By Population Balance
4.9
7878 ratings
The podcast currently has 121 episodes available.
Note: Despite the slightly compromised sound quality, Chris offers absolutely essential insights.
In this episode, we talk with climatologist and director of the Climate Hazards Center, Dr. Chris Funk, about the intersection of population growth and extreme weather events. With a focus on regions vulnerable to extreme heat and drought, particularly in Africa, Chris has helped create early warning systems that reduce suffering and save lives. Highlights include:
How rapid population growth in already hot and humid regions of Africa increases the number of people exposed to extreme heat, drought, and flood;
What Funk’s research reveals about how El Niño and La Niña events are amplifying extreme weather in the Global South and their impacts on food security;
Why early warning systems, particularly in Africa, are crucial for predicting and mitigating the impacts of droughts and extreme temperatures;
Why localized responses and infrastructure resilience are key to minimizing the humanitarian impacts of extreme weather events.
See episode website for show notes, links, and transcript:
https://www.populationbalance.org/podcast/chris-funk
ABOUT US
The Overpopulation Podcast features enlightening conversations between Population Balance executive director Nandita Bajaj, researcher Alan Ware, and expert guests that draw the connections between pronatalism, human supremacy, social inequalities, and ecological overshoot. Population Balance's mission to inspire narrative, behavioral, and system change that shrinks our human impact and elevates the rights and wellbeing of people, animals, and the planet.
Learn more here: https://www.populationbalance.org/
Copyright 2024 Population Balance
In this episode, we talk with Dr. Joshua Farley, an expert in ecological economics, about the urgent need to realign our economic systems with ecological and social justice imperatives by reclaiming our humanity from the destructive grip of mainstream economics. Highlights include:
A critique of the ‘Homo economicus’ model in mainstream economics, which inaccurately depicts humans as purely rational, self-interested, competitive, and insatiable, and misrepresents our fundamentally cooperative nature;
Why markets, while suitable for catering to individual tastes and preferences, are wholly inadequate in addressing ecological constraints and achieving secure sufficiency for everyone;
How overpopulation disproportionately benefits the wealthy, driving down wages and inflating the costs of land, food, housing, and other basic necessities.
See episode website for show notes, links, and transcript:
https://www.populationbalance.org/podcast/joshua-farley
ABOUT US
The Overpopulation Podcast features enlightening conversations between Population Balance executive director Nandita Bajaj, researcher Alan Ware, and expert guests that draw the connections between pronatalism, human supremacy, social inequalities, and ecological overshoot. Population Balance's mission to inspire narrative, behavioral, and system change that shrinks our human impact and elevates the rights and wellbeing of people, animals, and the planet.
Learn more here: https://www.populationbalance.org/
Copyright 2024 Population Balance
In this episode, we chat with Erica Gies, award-winning journalist and author of Water Always Wins: Thriving in an Age of Drought and Deluge. We explore the complex relationships between water, nature, and human societies, emphasizing the need to embrace 'slow water'—respecting the natural rhythms of water’s cycles for the benefit of both human and nonhuman life. Highlights include:
See episode website for show notes, links, and transcript:
https://www.populationbalance.org/podcast/erica-gies
ABOUT US
The Overpopulation Podcast features enlightening conversations between Population Balance executive director Nandita Bajaj, researcher Alan Ware, and expert guests that draw the connections between pronatalism, human supremacy, social inequalities, and ecological overshoot. Population Balance's mission to inspire narrative, behavioral, and system change that shrinks our human impact and elevates the rights and wellbeing of people, animals, and the planet.
Learn more here: https://www.populationbalance.org/
Copyright 2024 Population Balance
Hello, this is Nandita Bajaj, cohost of The Overpopulation Podcast and Executive Director of Population Balance. I am excited to share that we’ve launched a second podcast, Beyond Pronatalism: Finding Fulfillment, With or Without Kids. Please subscribe and share it widely. Episodes drop every two weeks and you can find them on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. Don’t miss the chance to hear stories that could very well resonate with your own experiences—or open your mind to new ways of thinking about family, community, and personal fulfillment. And, if you’d like to be on the show, check out the show notes on how you can get in touch with me.
