Who Defends the Defenders? UN Special Rapporteur on Environmental Defenders MICHEL FORST

Who Defends the Defenders? UN Special Rapporteur on Environmental Defenders MICHEL FORST

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UN Special Rapporteur on Environmental Defenders MICHEL FORST on Protecting Environmental Activists

My mandate focuses on the protection of those trying to protect the planet. Protection of defenders is my main topic. When I'm speaking to states or companies, it's always related to cases of defenders facing threats, attacks, or penalization by companies or governments, like the recent case of Paul Watson (founder of Sea Shepherd) in Denmark… When I travel to places like Peru, Colombia, or Honduras and meet Indigenous people, I realize they have a relationship with nature that we don't have anymore. They express that the food they eat, the water they drink, and the air they breathe goes beyond just air and food; it represents what they call Pachamama or Mother Earth. This is a cosmovision shared across various communities, not only in Latin America but globally.

Revolutionizing Sustainability: BERTRAND PICCARD's Path to a Cleaner Planet - Highlights

Revolutionizing Sustainability: BERTRAND PICCARD's Path to a Cleaner Planet - Highlights

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Explorer & Aviator of the First Round-the-World Solar-powered Flight
Founder of Solar Impulse Foundation & Climate Impulse
UN Goodwill Ambassador for the Environment

The goal with Climate Impulse is to revolutionize aviation and show that we can decarbonize aviation. We can make it more efficient. Of course, it's not yet a jumbo jet with hydrogen. It's a two-seater airplane. But I want to make the ultimate flight to shake a little bit the certitudes of the people. If we go around the world nonstop with two people on board, this project can become like a flagship of climate action.

Beyond the Horizon: Pioneering Green Aviation with BERTRAND PICCARD - Aviator, Explorer, Environmentalist

Beyond the Horizon: Pioneering Green Aviation with BERTRAND PICCARD - Aviator, Explorer, Environmentalist

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Explorer & Aviator of the First Round-the-World Solar-powered Flight
Founder of Solar Impulse Foundation & Climate Impulse
UN Goodwill Ambassador for the Environment

The goal with Climate Impulse is to revolutionize aviation and show that we can decarbonize aviation. We can make it more efficient. Of course, it's not yet a jumbo jet with hydrogen. It's a two-seater airplane. But I want to make the ultimate flight to shake a little bit the certitudes of the people. If we go around the world nonstop with two people on board, this project can become like a flagship of climate action.

Climate Education: Does Healing the Planet Begin in the Classroom? - BRYCE COON - Director of Education - EarthDay.ORG

Climate Education: Does Healing the Planet Begin in the Classroom? - BRYCE COON - Director of Education - EarthDay.ORG

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Director of Education · EarthDay.ORG

If you talk to a young person about the climate crisis, they tend to have one of two responses. They either feel like we're not doing enough, and they're advocating for more. The other response is that students would just shut down and wouldn't want to talk about it. I believe introducing climate education is key to addressing that climate anxiety and providing students with climate optimism, hope and solutions.

KATHLEEN ROGERS - President of EarthDay.ORG - Planet vs. Plastics Campaign 2024

KATHLEEN ROGERS - President of EarthDay.ORG - Planet vs. Plastics Campaign 2024

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President of EarthDay.ORG

The world recognizes that plastics have imperiled our future. Many environmentalists, myself included, view plastics as on par with, if not worse than, climate change because we do see a little light at the end of the tunnel on climate change. Babies vs. Plastics is a collection of studies, and we particularly focused on children and babies because their bodies and brains are more impacted than adults by the 30, 000 chemicals that assault us every day.

Highlights - Robert Sternberg - Fmr. President, American Psychological Assoc. - Author of “Adaptive Intelligence”

Highlights - Robert Sternberg - Fmr. President, American Psychological Assoc. - Author of “Adaptive Intelligence”

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Award-winning Educator - Author of Adaptive Intelligence: Surviving and Thriving in Times of Uncertainty
Fmr. President of the American Psychological Association

Are we looking at intelligence wrong? There are an awful lot of people who have graduated from top schools who become leaders who are worse than incompetent. They make their countries worse rather than better. And the conclusion I came to is that we made a mistake, in that intelligence was originally defined by the founders of the field Alfred Binet, David Wechsler, and others, as the ability to adapt to the environment a requirement. And answering a vocabulary problem for an obscure word is not about adapting to the environment. So I began to wonder where we lost the train of thought. And the conclusion I came to is that colleges just forgot the original message of the founders of the field, and so we got immersed in these numbers that turn out not to mean that much. So I wrote about intelligence as the ability to get along in the world and hopefully make the world a little bit better

Robert Sternberg - Award-winning Educator - Author of “Adaptive Intelligence” - Fmr. President, American Psychological Assoc.

Robert Sternberg - Award-winning Educator - Author of “Adaptive Intelligence” - Fmr. President, American Psychological Assoc.

