waves, vast coastal cities flooded. But he then imagined the progressive/activist response, which leads to the transformation of the global economy into a Piketty-esque zero carbon egalitarian post-nation state techno-utopia.

Robinsons book is dedicated to Frederic Jameson, the literary theorist who claimed it is easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism. Robinson imagines both, ending on a vision of wild optimism. (Along the way he wonders why the worlds central banks dont do carbon quantitative easing, printing money to pay people to sequester carbon instead of using QE to inflate their share markets and metropolitan house prices which is what most western governments are currently doing, including ours. Which might be the most important question in the world right now.) His solutions are partly political, partly economic, mostly technological; the heroes use distributed ledgers to invent new carbon currencies and drone swarms to assassinate the heads of energy companies.

For some climate activists Naomi Klein is the most prominent opting out of the carbon economy is easy. The problem is ideological, and we solve it by waking up and accepting that economic theory is wrong and economic growth is bad. Climate change is useful, in Kleins view: its the catalyst for realising that our real problem is capitalism. The radical transformation of our economy that the climate crisis forces upon us is the path to a better world.

Kleins logic found its way into the degrowth movement of the mid to late 2010s, championed by the Swedish activist Greta Thunberg, in which the consequences of climate change are prevented by halting and then reversing economic growth. But its hard to imagine a political climate in which citizens of developed nations willingly dismantle most of their energy infrastructure to reach emissions parity with the developing world. And its even harder to imagine states like China, India, Brazil or Nigeria scaling back their economic development to meet a global carbon budget that was almost entirely blown out by western nations over the previous hundred years.

For the novelist and former environmental activist Paul Kingsnorth whom Kolbert quotes in Under a White Sky, and who became a harsh critic of the environmental movement for its obsession with carbon accounting and tendency to see the natural world as an engineering challenge and not a sacred entity both technology and degrowth are illusions. There is no way out. Climate change is not ideological but systemic. Humanity has created a trap it cannot escape, a machine that sustains eight billion lives, more every day, who all will fight to keep it running. But its a machine with no pause, and no off switch. Economists merely describe this machine, which will continue to consume the planet and everything on it until the collapse of the ecosystem causes the destruction of our civilisation. Kingsnorths advice: move to the country. Buy a compost toilet. Learn to use a scythe.

Under a White Sky suggests a middle ground between the utopian optimism of writers like Robinson and Klein, and the apocalyptic bleakness of Wallace-Wells and Kingsnorth. Although theres a way in which her conception of the future is more depressing. There is, after all, something romantic about Kingsnorths vision: the terrifying chaos of modernity comes crashing down and the wise survivors live contemplative pastoral lives in the ruins. But what if modernity all the capitalism, globalisation, technological transformation doesnt stop? What if it keeps going? What if the apocalypse never comes? Or, what if it comes but nothing really changes? Kolbert sketches out what Ive come to think of as the boring apocalypse.

She starts with a river. Back in the 1960s Rachel Carson published Silent Spring, a foundational text for the modern environmental movement. It described the devastating impacts of synthetic chemicals on the natural environment. As an alternative to industrial chemicals, Carson suggested, we should be using natural solutions. Instead of spraying a waterway with toxic chemicals to wipe out insects, turning them into rivers of death, we could merely introduce a new species that would consume the insects. It was in this spirit that several species of Asian carp were introduced to lakes in the American south, to control the aquatic plants, algae and molluscs causing problems in the waterways.

The carp were aquafarmed in China for centuries, but when transported to US waterways they found themselves in a new environment with abundant food and no natural predators. They spread rapidly, either eating or outcompeting almost every other aquatic species they encountered. Which was bad for the rivers and lakes of the US south and midwest, but would be disastrous if they reached the great lakes ecosystem of the Atlantic northeast.

For millions of years the Great Lakes basin was separated off from the waterways of the rest of North America, but in the late 19th/early 20th century these systems were linked by the US Army Corps of Engineers, who were charged with redirecting the Chicago River. At the time the river carried Chicagos sewage directly into Lake Michigan, which caused routine outbreaks of cholera and typhoid. The Corps dug a gigantic canal and used it to reverse the rivers flow, carrying the effluent south into the Mississippi river delta. One hundred years later, it became the entry point for the endemic carp, moving upstream, to access the great lakes.

The same Engineer Corps that created the canal were given the job of preventing this, but they couldnt dam or block the waterway because it was still a vital part of Chicagos infrastructure. They looked at a variety of solutions: dosing the canal with poison, irradiating it with UV light, zapping it with ozone, superheating it, turning it anoxic by flooding it with nitrogen. In the end they decided the simplest solution was electricity. Kolbert, inspecting the canal on a pleasure craft called City Living, captures the surreal creepiness of floating down a deliberately electrified river: the dire warning signs, the flights of birds gathering to consume any fish that have been stunned or killed. If a human fell into the river, an engineer informed her, theyd probably die.

Its easy to say that its crazy to electrify an entire river, or that invasive new species shouldnt have been introduced to the US ecosystem, or that the Chicago River shouldnt have been reversed. But Kolberts book is about path dependency. All of those things happened. Theyre locked in and cant be rolled back. Rachel Carsons alternate title for Silent Spring was The Control of Nature, an idea Carson was firmly against. It was grounded in arrogance, she argued, in a worldview in which nature existed for the convenience of man. But what if relinquishing control is no longer an option? What if the attempt to control is already there, and all you have left is trying to control the control, in an endless layering of improvisations and feedback loops?

What will happen to the worlds coastal megacities when the sea levels rise and they begin to flood? Climate stories are often illustrated with drawings of drowned cities; the streets transformed into lagoons beneath the skeletons of abandoned skyscrapers. Kolbert suggests they might look like New Orleans, already a flood-prone city, already below sea level and sinking a little lower every year.

Some of the hydrologists and geologists Kolbert interviews no longer refer to the Mississippi River delta around New Orleans as a landscape, or a natural environment. Instead it is a CHANS: a Coupled Human and Natural System. The scale of the engineering works the levees, floodgates, canals and pumping stations needed to keep the city dry are so vast, so denaturing, the results require a new acronym, a new framework for thinking about humanitys relationship with nature. The section of the Mississippi running through the CHANS is so regulated it can no longer be thought of as a river, in any meaningful way. And, of course, these attempts to control nature have unintended consequences, requiring further interventions.

Some of this is simple. Relatively. Because most of New Orleans is below sea level, any rain falling on it needs to either evaporate or be pumped away by the massive network of pumping stations and canals distributed across the city. But marshy soils compact through dewatering so the city itself is sinking even deeper as a result of all the pumping. Which increases the danger, both from flooding and storm surges, which requires more levees and more pumping. The city is trapped in a loop, each iteration of which escalates both the problem and the solution required.

But the real headache is the river. The Mississippi is regulated to prevent it from drowning the city but its annual flooding once deposited millions of tons of sediment across the delta, and in its absence the land around New Orleans is eroding. It is, Kolbert informs us, one of the fastest-disappearing places on Earth, with the government officially retiring the names of its bays and bayous because theyve been consumed by the Gulf of Mexico. Kolbert flies over the area, observing the roads and fields still visible beneath the slowly rising waters.

Of course there is a plan to fix this, with the Engineer Corps and other agencies dreaming up grand plans to sledge vast amounts of sediment and divert it to the coastline. More control. The coastal cities of the future might not drown but theyll be radically transformed, with pharaonic flood control infrastructure rising to join the skyscrapers and motorways. It will fail, sometimes, as New Orleans does. Residents will get used to storms that scatter fishing boats across the roads and hang dead cows in the branches of trees. And the regions of the landscape that cant be saved because they have no economic value and their residents have no political capital will gradually disappear.

