The Future City

What if cities are the greatest opportunity we have to redesign the rules we live by? On this episode of the Podcast we speak with Pia Mancini, co-founder of Democracy Earth and Open Collective. Pia is an activist, technologist and serial impact entrepreneur working at the intersection of technology and policy making. Pia speaks with us about how we can reorganize how we govern so we are not bound by old rules tied to the places we are born and how decentralizing funding gives us the agility to do the work we love.

Pia is the co-founder of Democracy Earth, a foundation dedicated to incorruptible digital governance for organizations, and Open Collective, a platform for organizations to collect and spend transparently. She is the Chairwoman of The DemocracyOS Foundation, a Y Combinator backed collaborative decision-making platform. In the city of Buenos Aires, she co-founded Partido de la Red (The Net Party) one of the world's first political parties to be fully informed and powered by internet participation. Pia is a representative of the World Economic Forum Social Media Council, a member of The World Fix, and former Chief Advisor to the Deputy Secretary of Political Affairs of the Government of the City of Buenos Aires.

What would a city be like if citizens were emotionally aware of themselves and how they impacted others? On this episode of The Future City podcast, we speak with Futureye Consultancy Founder and Managing Director Katherine Teh. Katherine is a corporate executive, management consultant and specialist in social licence to operate. Katherine shares stories about how we can be more acutely aware of how our decisions affect people in our cities, why the Black Lives Matter protests of 2020 were a unique moment for cities to change and that outrage is something we should pay attention to.

Katherine Teh-White is the managing director and founder of Futureye – a firm which provides market research, public policy, public affairs, risk communication, foresight and strategy and change management for Fortune 500 companies in Australia, Asia and Europe. She worked actively for a decade to engage Australian companies to sign on to the UN Global Compact. Katherine currently sits on the Advisory Board, Masters of Politics and Policy at Deakin University and is a board member of the Castan Centre for Human Rights at Monash University.

What happens when there is no more water? On this episode of The Future City podcast, we speak with Professor Sarah Bell. Sarah is a Chartered Engineer, Fellow of the Chartered Institution of Water and Environmental Management and Fellow of the Institution of Civil Engineers who has worked across a number of cities on their water issues. Sarah speaks with us about our complex yet simple relationship to water, why engineers need to roll-up their sleeves and get involved with water users when designing water systems and how we can no longer just turn on the tap.

Professor Sarah Bell is the City of Melbourne Chair in Urban Resilience and Innovation at University of Melbourne. Prior to this, Professor Bell was the Steering Committee member, and Co-Director of the University College London's Urban Laboratory as well as Director of the UCL Engineering Exchange.

Imagine a city where corporations used their brands for public good? On this episode of The Future City Podcast, we speak with expert brand strategist Sergio Brodsky. Sergio is a corporate leader, marketing guru and founder of the concept of Urban Brand Utility. Sergio shares his own story of getting robbed over 10 times in his hometown of Sao Paulo as well as examples of how brands are lighting up dark alleyways, filtering polluted waterways and fixing potholes so we can live in safe, healthy and enjoyable cities.

Sérgio Brodsky (L.LM, MBA) is an internationally experienced brand, media and innovation strategist who has worked in senior leadership roles at some of the world's top brand agencies including Starcom, Omnicom and Initiative. He is the Founder and Principal at strategy and innovation consultancy SURGE and Co-Founder at Tik My Day - Australia's first dedicated TikTok agency. Sérgio is a Columnist and Editorial Board Advisor at Marketing Magazine and has been widely published beyond the trade press by the likes of Vice, The Conversation, Museum-iD, Berlin Marketing Journal, Journal of Futures Studies and many others.

What does it mean to have a city which regenerates itself? On this episode of The Future City Podcast, we speak with City of Sydney Councillor Jess Miller, an environmental activist and equity advocate. Jess shares about the power of urban ecology, why diverse representation matters and how equity is the lens to look through when studying our cities.

Councillor Jess Miller was first elected to Council in 2016, and is one of the youngest people to hold elected office at the City of Sydney. Jess served as Deputy Lord Mayor from 2017-2018. Jess is currently Deputy Chair of the Environment Committee, the Cycling Advisory Committee, and a member of the Southern Sydney Regional Organisation of Councils.

How do you feel right now? Understanding and regulating emotions is one of the key aspects to living a good life, and in fact it's never been more important than at this moment in our human history.

This week we doing something different as we share an episode from our friends at The Learning Future Podcast, a podcast on all things learning hosted by Louka Parry. In this episode, he speaks with Professor Marc Brackett, the Foundation Director of the Centre for Emotional Intelligence at Yale University, on why our workplaces, our schools, and our society will be better if we give ourselves permission to feel.

How do cities attract and retain the best talent, and therefore the best industries? On this episode of The Future City Podcast, we speak with Shelley Danner, community activator, Adjunct Professor of Design Thinking, and Co-founder and Program Director of Challenge Detroit. Shelley shares with us the dynamic talent generation and urban impact model she's been working on for the last 9 years. Her model has proven a new way for cities to develop economically while tackling urban social and environmental issues.

How do we truly discover and showcase the different cultures in our cities? On this episode of The Future City Podcast, we speak with Anya Shani, The most recent CEO of Hansen House, Jerusalem's Public Cultural Center. Anya is a convenor of creatives and embodies the essence of entrepreneurship in our cities. Whether we are going to a community-led theater performance or just getting lost in our cities, Anya shares the importance of experiencing hyper local, raw and real cultural experiences.

Anya is a Director of Culture, an entrepreneur and a farmer. She is the most recent CEO of Hansen House and was the Director of Culture and Events at the Jerusalem International YMCA, where Jews, Muslims, and Christians come together for cultural events, sports, and other activities. She is also overseeing Yitzhakale Farm, her late father's farm, which she is licensing to be one of Israel's first fully organic farms.

What would it be like to design a city from the perspective of justice? On this episode of The Future City Podcast we speak with Yassmin Abdel-Magied, a London-based, Sudanese-Australian writer, engineer and award-winning social advocate. Yassmin shares her thoughts about forgiveness, inclusive leadership and what it means to live in a city where each resident feels self-expressed and without fear.

Yassmin trained as a mechanical engineer and worked on oil and gas rigs around Australia for years before becoming a writer and broadcaster. She published her debut memoir, Yassmin's Story at age 24, and followed up with her first fiction book for younger readers, You Must Be Layla, in 2019. Yassmin founded her first organisation, Youth Without Borders, at the age of 16, leading it for nine years. Yassmin has spoken in over 20 countries on unconscious bias and inclusive leadership and today she joins us from London, UK.

How would you describe the way you experience your city? On this episode of The Future City Podcast we speak with Dominic Regester about the benefits of leveraging a city's ecology and what happens when city makers take the time to consider the emotional experience city dwellers have when they trounce around their favorite parks and gallivant in their beloved city pockets. Dominic is Program Director, Salzburg Global Seminar where he is responsible for designing, developing and implementing programs on education, sustainability and innovation, including a series entitled Parks for the Planet. He is a member of the International Union for Conservation of Nature's Commission on Education and Communication and is an Executive Committee Member for Karanga – The Global Alliance for Social Emotional Learning and Life Skills.