This month we are honoured to be joined by one of our colleagues from Global Development Studies at the University of Helsinki. Tiina Seppälä came to Global Development Studies by way of International Relations. Her work has looked at global inequalities, poverty, war, and social justice issues among many others. Activism is also an area of interest and Tiina has worked with peace activists in the UK, slum and women’s rights activists in South Asia, as well as asylum seekers in the Finnish context. Tiina gives us insight into her trajectory and how she naturally progressed from one project to another and how funding has had an impact on the directions of her career. During her fieldwork she had some interesting encounters with the dark side of development, or what could be called maldevelopment. Tiina speaks openly and honestly about her own positionality within research and some of the mismatches between the theoretical and the real. The role of unlearning can sometimes be just as important as the role of learning. Tiina gives us insight into the ways in which artistic methods have played a role in how she approaches her research. Our conversation is wide ranging and quite compelling!

Want to learn more about Tiina’s work? https://researchportal.helsinki.fi/en/persons/tiina-sisko-sepp%C3%A4l%C3%A4 

Want to learn more about The Finnish Society for Development Research (FSDR)? https://www.kehitystutkimus.fi/?page_id=326 

In this bonus episode of the TreesForDev podcast we are delighted to be joined by Project PI, Maria Ehrnström-Fuentes and Maria Holmberg who works for FIDA in Tanzania. Maria H. moved to Tanzania with her parents when she was 1 year old, grew up there, and has been working with different development projects in Tanzania since 1984. Currently, Maria H. is working with tree planting and environmental education. Maria H. tells us about some of the positive impacts of tree planting in this context because the planted trees grow faster than the natural forests, which means they can then be cut down and used so the natural forests are allowed to continue to grow. The population in Tanzania has grown quite quickly over the last 70 years, from approximately 12 million to over 60 million. This has naturally increased demand for food and cooking fuel, which has led to the decimation of natural forests, which in turn threw the ecology out of whack. However, if the stumps are left to sprout and the trees are allowed to come back, then the ecology slowly comes back into balance. Maria H. particularly focuses on the impacts to the role of water in the ecosystem balance. Join us for this extensive and intensive conversation!

Want to learn more about Maria H.’s work? https://www.fspm.fi/maria-holmberg-tanzania/ (in Swedish)

Want to learn more about the Trees For Development Project? www.treesfordev.fi

We are delighted to present a really interesting conversation on a yet unexplored facet of extractivism. This month we talked with Saana Hokkanen who is a doctoral researcher in Global Development Studies at University of Helsinki. Saana’s main interest is in the concept of soil extractivism, which is “is a form of capital accumulation based on systemic erasure of soils multispecies life.” Saana gives us insight into how soil is more than “just dirt” and the ways in which modern, industrial agriculture have negatively impacted the array of beings that make up soil. Saana gives us a lot of food for thought in relation to how our modern food system is composed and the multiple levels on which the extractive logics play out.

Want to learn more about Saana’s work? https://researchportal.helsinki.fi/en/persons/saana-maarit-hokkanen

Want to read Saana’s article on soil extractivism? https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jrurstud.2024.103298

This month we are honored to be joined by Evan Sullivan who is an assistant professor at SUNY Adirondack in Upstate New York. Evan is a historian whose research interests examine the intersections of disability, war and gender in the modern era, especially in the World War One era. Evan’s interest in this era stems from his master’s studies and from some of the archival collections that he found researching his master’s thesis. Evan gives us insight into his research trajectory, including how he started investigating disability history. We discussed how perceptions of disability are formed and whose stories are being told. Historically, there have been many cases where disability has been used to tell a story that does not match with the lived experience of the disabled people themselves. In many cases these stories were used more to satisfy the emotional/inspiration needs of the reader rather than tell the story and/or serve the needs of the disabled veterans. 

Would you like to check out Evan’s new book? Constructing Disability after the Great War: Blind Veterans in the Progressive Era: https://www.press.uillinois.edu/books/?id=p088247 

If you would like to check out more of Evan’s work, please visit his University profile: https://www.sunyacc.edu/staff-faculty/evan-sullivan

or personal website: https://evanpsullivan.wordpress.com/ 

You can also find Evan on various social media platforms:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61561801370318 

Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/evanpsullivan.bsky.social 

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dr.evanpsullivan_historian 

In this brief update, Sophia shares warm season's greetings and outlines what the audience has to look forward to coming up in 2025!

Want to learn more about the TreesForDev project? www.treesfordev.fi

This month we talked to Sergio Fernández Bravo, who is a fellow doctoral researcher from Global Development Studies at University of Helsinki. Sergio is interested in the relationship between natural sciences and politics, specifically in the Global South. His current research focuses on synthetic pesticides and how they are used as devices of power and influence the epistemic arrangements within the Mexican Green Revolution. Sergio gives insight into the history of pesticide use in Mexico and the various ways that they have influenced the trajectory of the region. Even though we are not directly invoking the term extractivism very often, there are so many connections and cross-fertilizations with extractivisms. For example, we discuss the role of terra nullius and wasteland in creating imaginaries about how land can and should be used (and what humans can do with it!) Join us for this wide ranging and intensely interesting conversation!