30 August, 2005; New Orleans in the aftermath of Katrina (Photo: Michael Appleton for the New York Daily News Archive, via Getty Images)

The best way to dim the sun to turn down the heat it casts onto our planet is by scattering vast amounts of small reflective particles into the stratosphere. Tiny (manufactured) diamonds are a strong candidate: theyre non-reactive and wont absorb any energy at all; the light scatters harmlessly back into space. But once you spray them into the atmosphere theyll eventually fall back to earth, and no ones quite sure what would happen to any or all of the planets lifeforms when we start inhaling or otherwise metabolising diamond dust.

The scientists Kolbert talks to at the Harvard Solar Geoengineering Research Program like calcium carbonate. Its natural: the main component of eggshells, snail shells, pearls. The air is already full of it; the ecosystem is saturated with it. And it has the right optical properties. Build enough specialised planes, dump enough of it in the atmosphere and itll reduce the energy of the incoming sunlight enough to offset the increased warmth from the greenhouse effect.

This was, Kolbert explains, almost the first technological solution proposed to the problem of climate change. Way back in the 1960s, when American and Soviet scientists first diagnosed the consequences of increased atmospheric carbon, they grimly predicted that nation states were highly unlikely to reduce their emissions, so youd have to counteract the warming some other way, and this seemed like the best answer.

Is it, though? Climate systems are famously hard to model so no one knows what will happen when you dump hundreds of thousands of tons of reflective particles into the atmosphere. The main concern is that itll disrupt rainfall patterns causing droughts in Africa and Asia. It will probably make solar panels less effective so it might increase the demand for fossil fuels. It will probably turn the sky white: that empty, bleached-out colour you already see in skies over megacities like Cairo or Delhi on a hot clear day.

But the biggest problem with solar geoengineering is that unless your atmospheric CO2 drops you have to keep doing it. It doesnt solve the climate crisis; it just addresses one of its symptoms. Imagine the heater in your house is broken: it keeps getting hotter and hotter. You can use an air conditioning unit to cool the rooms down but you havent fixed the heater. So you need to keep turning the air con up, and up, and up, just to maintain a stable temperature.

All those particles diamonds, or calcium carbonate, or whatever gradually fall to earth, but if CO2 levels continue to rise you need more particle dispersal; more flights. And if those flights are powered by fossil fuels you need even more flights to offset the emissions from those flights. And if you stop doing it, for whatever reason, the compounded heat hits very quickly a scenario that climate modellers refer to as a termination shock. So solar engineering is another trap; another loop. Another path dependent attempt to control a system thats too complex to adequately predict or control.

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The Harvard physicists understand all of these problems. In most cases theyre the ones who figured them out. Their argument is that weve already blown past the CO2 level that would see a 1.5C increase in global temperature. Were already locked into a trajectory that will see catastrophic climate change. And emissions arent going down. Itll take decades for the planet to transition to renewable energy economies, even if every country in the world starts now, which most of them wont.

Many of the IPCC pathways that see emissions reduce over the 21st century rely on widespread adoption of an industrial process called BECCS: Bioenergy with Carbon Capture and Storage. In the simplest implementation: you grow a forest, chop it down, burn the wood for energy and separate out the CO2 as its emitted. Then you store this captured carbon by injecting it deep underground, where it soaks into rocks deep in the planets crust. Climate modellers and economists love BECCS because it lets us have things both ways. We generate the energy that powers most economic growth and remove carbon from the atmosphere at the same time.

As of 2019 there were five BECCS facilities around the world, sequestering roughly 0.0004% of the worlds annual carbon emissions (my calculation; not Kolberts). So it needs to scale up by many orders of magnitude, at the same time that were transitioning the worlds 1.5 billion combustion engine vehicle fleet to electric and all the coal plants to solar and nuclear and wind.

The argument for solar geoengineering is that it buys the world time to carry out the transition to carbon neutrality: the transition we should have been working on for the last 30 years. Critics of the idea wonder if humans even have the right to do this. Were already geoengineering, its advocates reply: Thats what climate change is. But right now were geoengineering in this completely unplanned, uncontrolled way. Is it really worse to do it in a planned way to try and correct that? Kolbert quotes Lampedusa: Everything must change for everything to remain the same.

Towards the end of the book Kolbert contrasts three very different environmentalists on the subject of godhood. The technophile Stewart Brand, who said of humanity, We are as gods and might as well get good at it, the biologist EO Wilson who responds, We are not as gods. We are not yet sentient or intelligent enough to be much of anything, and Kingsnorth who commented, We are as gods but we have failed to get good at it. We are Loki, killing the beautiful for fun. We are Saturn, devouring our children.

In one of his most famous essays Kingsnorth wrote:

When I was young, I thought that the world was divided into good and bad people, and that I was one of the good ones. Later, slightly older, I thought it was divided into informed and ignorant people, and that I was one of the informed ones. Older still, though still not nearly old enough, I thought it was divided into Bad Elites and Good Masses, and that since I had no money or power, I must belong to the second category.

Now I think that humans like ease, material comfort, entertainment, and conformity, and they do not like anyone who threatens to take these things away. I think that even the people who say these things should be taken away in order to prevent the collapse of life on Earth do not really mean it The collapse of the industrial economy is, in all likelihood, the only remaining way to prevent the mass destruction of life on Earth.

Some people love this strain of fatalistic nihilism; they relish the prospect of humanity being destroyed for its sins. But Ive met more people whove read Kingsnorth or The Uninhabitable Earth, or other climate doom literature and found themselves overwhelmed with despair. Theyve abandoned environmentalism because whats the point? or decided not to have children, because why bring new life into a world that is about to end?

Under a White Sky points towards a vision of the future that is far from utopian but there is still a future. And it is a future that looks a lot more like the IPCCs higher probability intermediate pathways than the rapid extinction scenarios which have captured so many imaginations, but which weve been steadily moving away from over the last 10 years. Its a future where problems have been caused by people who arent bad, or ignorant or addicted to material ease; theyre smart and well intentioned but working with systems that were too complex for them to predict the consequences of their actions, which are now irreversible. And those problems are partly solved by that same class of people, who are creating further problems downstream. Its a future in which some things are better while others are horrible (the rivers are electrified, the skies are white, Elon Musk is the worlds first carbon currency trillionaire) but both the terrible and miraculous have become banal to those who live in it. A future we still have agency to influence, for better or worse.

Under a White Sky: The Nature of the Future, by Elizabeth Kolbert (Bodley Head, $37) is available from Unity Books Auckland and Wellington.

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Systems control: Introducing a new way of thinking about the climate crisis - The Spinoff

As large corporates weigh up the pros and cons of the office versus working from home, PwCs commitment to Merchant Square sends a strong signal about its faith in the future of Belfasts office sector. Its commitment to the scheme, which last month became the provinces biggest investment deal when it was sold by Oakland Holdings to a Middle Eastern investor for 87m, could also aidthe regeneration of Belfasts staid core.

So, just how big a role could the accounting giants commitment to Belfast play as we slowly emerge from lockdown?

The office sector in Belfast, along with every other UK town and city, has taken a massive hit from Covid. Figures from Savills show a significant drop in take-up from around 517,000 sq ft in 2019 to 140,000 sq ft in 2020. Data from CBRE shows that 2020 rents for grade-A office space stood between 21/sq ft and 23/sq ft, while rents for refurbished space were around 18/sq ft to 20/sq ft.

Commentators say it is too early to know whether Brexit will also have an impact on the market, but Belfast is expected to emerge from the pandemic stronger and raring to go.

PwCs tenancy announcement has already heralded a mini tsunami in lease take-ups by retail and leisure operators.

Merchant Square is a good location with leisure and public transport

Kevin MacAllister, PwC

No sooner had we signed our deal on Merchant Square than every lease and restaurant was taken up in the surrounding area, says Kevin MacAllister, regional market leader for Northern Ireland at PwC. We will not single-handedly regenerate Belfast city centre, but we are going a fair way to kickstarting it.

