VOICE OF COMMONS

Thirteen years old. Third COP. Already planting the future. On Day 4 at COP30 in Belém, Voice of Commons host Giulia Foscari meets Prasiddhi Singh, the youngest delegate in the negotiations — and one of the clearest voices in the room. Raised in Tamil Nadu in India, a region shaped by cyclones, drought, air pollution, and rising seas, Prasiddhi traces her journey back to Cyclone Vardah, when at just 4 years old she watched trees she called “friends” being uprooted. “Not who to blame,” she says — “but what to do.” That question ignited action: more than 160,000 trees planted, fourteen forests regenerated, and a call for “actionism” — moving beyond inspiration into delivery. From restoring mixed forests to strengthening resilience and clean air, her words highlight how small seeds of agency can grow into planetary change.

Prasiddhi Singh (13) is a globally recognized environmentalist, author, and social entrepreneur whose curiosity for the world matches her commitment to protecting it. Founder of the UN-accredited Prasiddhi Forest, she led over 1,000 workshops and empowered more than 80,000 people across 20+ countries. Her on-ground impact spans mangrove restoration, agroforestry, lake rejuvenation, and climate innovation. She has received the Prime Minister’s National Child Award, The Diana Award UK, the Global Child Prodigy Award, and the Femina Beautiful Indians Award 2024. As the youngest Head of Delegation at a UN Climate Conference, a COP29 Youth Leader, COP30 Impact Maker, and UNICEF India’s only Climate Youth Advocate, she represents young voices on global stages. Prasiddhi was born at 394 parts per million of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

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“Linear change is no longer an option.” Sandrine Dixson-Declève — a force of nature, Honorary President of The Club of Rome and Executive Chair of Earth4All — delivers a message that cuts through complacency as she joins Voice of Commons host Giulia Foscari at COP30 in Belém, fresh from a charged conversation at the Planetary Science Pavilion, co-led with Johan Rockström on “safe, just, and systemic” science-based pathways for climate policy.

From the prophetic warning of The Limits to Growth (1972) to today’s mission to “emerge from emergency,” she maps the shift from an extractive economy to a wellbeing economy — and the five “extraordinary turnarounds” that could unlock a Giant Leap on poverty, inequality, food, energy, and empowerment. 

Sandrine names the resistance head-on: fossil fuel interests “hunkering down” to protect profits, even as the cost of inaction at 1.5°C now exceeds the cost of transformation. Together with host Giulia Foscari, she confronts what it will take to make this the COP of delivery: Beyond GDP indicators that value nature and livelihoods, serious finance for adaptation and loss and damage, and a fierce defense of multilateralism.  “This is about resisting — she says — with hope and with fists.”

Sandrine Dixson-Declève is Honorary President of The Club of Rome, Executive Chair of EarthaAll, and Chair of the Systems Transformation Hub, is a leading global voice on climate, energy and economic transformation. and Executive Chair of Earth4All, working at the forefront of climate, energy, and economic transformation. With more than three decades of experience across EU, UN, and business policy, she advises, lectures, and facilitates high-level dialogue on systemic change. She serves on multiple non-executive and advisory boards, including the Climate Governance Commission, Imperial College London, and the Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership. A TED Global speaker, she is the co-author of Earth for All: A Survival Guide for Humanity. Sandrine was born at 331 parts per million carbon dioxide in the Atmosphere.

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How close is the Amazon to a point of no return? In this Atmosphere Commons episode of Voice of Commons, host Giulia Foscari speaks with climatologist Carlos Nobre — IPCC author and co-chair of the Science Panel for the Amazon — as the world races toward COP30 in Belém. Nobre warns that deforestation and global heating are driving the forest toward a tipping point beyond which it could collapse into degraded savannah, flip from carbon sink to carbon source, and weaken the “flying rivers” that sustain continental food and water security. From organised crime, illegal mining, and pandemics to Tropical Forests Forever, Indigenous stewardship, and a standing-forest bioeconomy, this urgent conversation makes clear: saving the Amazon this decade is a precondition for a stable climate.

Carlos Afonso Nobre is a leading Brazilian Earth system scientist specializing in Amazon research and its global impacts. He earned his PhD in Meteorology from MIT and chaired the Large-Scale Biosphere-Atmosphere Experiment in Amazonia (LBA). He contributed to several IPCC reports, including the Nobel Peace Prize–winning 2007 report. Nobre served as Brazil’s National Secretary for R&D Policies and as President of CAPES. He co-chairs the Science Panel for the Amazon and directs the Amazonia 4.0 initiative to promote a standing-forest bioeconomy. Carlos was born at 312 parts per million carbon dioxide in the Atmosphere.

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Xiye Bastida — young climate justice leader, Indigenous advocate, co-founder of the Re-Earth Initiative, and Voice of Commons Ambassador — joins host Giulia Foscari for a galvanizing conversation broadcast from the Planetary Embassies in Venice and Chicago, marking the opening of the Chicago Architecture Biennale: SHIFT – Architecture in Times of Radical Change. Rooted in her name’s meaning, Soft Rain, Xiye reminds us that imagination is a form of resistance — and that change, like rain, can begin gently yet reshape the world. Xiye reflects on intergenerational stewardship and invites us to slow down, breathe with the Ocean, and rebuild culture around care and reciprocity. Together they explore how youth movements shape policy, how Indigenous cosmologies meet science, and what it takes to shift power relentlessly without losing kinship with all life.

