Paul Behrens is British Academy Global Professor at the University of Oxford and Reapra Senior Research Fellow at the Wellbeing Research Centre there. He is an industrial ecologist examining how the ways we produce our lives and the things we consume in them are related to environment stress, especially climate change. In this episode, we discuss the role of demand management in averting ecological disaster - demand management here referring to reducing or changing unsustainable consumption practices. We talk especially about diets and food systems, but also energy, transport, plastics, and the political implications of greening all of the above. Did you know that the UK population reduced its meat consumption to around twice a week we could recover an area of land the size of Scotland? Tune in to find out why.

Find out more about Paul:

https://www.ox.ac.uk/news/find-an-expert/professor-paul-behrens

17:45

Planetary Boundaries Framework: 

https://www.stockholmresilience.org/research/planetary-boundaries.html 

20:00

Changing food systems towards plants > beef could rewild an area the size of Scotland: 

https://www.nature.com/articles/s43016-021-00431-5 

44:00

Intra-Elite Competition: A Key Concept for Understanding the Dynamics of Complex Societies (Peter Turchin, 2016)

https://peterturchin.com/intra-elite-competition-a-key-concept-for-understanding-the-dynamics-of-complex-societies/ 

50:30

Danish Action Plan for Plant-Based Foods (2023)

https://en.fvm.dk/Media/638484294982868221/Danish-Action-Plan-for-Plant-based-Foods.pdf