Progress would be swifter if there was not a shortage of office space, but the many statement buildings now under way or with planning consent should remedy this (see panel, overleaf).

Several huge projects are also set to alter the face of Belfast in the coming decades. There is Weavers Cross, a new 1bn regional transport hub; The Sixth, which is set to open in the old Belfast Telegraph Building; the Destination Hub a new 100m tourist attraction and cultural hub that the council is currently looking for a site for; and Smithfield Yard, just off the main retail thoroughfare.

All these are making developers salivate and, following the Merchant Square sale, investors are now watching the city closely.

A commitment of this scale [in buying Merchant Square] from an international investor new to the jurisdiction shows the exciting and unique place our market finds itself in, says Ben Turtle, director of investment at Savills. We are aware of other assets being prepared for market that will further test the depth of interest in Northern Ireland.

Brian Lavery, managing director Belfast at CBRE, describes the Merchant Square deal as a shot in the arm for not only the citys market but for PwC, making it clear they are going back into the office to be an office tenant.

There is a certain irony in PwC taking Merchant Square given it originally occupied the building two decades ago when it was known as Ferguson & Rushton. However, according to MacAllister, PwCs move was not because those of us who had worked there before [were] feeling in any way sentimental.

He says the building is well-located in the city centre and has a thriving leisure scene and good public transport links, so signing on the dotted line was a no-brainer.

When Covid struck, it seemed the world of professional services occupying big office development was gone, that we were going tomove into virtual working forever, says MacAllister. But we were never convinced that was the case. We are talking about future-proofing our business developing a place where people want to be, rather than have to be.

Merchant Square is just a few hundred yards away from the proposed Weavers Cross transport-led regeneration scheme. The eight-hectare site, in the heart of the city, will be home to a modern, high-capacity transport hub and mixed-use developments, including large swathes of offices. Set to be developed on the site of the existing Europa bus centre and Great Victoria Street railway station, the 1bn scheme promises to create 50,000 new jobs.

MacAllister says the development is seen as a huge catalyst for Belfasts regeneration. [Weavers Cross] is certainly influencing our decision to move in that direction because that will bring the whole life into the city centre.

Another development that will have a significant impact on the local property market is The Sixth. In February 2019, the 80m joint venture between Belfast City Council and McAleer & Rushe got the go-ahead. The 300,000 sq ft mixed-use scheme at the old Belfast Telegraph site on Royal Avenue will have 230,000 sq ft of workspace, and potential for a global HQ with floorplates of upto 30,000 sq ft.

The Sixth will be next to Ulster Universitys new 250m Belfast campus. The 750,000 sq ft site will house up to 15,000 students and staff the equivalent of a population the size of Armagh being dropped into one end of the city. The biggest change in Belfast is going to be the Ulster University campus, says Patrick OGorman, principal at Bywater Properties, which along with partner Ashmour is bringing its own changes tothe city.

Together they are refurbishing a 30,000 sq ft building, 35DP, which is five floors above the Boots shop on Donegall Place and set to be completed in early July.

Its a slightly untested environment for office space because traditionally the upper floors in Belfast have been left fallow above retail, says Gareth Howell, director at Savills, the schemes leasing agent.

Potential occupiers have clearly not been put off by the location,as the building is close to being under offer on half the space.

The Bywater/Ashmour partnership is also bringing on Smithfield Yard, a 167,000 sq ft mixed-use scheme with 152,000 sq ft of offices, which is currently populated by a hub of independent retailers. The scheme has planning permission and is viewed as a long-term prospect when market conditions allow.

It is one of the things that attracted us to working in Belfast, says Theo Michell, principal at Bywater. You dont get many major city centres in the UK where you get vacant sites that have sat for a long time with not much happening. But its right off Royal Avenue, slap bang in the city centre.

At all the new schemes and developments being brought forward in Belfast city centre, the spotlight is very much on wellbeing and ESG.

The wellness agenda was ramping up pre-pandemic, [but Covid has] sped up that process, says David Wright, director at CBRE Belfast. Theres going to be a flight to quality in the short term. We have a lot of secondary-type buildings in Belfast that arent fit for purpose.

Merchant Square has an entire floor dedicated to wellbeing, hosting pilates and yoga classes along with social activities. And next door is a building leading the charge on wellbeing.

The Lotus Group is developing The Well, a 36,000 sq ft office building on Wellington Street that has a strong focus on wellness and will be delivered in 2023. Already dubbed the healthiest building in Belfast, its website boasts it will be an office utopia where the air is clean, the lights are controlled and the journey from door to desk is 100% touch-free.

Alastair Coulson, managing director of The Lotus Group, says he has no worries about leasing activity post-pandemic. We bought a building in a really prime location next to the city centre, and the new transport hub [Weavers Cross] is going to be opposite PwCs new building so location is A1. We were always confident we were in the right location.

Despite the challenges the industry has faced over the last 12 months, Coulson is optimistic about the future. There are a lot of great developers doing great things in the city. That all [aids] Belfast plc, as a rising tide helpsall ships.

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Belfast is ready to bounce back | Insight - Property Week

Even the concert hall at Mills College is different.

Looming at the back of the stage is a huge, bright mural of a forest opening onto a deep blue lake. The ceiling is painted in geometric patterns and vivid colors. Frescos of Gregorian chant scores flank the stage.

We are not in sedate, monochromatic Carnegie Hall. No, Littlefield Concert Hall at Mills, in Oakland, Calif., is a vibrant, even eccentric place, where it is clear from the surroundings that music outside the mainstream is not simply tolerated, but celebrated.

There was a real atmosphere of comfort and support for whatever it is that you wanted to do, the composer David Rosenboom, who led the music program at Mills in the 1980s, said in an interview.

Now that program and the electronics-focused Center for Contemporary Music, together among the most distinguished havens for experimental work in America over the past century, are facing possible closure. On March 17 the college, founded in 1852, announced that ongoing financial problems, exacerbated by the coronavirus pandemic, would mean the end of its history as a degree-granting institution made up of an undergraduate womens college and several coeducational graduate programs.

Pending approval by its board of trustees, the schools final degrees are likely to be conferred in 2023. The statement announcing the proposed closure alluded to plans for a Mills Institute on the 135-acre campus, but the focus of such an institute and whether it would include the arts is unclear.

For composers and musicians, the potential loss of the Mills program has come as a startling blow, even if the colleges finances have been shaky for years. I long feared this might be the worst-case scenario, but I am still devastated by the news, said the harpist and composer Zeena Parkins, who teaches there.

It has been an astonishing run. The schools faculty over the years has been practically an index of maverick artists, including Darius Milhaud, at Mills for three decades beginning during World War II; Luciano Berio, who came at Milhauds invitation; Lou Harrison, who built an American version of the Indonesian gamelan percussion orchestra; the deep listening pioneer Pauline Oliveros; Robert Ashley, an innovator in opera; Terry Riley, a progenitor of Minimalism; the influential composer and improviser Anthony Braxton; James Fei, a saxophonist and clarinetist who works with electronic sounds; and Maggi Payne, a longtime director of the Center for Contemporary Music, Millss laboratory for electronic work since the 1960s, when Oliveros was its first leader.

Among the alumni are Dave Brubeck, Steve Reich, John Bischoff, William Winant and Laetitia Sonami; several former students ended up returning to teach after graduating.

What Mills College had was unique, said Riley, who taught there from 1971 to 1981. I have never in my travels encountered another institution like it.

Millss defining feature was its sense of community. Despite all the famous names involved, the overriding impression was that music is not created by lone geniuses, but by people working together.

Fred Frith, whose career has included avant-garde rock and idiosyncratic improvisations and who retired from Mills in 2018 after many years there, said, Music is essentially a collaborative activity, and if Im going to teach improvisation or composition without real hands-on involvement, then were all going to miss out on something.