Show Notes and Transcript
https://www.populationbalance.org/podcast/beyond-pronatalism
Beyond Pronatalism | Finding fulfillment, with or without kids
To have or not have kids is one of the biggest decisions we make in our lives, and yet how many of us know that we even have a choice about how we define and create our families? Beyond Pronatalism host Nandita Bajaj interviews women and men from diverse backgrounds who are courageously and creatively navigating pronatalism - the powerful pressures to have children - whether from family, friends, or the culture at large. Through intimate conversations, they discuss how they are forging unconventional pathways to fulfillment, including redefining what family means to them - whether that means being childfree or childless, having biological children, adopting or fostering children or animals, or creating close-knit communities of friends and loved ones.
https://www.populationbalance.org/beyond-pronatalism-podcast
ABOUT US
Beyond Pronatalism is brought to you by Population Balance, the only non profit organization advancing ecological and reproductive justice by confronting pronatalism. This podcast is produced and hosted by Nandita Bajaj, with the support of the production team - Josh Wild, Elisabeth Strunk, Alan Ware and Kirsten Stade. Population Balance's mission to inspire narrative, behavioral, and system change that shrinks our human impact and elevates the rights and wellbeing of people, animals, and the planet.
Learn more here: https://www.populationbalance.org/
Copyright 2024 Population Balance
In this episode, we chat with Dr. James Hopeward, an environmental civil engineering professor at the University of South Australia. We explore the limitations of conventional economic growth models and their environmental impacts, emphasizing the need for more holistic and ecologically grounded engineering practices and cultural beliefs.
Highlights include:
See episode website for show notes, links, and transcript:
https://www.populationbalance.org/podcast/james-hopeward
ABOUT US
The Overpopulation Podcast features enlightening conversations between Population Balance executive director Nandita Bajaj, researcher Alan Ware, and expert guests that draw the connections between pronatalism, human supremacy, social inequalities, and ecological overshoot. Population Balance's mission to inspire narrative, behavioral, and system change that shrinks our human impact and elevates the rights and wellbeing of people, animals, and the planet.
Learn more here: https://www.populationbalance.org/
Copyright 2024 Population Balance
In this episode, we chat with Maneesha Deckha, Professor and Lansdowne Chair in Law at the University of Victoria, about her research in critical animal law. We discuss her 2021 book, Animals as Legal Beings: Contesting Anthropocentric Legal Orders in which she argues for a new legal category of “beingness” for animals that transcends the inadequate legal categories of “persons” or “property.” We also dive into her 2023 article Animalization and Dehumanization Concerns: Another Psychological Barrier to Animal Law Reform, in which she highlights why a critique of human exceptionalism is essential to advancing the goals of anti-racism and decolonization.
Highlights include:
Maneesha’s personal journey into exploring the links between animal legal studies and critical animal studies, health law, reproductive ethics, feminist analysis of law, and postcolonial and critical race theory;
Deckha’s evaluation of the 2022 decision by the New York Court of Appeals with respect to the ongoing captivity of Happy, an elephant at the Bronx Zoo, in which she outlines why the dissociation of humans from animals is counterproductive to eliminating racism and other intra-human prejudices and inequities;
How the legal classification of animals as “property” creates problems, such as commodification and objectification; meanwhile, using the “personhood” category for animals exacerbates the concept of human exceptionalism. Deckha argues for a new category of “beingness’ for nonhuman animals which recognizes their embodiment, relationality, and vulnerability;
A new six-part series documentary series targeted towards secondary school students, A Deeper Kindness: Animal Law and Youth Activism, which surveys the current field of animal law and policy through the eyes of four youth active in animal advocacy.
See episode website for show notes, links, and transcript:
https://www.populationbalance.org/podcast/maneesha-deckha
ABOUT US
The Overpopulation Podcast features enlightening conversations between Population Balance executive director Nandita Bajaj, researcher Alan Ware, and expert guests that draw the connections between pronatalism, human supremacy, social inequalities, and ecological overshoot. Population Balance's mission to inspire narrative, behavioral, and system change that shrinks our human impact and elevates the rights and wellbeing of people, animals, and the planet.
Learn more here: https://www.populationbalance.org/
Copyright 2024 Population Balance
In this episode, we chat with Zoe Weil, co-founder and president of the Institute for Humane Education, about her pioneering work in the area of comprehensive humane education, an approach to teaching that draws the intimate links between human rights, animal protection, and environmental sustainability. We take a dive into Zoe's latest book The Solutionary Way, which explores how to use a solutionary lens to bridge divides and address the seemingly intractable challenges we face.