If you are interested to learn more about Sergio’s work, please visit his academic profile. https://researchportal.helsinki.fi/en/persons/sergio-fernandez-bravo 

If you would like to contact Sergio for any further discussion of what you heard in this episode, please feel welcome and encouraged to drop him a line (sergio.fernandezbravo (at) helsinki.fi). He is up for making connections and having conversations about pesticides and the broader topics of his research.

This month we were honoured to be joined by Rauna Kuokkanen, a Research Professor of Arctic Indigenous Politics at the University of Lapland (Finland) and Adjunct Professor of Political Science at the University of Toronto. Over the course of her career, Rauna’s work has focused on comparative Indigenous politics and various forms of violence, from structural settler-colonial to interpersonal gendered violence,  and theorized Indigenous feminism. She has also critiqued the narrow epistemic foundations of the academy and how Indigenous epistemes could be ethically received as a gift. In this conversation, we explore her new project on the systematic exclusion of the Sámi people and institutions in pursuit of the Nordic energy transition. What does a just transition mean for the Sámi and other Indigenous peoples? The push for decarbonization puts huge pressure on the land, resources and livelihoods in the Sápmi, while Sámi are simultaneously at the forefront experiencing the negative impacts of the climate crisis. Join us for this extremely interesting and wide-ranging conversation. 

Interested in learning more about Rauna’s work? https://rauna.net/

This month we are delighted to be joined by Prof. Bruno Ramamonjisoa from the University of Antananarivo in Madagascar. Bruno is the Director of the PhD School on Natural Resources Management and Development and coordinator of the Applied Research Laboratory at the School of Agronomy. Bruno is one of our key collaborators in Madagascar and an expert on sustainable management of natural resources. In this interesting and wide-ranging conversation, Bruno gave us insight into some of the issues on the ground facing tree planting initiatives.

Interested to learn more about Bruno’s research? https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Bruno-Ramamonjisoa

Interested to learn more about the TreesForDev project? www.treesfordev.fi 

This month we are happy to be joined by Markus Kröger and Peter Dewees. Markus is a professor of Global Development Studies at University of Helsinki and one of the co-PIs of the TreesForDev Project. Peter is retired from a 30 plus year career with the World Bank. During his time with the World Bank Peter worked on many different projects, with a focus on why rural people cultivate and plant trees, wood fuel use, and the management of the Miombo woodlands. While his focus was on Eastern Africa, he also has done work in Eastern Europe and Asia. He shares with us his insights into the role of rural peoples’ agency in tree planting and how historical factors have influenced the land use practices. Top-down processes are not always the best path to get trees into the rural landscape; if a farmer needs a tree, they will figure out how to grow it. He shares with us some of the innovations that have been brought to the field that have been successful. We also discuss the question of ecological restoration and whether it is possible through tree planting schemes. We talk about some of the mismatches between the goals of funding agencies and the on-the-ground realities of the people living in place. And while he worked at the Bank for a long time, the views he expressed in this podcast are his own, and should not be ascribed to the World Bank.

Want to learn more about Peter’s work? https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=-HD6w24AAAAJ&hl=en

Want to learn more about Markus’ research? https://researchportal.helsinki.fi/en/persons/markus-kr%C3%B6ger

Want to revisit the TreesForDev episodes about carbon?

Steffen Böhm https://podcasts.apple.com/ee/podcast/treesfordev-maria-ehrnstr%C3%B6m-fuentes-and-steffen-boehm/id1499621252?i=1000666744435

Forrest Fleischman https://podcasts.apple.com/ee/podcast/treesfordev-maria-ehrnstr%C3%B6m-fuentes-and-forrest/id1499621252?i=1000663758730

Want to learn more about the TreesForDev Project? www.treesfordev.fi

This month we are honored to be joined by Jojo Mehta from Stop Ecocide International, which is an international advocacy organization with the goal of making ecocide a crime. Jojo gives us insight into the continuous thread throughout her life that led her to this work. Her “outrage” moment was when she learned about fracking. Her work in the anti-fracking community introduced her to the late Polly Higgins, with whom she co-founded Stop Ecocide International. Jojo gives us insight into what kind of gross environmental harms which fall under the umbrella of ecocide. The Independent Expert Panel for the Legal Definition of Ecocide describes it as "unlawful or wanton acts committed with knowledge that there is a substantial likelihood of severe and either widespread or long-term damage to the environment being caused by those acts". This definition focuses on the potential results of the activity in question which creates a kind of reality check. It is not exactly what you do but how you do it, how much you do it, and where you do. It is any instance where the net results of what ones does results in gross damage to the environment. This would force this companies to look at their activities on the ground to assess their activities and whether they are at risk of committing ecocide through their activities. This conversation goes deep and takes us to so many different angles of criminalizing environmental destruction. 

Want to learn more about Jojo? https://www.stopecocide.earth/jojo-mehta-profile

Want to learn more about Stop Ecocide International and the work they are undertaking? https://www.stopecocide.earth/