In the first half of the 20th century, when composers like John Cage became associated with the school, Mills developed a reputation for nonconformity. Performances ran the gamut from traditional instruments to obscure electronics to vacuum cleaners, clock coils and other found objects. Riley recounted an early performance of In C, his open-ended classic from 1964, at which the audience was dancing in the aisles. Laetitia Sonami recalled taking singing lessons with the master Indian vocalist Pandit Pran Nath, guru to Riley and others.

At that time, the program was practically public access. In the 1970s, Mills was still like a community group, said the composer Chris Brown, a former director of the Center for Contemporary Music. It still had the idea that community members could come and use the studios.

Robert Ashley, a guiding presence from 1969 to 1981, helped foster that spirit. Though the radically open sensibility faded as the years went by, Mills maintained a commitment to access through frequent performances in and around Oakland, many of them free.

One of the amazing things about Mills is the rich musical community that it creates through the entire Bay Area, said the composer Sarah Davachi, who graduated in 2012.

As the personal computer revolution was taking hold in the nearby Silicon Valley, experiments with home-brew electronics and microcomputers, like those of David Behrman, were common at Mills, where technology had long been at home through the Center for Contemporary Music. Serendipitous moments abounded: As a student in the 70s, John Bischoff remembers running into David Tudor, renowned as a collaborator with John Cage, in the hallway and being asked to assist with recording Tudors work Microphone. William Winant said he found an original instrument built by the composer and inveterate inventor Harry Partch hidden under the stage in the concert hall.

It felt like utopia: an environment where students are encouraged, and given the support they need, to pursue any and all ideas that came to mind, free from the stifling pressures of capitalism, said Seth Horvitz, an electronic composer who records under the name Rrose.

Students built their own instruments and sound installations, exhilarated by the freedom to do what they wanted. We commandeered every square inch of the music studio and surrounding areas, said the composer Ben Bracken, putting up rogue installations in the courtyards, hallways and hidden rooms, inviting friends to perform in inflatable bubbles, screening Kenneth Anger films in the amphitheater with live studio accompaniments, Moog studio late nights that bled into morning.

But pressures on institutions of higher education around the country, which have intensified in recent decades, did not spare Mills. In 2017, as a cost-cutting measure, it began laying off some tenured faculty. The celebrated composer and multi-instrumentalist Roscoe Mitchell learned his contract was not being renewed news that was met with an outcry from the experimental music community. (Mitchells contract was eventually extended, but he chose to retire.) In 2019, the college sold a rare copy of Shakespeares First Folio at auction for just under $10 million, and a Mozart manuscript for an undisclosed sum. But the losses continued and then came the pandemic.

Many musicians said they were concerned about the fate of Millss archives. Maggi Payne said it includes over 2,000 tapes of performances, lectures and interviews, along with scores, letters and synthesizers and hundreds of percussion instruments owned by Lou Harrison.

David Bernstein, the current chair of the music department, said the archives would be protected. We have been working on this project for quite some time, he said. And yes, there are instruments at Mills of significant historical importance. We are very concerned about their fate. Most of all, they should not be stored but used by students interested in exploring new sounds and different musical cultures. And they should also be played by virtuoso performers, as they are now.

But if Millss future is unclear, Roscoe Mitchell said, its legacy is not. It will live on much longer than you and I, he said.

Its history, Mitchell said. Its not going to go away.

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Is the Music Over at Mills College? - The New York Times

A few months ago, when a Reddit-induced buying spree inflated the stock of GameStop and other imperiled companies to absurdist heights, several people asked me if it reminded me of Occupy Wall Street, the protest movement I covered a decade ago that confronted the financial elite. After all, isnt that what the GameStop stock story was all aboutordinary people sticking it to the big investors, swarming a system rigged against most of us?

No, it didnt remind me of Occupy Wall Street at all. There, protesters didnt buy stock; they fed warm meals to hundreds of people each day. They ran a library and held teach-ins and organized free clinics. They worked at making decisions together in a way where everyone could be heard. The goal wasnt to play with commodities; it was to make a commons.

These days, the viral asset class of the moment is NFTsnonfungible tokens, which are turning pieces of digital culture into multi-million-dollar bonanzas. Essentially deeds of ownership enforced by computers rather than governments, NFTs are being heralded as a new opportunity to bring the mechanisms of the elite art world to the people. Think of it as Christys meets eBay, except what you buy doesnt come in the mail, it just sits in your digital wallet. The speculation is fueled by historic highs in the value of cryptocurrencies of all sorts.

I have been hanging around the crypto world since early 2014, during the first murmurs about Ethereum, the system that runs much of the NFT craze. I have been drawn to the creativity of many crypto pioneers, who envision utopias of community governance and equitable distributions of value. But when the crypto market soared in 2017, it was on the basis of collectible CryptoKitties and largely scammy initial coin offeringsstart-ups raising cash with virtually no regulation or accountability. It democratized start-up investing, but for participants in most projects, it was a disaster, much like a lot of the GameStop froth.

The democratization is spreading. In addition to buying NFTs for art, you can buy tokens attached to brands and even non-consenting people, betting on whose tokens you think will be worth more later on. Crypto makes it easier to buy collateralized debt and futures and all the other fun stuff that caused the financial crash in 2008. I coined the term exit to community to describe how start-ups could become owned and governed by their users, rather than investors; but increasingly people are using this to describe turning users into petty investors.

Types of speculation once reserved for elite traders in office buildings or underground gamblers are now subject to that hallowed democratization. Now you, too, can get rich by playing with financial abstractions. But is that what we want to be democratizing?

This latest phase of capitalism has a feeling of dj vu from its first stageexcept rather than speculating on colonial land-grabs and the bodies of slaves, tokens are making commodities of famous people and GIFs. This seems less harmful for now, until it isnt; until we all become tokenized assets, along with the air, water and everything else we need to survive. Already, crypto markets demand massive amounts of electricity. That looks more like dystopia than utopia so far. The apparent freedom to speculate quickly turns into servitude to the whims of the market.

Take art. As the NFT superstar Bleeple told Kara Swisher, all these tokens will probably just make the rich richer. Is more inequality really what the art market needs?

In contrast, consider an important new report commissioned by Grantmakers in the Arts, Solidarity Not Charity, which points the way toward an art-world based on the solidarity economy. The goal there is not to create overvalued superstars but to support cultural workers of many kinds, particularly those who have been most left behind by speculation.

The idea behind the solidarity economy is the opposite of democratizing speculation: It is about expanding the commons, ensuring that more and more of the goods of the world are available for everyone, no matter what tokens they do or dont hold. As Occupy Wall Street tried to show in microcosm, health care and food and housing could be shared resources for everyone, not scarce commodities. Rather than a few people getting rich from their art, the solidarity economy means more and more people having time to develop their cultural skills. Rather than trying to predict what will be valuable in the future, it turns attention to what we need right now.

Crypto technology could support this, too. Projects like Cambiatus and Moeda, both born in South America, put crypto to work to create abundance among the poor. Gitcoin uses a clever system of matching grants to fund common-good software development. The same tools that can be used to speculate can also be used to coordinate and collaborate in new ways.

With every boom and bust cycle, crypto gets closer to the mainstream. Facebook is slated to release its own cryptocurrency this year. Before long, todays wild experiments among early adopters will be the precursors for what we all use and take for granted. But too many of the visions for this emerging technology take us straight down the road of dystopia, where everything is for sale and nothing is shared.

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NFTs are leading to a new financial dystopia. Here's why you should care. - America Magazine

Restoration And Care

Under the leadership of Stagg, who served as the Rugby Restoration Association director for 10 years, the town started coming back to life. Restoration work began on the founders home, the church, and the library, and the Rugby Archives were created to preserve the historic photographs, memoirs, letters, and records of the early settlement.