Highlights include:
See episode website for show notes, links, and transcript:
https://www.populationbalance.org/podcast/zoe-weil
ABOUT US
The Overpopulation Podcast features enlightening conversations between Population Balance executive director Nandita Bajaj, researcher Alan Ware, and expert guests. We cover a broad variety of topics that explore the impacts of our expanding human footprint on human rights, animal protection, and environmental restoration, as well as individual and collective solutions. Learn more here: https://www.populationbalance.org/
Copyright 2024 Population Balance
In this episode, we explore with environmentalist and author Ashish Kothari how entrenched “development” ideologies have led to an immense loss of traditional knowledge and cultural systems and caused immeasurable ecological destruction in India and globally. Ashish highlights radical alternatives being led by communities in India and around the world who are resisting the dominant capitalist, statist, and patriarchal model of “development” and offering transformative solutions from the ground up that are based in social justice and ecological wisdom. Highlights include:
How the Western model of development in India, combined with colonialism and globalization, led to incalculable social injustice and ecological destruction;
How the elite class within countries reinforces neoliberal and neo-colonial models, exacerbating existing inequalities such as gender and caste;
The concept of radical ecological democracy, as expressed through the Flower of Transformation, the Global Tapestry of Alternatives, Vikalp Sangam (Alternatives Confluence), all of which highlight and connect local community-led radical alternatives of social transformation, ecological restoration, and revival and sustenance of multiple knowledge and cultural systems;
Pathways to authentically engage in the practice of decolonizing knowledge systems and cultural practices to allow for the emergence of social and ecological diversity.
See episode website for show notes, links, and transcript:
https://www.populationbalance.org/podcast/ashish-kothari
ABOUT US
The Overpopulation Podcast features enlightening conversations between Population Balance executive director Nandita Bajaj, researcher Alan Ware, and expert guests. We cover a broad variety of topics that explore the impacts of our expanding human footprint on human rights, animal protection, and environmental restoration, as well as individual and collective solutions. Learn more here: https://www.populationbalance.org/
Copyright 2024 Population Balance
In this episode we speak with Dr. Clive Spash, an ecological economist who is fundamentally challenging conventional economic paradigms through his development of social ecological economics. His work addresses the intersections of human behavior, environmental values, and economic systems - advocating for a radical transformation towards a more socially and ecologically just world. Highlights include:
How economists who have completed multiple degrees in economics are found to be particularly closed-minded and resistant to alternative perspectives;
How major environmental NGOs, including The Nature Conservancy, Sierra Club, Natural Resources Defense Council, and World Wildlife Fund, have been taken over by corporate and neoliberal ideologies;
How prominent advocates of degrowth and alternative economic models, such as Jason Hickel, Tim Jackson, Kate Raworth, and Timothée Parrique, are unwittingly supporting the many growth agendas of mainstream economics while also peddling population denialism and human supremacy;
Why Social Ecological Economics provides a scientific and ethical basis for degrowth economics that considers the rights of nature and of people.
See episode website for show notes, links, and transcript:
https://www.populationbalance.org/podcast/clive-spash
ABOUT US
The Overpopulation Podcast features enlightening conversations between Population Balance executive director Nandita Bajaj, researcher Alan Ware, and expert guests that draw the connections between pronatalism, human supremacy, social inequalities, and ecological overshoot. Population Balance's mission is to inspire narrative, behavioral, and system change that shrinks our human impact and elevates the rights and wellbeing of people, animals, and the planet.
Learn more here: https://www.populationbalance.org/
Subscribe to our newsletter here: https://www.populationbalance.org/subscribe
Copyright 2024 Population Balance
In this episode we speak with Riane Eisler, a social systems scientist, futurist, cultural historian, attorney, consultant, speaker, and author of many books, including The Chalice and the Blade and The Real Wealth of Nations, about how to construct a more equitable, sustainable and less violent world based on partnership rather than domination. Highlights include:
Riane’s childhood experiences of being a Holocaust survivor and living as a refugee in Cuba, which informed her study of contrasting societal models of dominator versus partnership;
How domination systems enforce violence through rigid rankings, while partnership systems reduce abuse through democratic structures;
How gender inequality, pronatalism, and population growth are integral to domination systems, and why engaging in population denial perpetuates hierarchies of domination within the family and within politics;
How partnership model values, such as caregiving and non-violence, were prevalent in pre-historic times and are more conducive to individual human happiness and flourishing;
Why examining past societies' egalitarian models can help us redefine power structures and gender in order to reconstruct models that are relevant in today’s societies.
See episode website for show notes, links, and transcript:
https://www.populationbalance.org/podcast/riane-eisler
ABOUT US
The Overpopulation Podcast features enlightening conversations between Population Balance executive director Nandita Bajaj, researcher Alan Ware, and expert guests that draw the connections between pronatalism, human supremacy, social inequalities, and ecological overshoot. Population Balance's mission is to inspire narrative, behavioral, and system change that shrinks our human impact and elevates the rights and wellbeing of people, animals, and the planet.
Learn more here: https://www.populationbalance.org/
Subscribe to our newsletter here: https://www.populationbalance.org/subscribe
Copyright 2024 Population Balance
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