Xiye Bastida is a 23-year-old Mexican climate justice activist, Indigenous rights advocate, and storyteller. Through her Otomi roots, she champions Indigenous wisdom and principles as a solution for the climate crisis. She was an organizer with Fridays For Future and is the co-founder and Executive Director of Re-Earth Initiative an international youth-led organization that supports frontline youth across 27 countries.

Xiye received the 2018 UN Spirit Award and was named TIME100 Next in 2023. She was born at 372 parts per million carbondioxide in the Atmosphere.

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What is the vital link between food systems, world hunger and the Atmospheric Commons? In this episode of Voice of Commons, host Giulia Foscari speaks with Martin Frick, Director of the UN World Food Programme’s Global Office in Berlin and co-founder of COPx, about how the systems meant to nourish life are accelerating planetary collapse. With hundreds of millions suffering from extreme food deprivation, this conversation explores how hunger is driven by systemic failures across our Global Commons — from a destabilised Atmosphere to degraded land and collapsing Ocean. Recorded at the Planetary Embassy in Venice, Frick calls for a mandatory global food transformation grounded in regenerative agriculture. A powerful call to rethink governance — and our role as stewards of life.

Martin Frick is a climate diplomat and systems thinker. He is a member of the Executive Committee of the Club of Rome, Director of the UN World Food Programme’s Global Office in Berlin, and co-founder of COPx. As Senior Director of UN Climate Change (UNFCCC), he oversaw the implementation of the Paris Agreement and the Secretariat’s global Climate Action work. Frick was the EU’s lead negotiator in the creation of the UN Human Rights Council and later helped establish the UN’s sustainability hub in Bonn. 

He is a member of the Advisory Council of Voice of Commons, and was born at 324 parts per million carbon dioxide in the Atmosphere.

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What futures are we failing to imagine for Antarctica? In this episode of Voice of Commons, host Giulia Foscari speaks with Klaus Dodds — geopolitical theorist, Antarctic scholar, and Voice of Commons Advisor — about the power of imagination in shaping geopolitics. Together, they explore how political imagination shapes territorial claims, environmental governance, and the legal ambiguity at the heart of the Antarctic Treaty. Recorded after the 47th ATCM in Milan, the episode also addresses marine protection, EU policy gaps, and the shifting geopolitics of the Global Commons. From “blue geopolitics” to plural futures, Dodds calls for new actors, new alliances, and new thinking to meet the planetary challenges ahead. A compelling look at Antarctica as a mirror of global transformation.

Klaus Dodds is a geopolitical theorist. He is Executive Dean and Professor of Geopolitics and at the School of Life Sciences and Environment at Royal Holloway, University of London, and Honorary Fellow of the British Antarctic Survey. Dodds has served as a specialist adviser to the UK Parliament. He has visited the Arctic and Antarctic on many occasions; his latest book, Unfrozen (co-authored with Mia Bennett), will be published by Yale University Press in 2025. 

A longstanding advocate for critical geopolitical literacy, Dodds contributed to Antarctic Resolution (edited by Giulia Foscari/UNLESS, Lars Müller Publishers, 2021) and is a member of the Voice of Commons Advisory Council. 

He was born at 323 parts per million carbon dioxide in the Atmosphere.

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Space is no longer the untouched frontier we once imagined. Crowded with satellites, threatened by debris, and on the verge of a new era of extraction, outer space faces a crisis of governance.

On International Moon Day, Voice of Commons host Giulia Foscari speaks with Michael Byers — Co-Director of the Outer Space Institute and author of Who Owns Outer Space? — to explore the urgent legal and ethical dilemmas shaping the cosmos. Together, they unpack the risks of mega-constellations, uncontrolled rocket re-entries, and the race for lunar resources, while asking: how can international law evolve fast enough to keep space a peaceful and equitable domain?

Michael Byers is a world-leading space expert that addresses grand challenges facing the continued use and exploration of space. He is the Co-Director of the Outer Space Institute and holds the Canada Research Chair in Global Politics and International Law at the University of British Columbia. Michael has been a Fellow of Jesus College, Oxford University; Professor of Law at Duke University; Visiting Professor at the universities of Cape Town, Tel Aviv, Nord (Norway) and Novosibirsk (Russia) as well as the Geneva Graduate Institute; and Senior Global Fellow at the University of St Andrews. He is the co-author, with Aaron Boley, of Who Owns Outer Space? International Law, Astrophysics, and the Sustainable Development of Space. Michel Byers was born at 321 parts per million carbon dioxide in the Atmosphere.