Today, Rugby is a rarity. The original town plan and its surrounding wilderness remain much as they did in 1880, and new residents and tourism have breathed life into the dream community.

Today, 12 original buildings have been restored to their historic origins, and the 805-acre Rugby State Natural Areas and the Big South Fork National River and Recreation Area bring more and more visitors through Rugby.

New residents who move into Rugby build historically compatible homes based on the original 1880 town plan, and more and more buildings are being restored, including the 1881 Uffington House, where Thomas Hughes niece and elderly mother once lived.

Pro Tip: The Rugby Visitors Centre offers a fantastic free documentary called The Power of a Dream that should not be missed. The short movie delves deep into the history of Rugby and its people, quotes diary entries of those who lived here, and provides information and commentary on the lifespan of the village from its founding up to its current community.

Getting to Rugby isnt difficult, but you can pass by it without ever seeing the turn-off. From Knoxville, travel on I-75 North to Exit 141 for Huntsville/Oneida, and then take Highway 63 to a left on Highway 27.

Start your tour of Rugby at the Rugby Visitors Center, which is open Thursdays through Sundays. After learning about the history of the town with the film The Power of a Dream, sign up for a guided walking tour of some of the buildings and exhibits in Historic Rugby. The one-block walking tour will bring you to the 1882 Thomas Hughes Free Public Library, the founders home, 1887 Christ Church Episcopal, and the 1907 Schoolhouse with exhibits featuring Rugby images through the years.

Be sure to pick up a detailed map of Rugby, which is free at the Visitor Centre. The map includes all trails leading from Rugby into The Big South Fork National River and Recreation Area, plus trails through the Rugby State Natural Area.

You can even stay overnight at Rugby in one of three historic lodgings: the Pioneer Cottage, the Newbury House, and the Percy Cottage.

In addition, Rugby hosts several events throughout the year, including guided hikes, art events, special festivals, and classes.

Excerpt from:

The Victorian Utopia Hidden In The Middle Of Tennessee - TravelAwaits

In September 2009, when newspapers reported that activist Kobad Ghandy had been arrested in Delhis Bhikaji Cama Place, there was a curious historical coincidence to the event.

Just over 90 years earlier, Madame Cama had been arrested for her efforts to further the cause of independence. Now, another privileged member of Indias tiny Parsi community had been taken into custody in an area named for the freedom fighter for his efforts to helped Indias most marginalised communities liberate themselves from the structures that perpetuated their exploitation.

The police alleged that Ghandy, who had attended Doon School and studied in London to be a chartered accountant, was a top ideologue of the banned Communist Party of India (Maoist).

Ghandy, who is now 74, spent the next decade in jails across the country, facing a variety of charges. He was finally released on bail in October 2019. On March 16, Roli Books released his prison memoir Fractured Freedom, a chilling and engaging account of his experiences in Indias brutal jails.

In his book, Ghandy details his encounters with fellow prisoners. Amidst dons, rapists, and corrupt businessmen and people accused of political violence, two men earned his affection: Sudheendra Kulkarni, who had been arrested in the cash-for-votes case in 2011, and Afzal Guru, who had been convicted in the 2001 Parliament attack case and was later hanged.

Ghandy explains why he was attracted to Marxism as a volunteer with anti-racism groups in London in the late 1960s. His association with radical politics deepened when he returned to Mumbai in 1972, as he began to do social work in the Dalit-dominated Mayanagar slum near his home on the posh Worli Sea Face. He joined PROYOM, the Progressive Youth Movement, and came into contact with leaders of the citys most important trade unions.

Also a member of PROYOM was Arunadha Shanbag, who would become his wife and partner in the quest for social justice. Ghandys descriptions of her influence on his life and ideas make for some of the warmest sections on Fractured Freedom. In the last chapter, Ghandy suggests that the world could be transformed with the introduction of a new set of values that he describes as the Anuradha- model. She died of malaria in 2008.

In this interview, Kobad Ghandy talks about Indias present predicament and his vision for social change.

In the 1970s, when you became an activist and class struggle seemed to be the dominant concern, did you ever imagine that Hindu majoritarianism would be the main challenge to Indias social fabric?Actually, since the 1980s, the Congress themselves started playing the Hindutva card opening the locked gates to the Babri Masjid, engineering the Sikh killings after Indira Gandhis death in 1984 and all that type of stuff. The 80s also witnessed the introduction of the new liberalised economy. And Ramanand Sagars television programme on the Ramayana (just as TV was newly introduced) created a huge atmosphere for what was to come. As an economist, I had the impression that the two processes were linked.

Of course, neoliberalism was introduced in a big way after the 90s, when Manmohan Singh was finance minister and Montek Singh Ahluwalia was finance secretary, with the instructions of the International Monetary Fund. But the seeds were planted in the 80s itself, when talk about privatisation began.

Liberalisation is nothing but a word for big corporations amassing money at the expense of the poor. Now, even the middle class is finding employment only as contract labour etc.

Being involved with trade unions from the 1970s, we began to see how Bombays textile mills closed and work shifted on a contract basis to powerlooms. The textile strike of 1984 changed the nature of Bombay, transforming it from a working-class city to a financial hub.

I used to live in Worli at the time and when the mill shifts were about to begin, you could see a sea of humanity coming down the road. That has long ceased. The neoliberal system is a culmination of the seeds planted in the 1980s.

I now get the impression also that the Covid lockdown was also somehow linked to the ongoing depression in the world economies. Even as the poor have been further impoverished, the richest people have got much more wealthy.

The communal division was a necessary effort to divert the attention of the working class and the farmers away from the economic crisis they are facing. And I think, if you take it historically, the Congress has also played a big role in this game.

What is the source of Narendra Modis popularity?I dont really know as just after I came out of jail, we went into the Covid lockdown. Ive not really been able to interact with people and I dont know their psychology. But my feeling is that he and his party use the communal and nationalism cards very effectively. To do this, they have the media fully behind them. Some of those TV anchors, particularly, can become really rabid. This leads people to believe theres no alternative to Modi, which also is a reality at the national level.

There are, of course, alternatives at the regional level. But these parties have a limitation on the national stage. Many had put their hopes in the Aam Aadmi Party but it is not playing the role it was expected to. They are playing the soft Hindutva card too. Some claim this is necessary if they are to fulfil their immediate electoral calculations. Besides, they too take no stand on neo-liberal policies, but of course they have done some good work on education and healthcare. But I dont know whether this will bring a long-term payoff.

How do you think it can be countered?Lets look to the farmers, I think. Lakhs of people are participating in the agitation. But so far, there is no political platform to capitalise on this. They pride themselves on not being political, like most trade unions and movements did in our days also. But I feel unless theres some political platform, its all a dead end. Ive seen this with many mass movements in my time.

Thats where the Naxalites also make a mistake by boycotting elections. Boycotts only help the most reactionary of the electoral forces.

What is your idea of Utopia?Thats a long, very far thing. I dont see it on the agenda anyway in the near future. I have spent 40 years as an activist thinking about this. What is equality to ensure the basic necessities of life? That is only economics. But what about social and human factors?

Utopia means people should be happy. No doubt that presupposes that they have the necessities of life. Without food, clothing, shelter, and medical care you cant be happy. Some of these rich religious types say that, oh, they might be poor, but they are happy with all our money and property, we have so much tension. If you actually live the life of a poor person, youll see the immense mental strain it brings.

Thats why I say that the goalposts should change to happiness, which is inclusive of the economic agenda. Capitalism has not provided any of the answers for the masses. And its only socialism of whatever type that has given some relief. Even in the East European countries, people now look back at how they had free education and free health care. Socialism has given benefits to the people. Even China, which has the largest number of billionaires in the world today, has lifted a vast part of the population to a middle-class level.

So economically, no doubt thats the answer. But with these economic gains, happiness, freedom, and democracy need to be linked. This in turn is inconceivable without a new set of values: the qualities of naturalness, straightforwardness, simplicity, without ego and manipulativeness. What I have outlined as the Anuradha-type values putting her as a model for others to emulate.

When I speak of freedom I am not speaking merely from the political context, it starts from oneself. Most of us are ourselves wrapped up in numerous knots where we are often alienated from ourselves. We ourselves are unable to understand our own emotions and have become what Marx called a crippled monstrosity. We get wrapped up in our own problems all the time, where subconscious emotions, programmed in our childhood, are in conflict with the actual reality. These are so deep-rooted in our subconscious mind that a mere change in ideology does not automatically bring in the new values.

The new economy must promote a new set of values, happiness and freedom. There are many different types of socialist models the Soviet one which only focused on the state sector, which everyones rejected, and the Chinese model of walking on two legs involving a balance between the state and private sectors. There are also examples to investigate in Latin America. Whatever the type of economics, it must be interwoven into a structure that generates happiness.

You have looked to ideas from Indias past to provide a model for our present.A major aspect that is preventing the democratisation and the development of our country in the true sense of the word is the caste system. This doesnt exist anywhere else in the world. In fact, when rulers from afar seek to conquer foreign countries, they try to impose a policy of divide and rule. But in India, with a country divided into 1,000 parts, we give it to them on a platter. Unless that aspect is broken, India cannot advance towards any democratisation as caste is not only divisive it is hierarchical and oppressive.

But we do have some models in our traditions. For instance, the egalitarianism of the Bhakti traditions, and even earlier the Charvaka and Buddhist past. We have to fully develop them and take these traditions forward, as Phule and Ambedkar did, and build on these democratic foundations to create a better India.

Since coming out of jail, though, Ive noticed that many of these traditions are being used for promoting Hindutva and its progressive essence is being lost. We need to reclaim them. Marxists negated the caste question and thought it was all about class struggle. That must change.

Are you still a communist?Of course, I still say that a form of socialist economy is the only alternative. The method by which it is to be achieved depends on the situation. Looking back, its clear that armed struggle has only been successful during World Wars. On the contrary, we also see peaceful communist movements have resulted in the most cruel massacres in Indonesia, Chile and numerous other countries.

Communism grows as scientific ideas develop and economic structures change. We have to take the experiences of the past and incorporate happiness, freedom and value systems into any model for change. We have to find a model for radical change to socialism depending on the concrete conditions prevailing in our respective countries.

In a way, the task has become easier as it is no longer the rich vs the poor. But with the international economy so polarised, it would be the 3,500-and-odd billionaires and the vast retinue of hangers-on vs the mass of the people. The wealth that these 3,500 families and agents in politics and bureaucracy hold will be more than sufficient to create a heaven on earth.

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Why I am a communist: Activist Kobad Ghandy on ideology and Utopia - Scroll.in

Just when you thought theres no possible way to tell the story of Princess Diana in an updated, unique way, here comes Diana: The Musical. Netflix has just announced that the Broadway show, Diana: The Musical, will premiere on the streaming site on October 1, 2021. A performance of the stage show, which had to close in March 2020 due to COVID-19 while it was still in early previews, was filmed last year and features the original Broadway cast. It was also announced that, pending the approval to re-open live theater venues, the show will begin previews on December 1 at the Longacre Theatre in New York.

While several other Broadway shows have found great success on streaming sites during the pandemic, among them Hamilton on Disney+ and David Byrnes American Utopia on HBO Max, Diana: The Musical barely had a chance to gain exposure and a wide audience before closing last March.

The chance to share our show, first with Netflixs global audience, and then welcoming a live audience back on Broadway, is something weve all been dreaming about for more than a year, a statement from the shows producers reads. We could not be more thrilled to finally share both the film and the Broadway musical with the world.

Diana: The Musical stars Jeanna de Waal as Diana. Originally from England, de Waal is a Broadway and London theater veteran who has also appeared on Netflixs Marvel series Iron Fist. Supporting cast includes Roe Hartrampf as Prince Charles, Erin Davie as Camilla Parker-Bowles, and veteran stage actress Judy Kaye as Queen Elizabeth. The Netflix special presentation is directed by Christopher Ashley.

For a sneak peek of some of the music, check out de Waal performing one of the shows original songs, If, below.

See the original post:

'Diana: The Musical' Will Premiere on Netflix This October - Decider

Kera Sherwood-O'Regan was running out of voice by the time she made her stand.

It was December 2019, during the final stages of the last climate summit before Covid hit.

The United Nations climate talks were meant to end on a Friday, but countries had haggled, delayed and resisted their way through the night on Friday, into Saturday, then into Sunday.

Even New Zealands official government delegation had slept on the floor for two nights running.

READ MORE:* Iwi leader Mike Smith takes OMV oil boss to International Criminal Court* 'Old ways' key to sustainable future for indigenous people* Waikato woman represents Mori and Pasifika youth at United Nations conference in Poland

Things were no better for activists. Unable to leave the building in case they missed something, people were sleeping under desks and jackets, living off chocolate bars and Uber Eats pizza deliveries, which proved tricky to get through security. There wasnt much choice the conference centre eateries had closed, and negotiations were being extended by the hour. Those who couldnt afford to change their flights had to abandon the meeting.

Theyd been promised a prize for surviving until the end, though. Civil society and indigenous groups have no formal standing at climate summits, but the organisers had promised them a chance to address the delegates when negotiations finished. This was their chance to be heard by ministers, journalists and they hoped the public.

By the time they got their turn to speak, tensions and emotions were running high.

Reuters news agency captured some of the highlights on camera.

The speeches were heartfelt and impassioned, but the most striking moment in the news video is a line by Sherwood-O'Regan, a young Ki Tahu woman with dark hair, red lipstick and a vivid blue cloth draped across one shoulder. (Ki Tahu is sometimes pronounced Ngi Tahu. This article uses Ki Tahi at Sherwood-ORegans request.)

Her words became the key quote of a Guardian caption, accompanying the video of the speeches: Stop taking up space with your false solutions and get out of our way.

The slight catch in her voice has its own backstory, as does the vivid blue prayer cloth.

Jason Boberg/Supplied

Kera Sherwood-O'Regan says her illusions about the UN process were shattered pretty quickly.

But, before we get to that, lets clear up one thing. Sherwood-ORegan knows shes lucky to be able to attend these summits at all. Unlike many, she can save up the $10-15,000 to get there, and her academic studies in political science help her speak the conference lingo.

She has well-known family and two marae, both of which she gets to visit. Her grandad, or poua, on her dads side is Sir Tipene ORegan, the professional company director and former long-serving chairman of the Ngi Tahu Mori Trust Board. Her marae are Te Rau Aroha in Awarua/Bluff, and Moeraki. Her dad is archaeologist Gerard ORegan, the curator Mori at Otago Museum. Her mum, Viv Sherwood, is Pkeh, works in sustainability and grew up in Auckland. Together, they made an environmental activist with a strong sense of indigenous rights.

None of that makes these summits easy, though. Madrid was her third, but, right from her first one, in Bonn, Germany, in 2017, she noticed a pattern. [Indigenous people] are the first to be tokenised, as soon as it would be a good look to have some indigenous people doing prayer or singing some songs.

[Yet] when it came to the negotiation room we didn't get to participate at all.

Supplied

Kera Sherwood-O'Regan speaking at end of the marathon UN climate summit in Madrid.

Without formal standing, indigenous activists must spend their time lobbying national delegations to speak up for their peoples interests. Sometimes, theyll make headway, only to discover the country they were dealing with has made a side deal with another nation.

For disabled people, a group among which Sherwood-ORegan counts herself, even getting around the conferences is challenging, with big crowds, barriers, and long distances between meeting rooms.