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Who speaks for Antarctica? And what’s at stake when 58 nations meet behind closed doors to decide its future? In this special edition of Voice of Commons, host Giulia Foscari takes you inside the Antarctic Treaty Consultative Meetings (ATCM) – the once-a-year forum where the governance of the southernmost continent is shaped by consensus, on behalf of all humanity. Across two weeks of heated plenaries, quiet diplomacy, and unexpected alliances, we capture the pulse of this year’s negotiations. Featuring conversations with delegates from Australia, Belgium, Bulgaria, India, Italy, Portugal, Spain, Turkey, the Antarctic and Southern Ocean Coalition, and the International Association of Antarctica Tour Operators, this episode reveals the fragile politics of protecting the planet’s last wilderness. 

The Antarctic Treaty Consultative Meeting - visit www.ats.aq

Every year the original twelve Parties to the Treaty and those Parties that demonstrate their interest in Antarctica by conducting substantial research activity there - together called the Consultative Parties - meet "for the purpose of exchanging information, consulting together on matters of common interest pertaining to Antarctica, and formulating and considering and recommending to their Governments measures in furtherance of the principles and objectives of the Treaty" (Art. IX). This forum is the Antarctic Treaty Consultative Meeting (ATCM).

From 1961 to 1994 the ATCM generally met once every two years, but since 1994 the meetings have occurred annually. The ATCM is hosted by the Consultative Parties according to the alphabetical order of their English names.

The meeting consists of representatives of: The Consultative Parties; The Non-Consultative Parties; Observers: currently the Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR), the Commission for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources (CCAMLR) and the Council of Managers of National Antarctic Programs (COMNAP); and Invited Experts, such as the Antarctic and Southern Ocean Coalition (ASOC) and the International Association of Antarctica Tour Operators (IAATO).

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For our 10th episode, Voice of Commons responds to questions from our listeners about the origins of the project and UNLESS. We share a special live conversation held during the vernissage of the Venice Biennale between architects Giulia Foscari and Eva Franch i Gilabert. The dialogue frames the urgency, structure, and ambition of Voice of Commons and explores the project’s multi-scalar planetary mobilisation from high-level advocacy to grassroots participation. They also reflect on the transformation of Scarpa’s 1952 Biennale ticket office into the Planetary Embassy – a space of democratic in-betweenness broadcasting voices from Indigenous communities and the more-than-human world. From political imagination to spatial activism, the dialogue traces how Voice of Commons amplifies unheard voices and catalyzes systemic change. 

Giulia Foscari is an architect, curator and activist who practised in Asia, the Americas and Europe. She is the founder of UNA/UNLESS. UNLESS is a nonprofit agency for change advocating for the Global Commons; UNA is an international architecture practice. Her work with UNLESS includes Antarctic Resolution, recipient of multiple awards including the European Commission’s S+T+ARTS Grand Prize. With UNLESS, she launched Voice of Commons as a Special Project of the 2025 Venice Architecture Biennale. Giulia has taught at the University of Hong Kong and the Architectural Association in London. She is the author of Elements of Venice and editor of Antarctic Resolution (both Lars Müller Publishers). She previously worked with Rem Koolhaas and Zaha Hadid, and serves on several boards including ASOC. She was born at 338 parts per million of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

Eva Franch i Gilabert is an architect, curator, educator, and researcher, widely known for her radical and visionary approach to architecture, cultural institutions, and public engagement. She is the co-founder of FAST - a new platform for investigation and research in art, architecture and technology; she is also professor at UMPRUM and co-founder of MODEL, Barcelona’s forward-thinking Architecture Festival. She previously served as Director of the Architectural Association School of Architecture in London and as Chief Curator at Storefront for Art and Architecture in New York City. Her diverse practice spans exhibitions, theoretical manifestos and public lectures that challenge entrenched boundaries of design, governance, and spatial politics. Eva is a member of the Voice of Commons Advisory Council. She was born at 335 parts per million carbon dioxide in the Atmosphere.

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What links the abyss of the deep sea to the southernmost ice shelves? Can open-source science protect Antarctica? And how urgent is the threat of deep-sea mining? In this episode of Voice of Commons host Giulia Foscari speaks with deep-sea biologist and polar explorer Antje Boetius. Broadcast just after the United Nations Ocean Conference in Nice and ahead of the Antarctic Treaty Consultative Meetings in Milan, In this episode, we speak with her about the critical role of Antarctica as a planetary climate regulator, the commitment of open science through Antarctica InSync, the hidden carbon cycle of the deep sea, the threats of deep-sea mining, and the urgency of marine protection. As President of MBARI and former Director of the Alfred Wegener Institute, Boetius offers urgent insight into the living systems that sustain us and why we must act now to defend both the Ocean and Antarctica.

Antje Boetius is a marine biologist recognized for her research on deep-sea ecosystems and climate change. She is the President and CEO of the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute, Professor at the University of Bremen and former Director of the Alfred Wegener Institute. Antje led over fifty polar and marine international expeditions and is a strong advocate for ocean conservation and climate action. Her numerous awards include the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize and the German Environmental Award. She is involved with the Max Planck Society and the German National Academy Leopoldina, and is an official Advisor of Voice of Commons. Antje was born at 322 parts per million carbon dioxide in the Atmosphere. 

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