You... come out of your politics degree thinking that the UN is the place where this great diplomacy is meant to happen, and where there are going to be these great standards of human rights, where people's voices are able to be heard, and where indigenous people can have a say, she says.

That illusion was shattered pretty quickly.

The Madrid talks were gruelling even for veterans of the art.

Sherwood-ORegan was there volunteering with the International Indigenous Peoples Forum. The 28-year-old has fibromyalgia, a condition associated with chronic pain and fatigue. Shed been sleeping on a couch squab, and the heating in the conference centre seemed to have been turned off, along with the food supply. It was just bitterly cold, she says.

Of course, no-one had prepared to stay the night in the freezing cold. We had to set an alarm to wake up every hour or two to check the (live bulletin) board and find out if we were going to be asked to give our statements at 3am or something. Later, shed find she'd contracted pneumonia and pleurisy.

When her allotted time rolled around, she was running on adrenaline. Then came the bombshell.

The proposal was put forward by the (climate summit) presidency, that they just weren't going to hear any of the statements, and that we could all just email [them] in.

The words popped out before shed fully thought them through.

I just shouted, from the back of the room, You can give us our damn two minutes, and it was kind of frightening, at first. It started coming out of my mouth, and then I was like, oh god, I'm going to get thrown out. It's forbidden to cause a ruckus or have a scene in those negotiations, and in previous years we've been kicked out just for having somebody take photos who's not an accredited photographer.

The only thing that really helped was that everybody else joined in, and some countries came in and said, We support allowing civil society to have their say.

Her speech, when she got to make it, came out powerfully, with only a hint of a quaver.

She told the delegates: We are experts on climate. We are the kaitiaki, the stewards of nature.

The Guardian headline called the activists furious. But was she?

I think I maybe came across as quite exasperated, because it was really high stakes it was really high tension. And I didn't really have very much voice left. But one of the things I find very frustrating... is the framing [of] indigenous activists just as angry indigenous people. People just write it off as, Oh, you're just angry all the time. And it's not that we're just angry all the time.

We're literally here, still having to say, Please let us in the room. We get to the end of this massive conference that has cost people so much, financially, emotionally, culturally. And then, in the final minutes, where you'll finally get your two minutes of space... they wanted to take that from us.

One message Sherwood-ORegan wanted to get across was this: listen to our solutions. People on marae in New Zealand are planning for, and fighting, climate change, despite most of them never having been to a climate summit. We had side events happening with indigenous people on panels, talking about the innovations they have at home, about the way their community operates to reduce their own carbon emissions, and to do so in a way that preserves their culture and language, she says.

LUKE MALPASS/STUFF

Jacinda Ardern gives the opening speech at the 2019 UN Climate Action Summit in New York, shortly before the Madrid meeting.

Yet, earlier in the conference, a group of mainly women and indigenous people had been thrown out by police for protesting, an incident that organisers later described as unfortunate.

Another time, Sherwood-ORegan and others were almost trampled in a media scrum, which was trying to get to Greta Thunberg, as they attempted to cross the crowd to get to their office. Sherwood-ORegans tweet about the incident got thousands of likes, Twitters version of agreement.

Ironically, one of Thunbergs topics that day was telling the assembled crowd to listen to indigenous people.

It was quite disheartening, because I think Greta herself has worked really hard to be a good ally to indigenous people, says Sherwood-ORegan.

On the other side of the corridor were indigenous people working our asses off just to get people to pay the slightest bit of attention.

Jason Boberg/Supplied

Sherwood O'Regan is weighing up the risks of attending the next climate summit, in Glasgow.

As for the prayer cloth, its story is happier. Shed introduced herself with her pepeha during a talanoa with young indigenous people held at the New Zealand pavilion. Shed mentioned Aoraki/Mt Cook was her maunga ariki, her mountain, information which made its way to another indigenous young woman at the conference, Niria Alicia Garcia. Garcia had been involved in protecting indigenous waterways in California and knew that, before World War 2, Chinook salmon eggs were taken from the McCloud river near Mount Shasta and brought to the Rakaia river in the South Island. Sherwood-ORegans iwi had hosted the Winnemem Wintu people when they visited to see about repatriating some of their endangered salmon. The blue cloth features three mountains Mt Shasta, Hawaiis Mauna Kea and Sherwood-ORegans home mountain Aoraki.

Sherwood-ORegans carefully considering whether shell go to the next summit in Glasgow, if its held in person in November, given the possible health risks Covid poses.

The Madrid summit ended in compromise: almost 200 countries present would put new pledges on the table before the next summit, in an attempt to ramp up efforts to combat heating. Crucial negotiations to set the rules for using international carbon credits couldnt be concluded, and havent progressed quickly enough without in-person meetings.

Those carbon trading rules have implications for indigenous people. A sore point at the Madrid conference was the weakening of safeguards meant to protect the rights of local people when countries are claiming credit for building carbon-cutting projects. The mega Alto Maipo hydropower scheme in Chile, for example, could be eligible to sell carbon credits offshore, despite alleged human rights violations over local water and grazing.

Meanwhile, most countries existing pledges to cut emissions have been rated lacking. New Zealands own, independent Climate Change Commission has told our Government it should increase its pledge.

But, says Sherwood-ORegan, in any case, much of the real climate action happens on the ground.

If Thunberg wants to pass the mic to indigenous climate activists, Sherwood-ORegan wants to pass it again, to people doing the work far from climate summits.

The most important action is the stuff that's happening at home, that people don't see on a TV screen, or getting whipped up in the media, she says.

Were not going to solve all these issues at the UN.

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Shut out: Why the United Nations is no utopia - Stuff.co.nz

Altrincham has been named the Best Place to Live in the North West of England.

It is top of a list of eight locations in the region chosen by The Sunday Times in the annual Sunday Times Best Places to Live guide.

Manchester also made it into the shortlist, particularly for the area around Manchester Piccadilly station, which has been commended for its redevelopment.

On Altrincham, judges described the Greater Manchester market town as where suburbia meets utopia.

They particularly admired the areas schools, with the girls grammar being named the North West state secondary school of the decade by The Sunday Times Parent Power guide, while the boys grammar landed second place.

The convenient tram route into central Manchester was noted, and so too were its open spaces such as Stamford Park, the River Bollin and the National Trusts Dunham Massey.

Most of all, though, they were impressed with the market and food hall responsible for the regeneration of the town centre.

They made a special mention of Tender Cows triple-cooked chips (4) and the way that even though the market was only able to sell essentials during lockdown, it remained at the heart of life in the town.

Altrincham was titled The Sunday Times Best Place to Live in Britain overall last year, but this year that honour went to Stroud in Gloucestershire.

Alongside Alty, seven other locations were selected across the region for the guide, listed in no particular order.

They favoured Manchester, Saddleworth in Oldham, Liverpool, Knutsford and Bollington in Cheshire, Kirkby Lonsdale in Cumbria, and Arnside and Silverdale, Cumbria.

Helen Davies, The Times and Sunday Times property editor, says the guide has never been so important in 2021.

The pandemic has taught us how much we rely on our homes and communities, she says, with many of us reassessing our priorities on where we really want to live.

Our focus for this year has been community, countryside and convenience, Helen said.

It hasnt been a year for big cities or small villages. Instead, it is small towns that have shone: big enough to have everything you need within walking distance and small enough for everyone to feel connected.

Altrincham was chosen as our regional winner this year as it has everything you want in a suburb: parks, excellent transport links and top-class schools.

She added: The inspirational market and food hall that transformed the town centre from the worst in Britain to a favourite destination have continued to show their value, even during the pandemic.

Safiyyah Abdulla, of GINKGO on Stamford New Road, says moving to Altrincham from London was a no brainer.

She owns the health and eco-lifestyle store with her sister, Qayyah, offering nutritional supplements alongside a zero-waste refill station.

"When choosing a location for our new store, Altrincham was an absolute no brainer, she said.

We love living and working here. There really is an unparalleled sense of community and we feel so fortunate to be surrounded by the most amazing set of local independent businesses who have rallied together to support each other through the last year.

It has been fantastic to see that despite Covid, a growing number of vibrant independents are joining the area and with the exciting new redevelopment plans for Stamford Quarter, the area really feels like it will continue to flourish."

Altrincham property expert Steve Ford from Purplebricks says in his 37 years of estate agency, Altrincham has always been an "extremely popular hotspot."

The tram gets you to the centre of Manchester in about 20 minutes whilst you still enjoy the leafy suburbs on the edge of the Cheshire countryside," he said.

Altrincham town centre is enjoying a huge investment and resurgence.

"The announcements this week around the proposed improvements to the Stamford Quarter further illustrate how the town centre is truly returning to a bustling market town."

The Sunday Times expert judges assess a wide range of factors, from schools, air quality, transport and broadband speeds to culture, green spaces and the health of the high street.

They look for improving towns, villages or city centres, for attractive, well-designed homes, and locations bursting with community spirit.

This is what the judges had to say on the other selected locations in the North West:

Even in a difficult year for Manchester, with its shops, bars and live music venues closed and a supernova of high-rise investment flats springing up, the judges found plenty to be impressed by.

Most of it is in the area around Manchester Piccadilly station.

Piccadilly provides a perfect weekday work perch or a full-time base in the thick of the action, the judges said.

The clutch of new developments under construction wont just plug a gap between Manchesters best bits Ancoats and the Northern Quarter; Canal Street and Oxford Road they will also bring much-needed colour and community to an overlooked corner."

They are particularly impressed by Crusader Mill, an elegant conversion that has become the citys first purpose-built owner-occupier development thanks to a ban on buy-to-renters by developers Capital & Centric and Kampus, a lively garden neighbourhood beside the canal.

Average sale price: 210,000

Average rental: 650 pcm

This collection of villages combines old-fashioned country living with high-class shops and restaurants - perfect for Manchester commuters and work-from-homers looking for fresher air without sacrificing the good things of life, said the judges.

Their highlights include the luxury ice cream from Grandpa Greenes in Diggle and country pubs, such as the Cross Keys Inn, or the Church Inn, where the Rushcart Festival, the big event of the year, is celebrated in jolly style.

Average sale price: 229,000

Average rental: 1,200 pcm

These twin villages on the Kent estuary have some of the finest views in the country as well as an energetic, kind-hearted community, said the judges, who were impressed by the efforts of the 500 or so volunteers who delivered meals, ran telephone buddy systems and sewed PPE kit during the pandemic.

They also highlighted the friendly sailing club, which has been holding virtual music nights featuring local musicians, and the tasty fish and chips from the Arnside Chip Shop.

Average sale price: 295,000

Average rental: 625 pcm

Cheshires happy valley kept a smile on its face thanks to an endless choice of country walks and helpful neighbours, said the judges.

They love the views from White Nancy, the beehive-shaped folly overlooking the town, the walks on the Middlewood Way, and the spicy takeaways from the Indian Goat, a brilliant new food truck based at the immaculately kept recreation ground.

Average sale price: 285,000

Average rental: 725 pcm

This handsome old town justified its status as one of our very favourite locations thanks to its magnificent scenery, brilliant high street and its prompt, well organised and inspiring response to the coronavirus, according to the judges.

They were particularly impressed by the way organisations such as the Rugby Club, Queen Elizabeth School and the churches work together to help the community, as well as the variety on display in its town centre, from Dales Butchers and the Milking Parlour, a brilliant cow-to-cone ice cream shop, to the clothes and homewares at Abrahams, described by some as the Liberty of the North.

Average sale price: 350,000

Average rental: 765 pcm

Posh Cheshire with a sense of fun and a love of the countryside, is how the judges described the ancient market town that is a regular feature on the Best Places to Live list.

Theres no better example of its spirit than the Knutsford Hosts, a group of volunteer helpers whose efforts have been vital during the pandemic, they said.

They also liked the quirky buildings designed by Richard Harding Watt, the walks in Tatton Park, in Toft Wood or around Knutsford Moor - and the coffee from the Tatton Perk coffee van.

Average sale price: 445,000

Average rental: 1,100 pcm

Despite the current political controversy, the judges think that Liverpools prospects look bright, with exciting new plans in the pipeline, from the new film studio in the iconic Littlewoods building to Evertons new waterfront stadium.

There was lots of competition but the judges favourite spots are Aigburth, which they described as a family-friendly suburb thats sensible but never boring, with Sefton Park for exercise and Lark Lane for fun.

Also the Georgian Quarter, where the beautiful period houses sell for half as much as they would in Bath, and neighbourhood restaurants such as the splendidly restored London Carriage Works.

Average sale price: 145,000

Average rental: 875 pcm

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Greater Manchester town dubbed 'utopia' and named one of the best places to live in the country - Manchester Evening News

A man takes a photo with his mobile phone in the Plaka district of Athens. [AP]

Utopia is one of the many Greek words used in English. For many, it denotes a place of impossible fantasy. In my view, Greece could really be such a place.

In this last year, it has felt as if the whole world is in a state of upheaval and change. Both politically and environmentally, nothing has felt secure. It is just my own speculation, but I wonder if this will draw some more of the highly educated and successful Greek diaspora back to their patrida. They might recognize that the values and the way of life in Greece could offer much more than they will ever find in the supposedly more successful economies where they live. Their return would greatly strengthen Greece.

Specifically imagining Athens in 100 years time, there is one thing that dominates my hopes: that the buildings of the past 150 years that are currently in a state of dilapidation will have been restored. In my dreams, there will be a project inspired by the photographs and writing of Nikos Vatopoulos to ensure the salvation of derelict and precious architecture. His book Facing Athens would be the blueprint, the handbook, for this, not just to preserve the past for its own sake, but to respect the elegance and grace of the past so that it can sit side by side with the best of the modern. Such an initiative (and I think it will take 50 years) would have a huge impact on tourism too. Many visitors go to the Acropolis and a couple of museums and then make a dash for the islands, intimidated by the sight of dark, boarded-up mansions in the heart of the city. Athens should seize the moment now before its too late. The longer-term benefits will be immense.

By the time this huge restoration project has happened, I would be happy to think that the anger that inspires someone to daub graffiti on the walls of a beautiful building will simply not be there. Graffiti is usually an expression of fury against inequality and social injustice and while those factors are still there, perhaps my notion is nave. It goes without saying, that societal improvement underscores all images of the future.

In 100 years time, I hope the Parthenon Marbles currently in the British Museum will be in Athens and that our grandchildren will assume they have always been there. When they learn that they resided in London for a long period of time, they will find it impossible to believe.

I believe that in the next few decades (it has already begun since the pandemic, I think) there will be a growing appreciation and appetite for a more authentic life, away from the city. We no longer see progress only being about the new. Technology is also allowing us to lead connected lives without the need to be in a specific place. Island life, therefore, which might once have seemed so cut off, will no longer be perceived that way. Living in a natural unpolluted environment allows us to be more in touch with ourselves as well as with nature, and I wonder if, a century from now, many more people will have been drawn back to the islands to lead their best possible lives. They will be the new utopians. A new tourist boom will follow, as foreigners flock 12 months of the year to have a taste of this ideal life.

PS I would love to think that antagonism from the neighbor will have come to an end by 2121. Given that we are celebrating 200 years of independence, it is more than ironic that Turkeys attitude still continues to drain Greeces resources (financial and mental). At least there is one certainty. There will be a different president by then and I can only pray that he (or even she) will lead Turkey in a more enlightened fashion and cease to bully the people next door.

Victoria Hislop is a writer.

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How things will have changed a century from now - http://www.ekathimerini.com