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Award-winning Educator - Author of Adaptive Intelligence: Surviving and Thriving in Times of Uncertainty
Fmr. President of the American Psychological Association

Are we looking at intelligence wrong? There are an awful lot of people who have graduated from top schools who become leaders who are worse than incompetent. They make their countries worse rather than better. And the conclusion I came to is that we made a mistake, in that intelligence was originally defined by the founders of the field Alfred Binet, David Wechsler, and others, as the ability to adapt to the environment a requirement. And answering a vocabulary problem for an obscure word is not about adapting to the environment. So I began to wonder where we lost the train of thought. And the conclusion I came to is that colleges just forgot the original message of the founders of the field, and so we got immersed in these numbers that turn out not to mean that much. So I wrote about intelligence as the ability to get along in the world and hopefully make the world a little bit better

Highlights - Debra Fisher - Showrunner of Netflix’s “Ginny & Georgia” - Writer, Exec. Producer “Criminal Minds” , “Alias”

Highlights - Debra Fisher - Showrunner of Netflix’s “Ginny & Georgia” - Writer, Exec. Producer “Criminal Minds” , “Alias”

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Showrunner of Netflix’s Ginny & Georgia
Writer · Exec. Producer · Director · Alias · Criminal Minds · The OC · Charmed

I need a balance of light and dark. It can't be just one thing. I want you to be laughing one minute and by the end I want you to be crying. For me, character study is what is the most important. It all comes down to the characters. It's less about action or things like that, which you can have some of that, but it tonally, has to be female-centric and you have to be crying and laughing. There's so many interesting shows that walk that line of light and dark. I want to always live in the gray area with characters. Always. Nothing is ever black or white. It's always a weird gray area.

Debra J. Fisher - Showrunner of Netflix’s “Ginny & Georgia” - Writer, Exec. Producer “Criminal Minds” , “Alias”

Debra J. Fisher - Showrunner of Netflix’s “Ginny & Georgia” - Writer, Exec. Producer “Criminal Minds” , “Alias”

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Showrunner of Netflix’s Ginny & Georgia
Writer · Exec. Producer · Director · Alias · Criminal Minds · The OC · Charmed

I need a balance of light and dark. It can't be just one thing. I want you to be laughing one minute and by the end I want you to be crying. For me, character study is what is the most important. It all comes down to the characters. It's less about action or things like that, which you can have some of that, but it tonally, has to be female-centric and you have to be crying and laughing. There's so many interesting shows that walk that line of light and dark. I want to always live in the gray area with characters. Always. Nothing is ever black or white. It's always a weird gray area.

Highlights - Nina Hall - Author of “Transnational Advocacy in the Digital Era”


Highlights - Nina Hall - Author of “Transnational Advocacy in the Digital Era”


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Author of Transnational Advocacy in the Digital Era: Think Global, Act Local
Assistant Professor · International Relations · Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (Europe)

Digital advocacy organizations are recognized as influential actors by the media, politicians, and some academics. In 2016, GetUp, an Australian digital advocacy organization, was named by the Australian Financial Review as one of the top ten actors with ‘covert power’ in Australia.1 Campact in Germany has powerfully mobilized public opinion against the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership. MoveOn was one of the ‘leading advocacy organizations’ mobilizing people against the Iraq War in the United States. Meanwhile, Leadnow, a digital advocacy organization in Canada, helped to unseat Prime Minister Stephen Harper in the 2015 Canadian federal election. This new model of advocacy organization has spread around the world. Nineteen digital advocacy organizations claim to have a total of over 20 million members. What drove the global spread of digital advocacy organizations?

Nina Hall - Author of “Transnational Advocacy in the Digital Era: Think Global, Act Local”

Nina Hall - Author of “Transnational Advocacy in the Digital Era: Think Global, Act Local”

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Author of Transnational Advocacy in the Digital Era: Think Global, Act Local
Assistant Professor · International Relations · Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (Europe)

Digital advocacy organizations are recognized as influential actors by the media, politicians, and some academics. In 2016, GetUp, an Australian digital advocacy organization, was named by the Australian Financial Review as one of the top ten actors with ‘covert power’ in Australia.1 Campact in Germany has powerfully mobilized public opinion against the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership. MoveOn was one of the ‘leading advocacy organizations’ mobilizing people against the Iraq War in the United States. Meanwhile, Leadnow, a digital advocacy organization in Canada, helped to unseat Prime Minister Stephen Harper in the 2015 Canadian federal election. This new model of advocacy organization has spread around the world. Nineteen digital advocacy organizations claim to have a total of over 20 million members. What drove the global spread of digital advocacy organizations?

Highlights - Johnjoe McFadden - Author of “Life is Simple” - Prof. Molecular Genetics, Assoc. Dean - U of Surrey

Highlights - Johnjoe McFadden - Author of “Life is Simple” - Prof. Molecular Genetics, Assoc. Dean - U of Surrey

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Author of Life is Simple: How Occam’s Razor Set Science Free and Shapes the Universe
Co-author of Life on the Edge: The Coming of Age of Quantum Biology
Professor of Molecular Genetics & Assoc. Dean (Int’l) · University of Surrey

I think that's what art is all about is communicating these big, complex objects, which are ideas inside our head, but in a non-dissected way in which the object isn't completely dissected, or it's dissected in such a way it can be reassembled in somebody else's mind. So you get a full experience of what the artist had or as close as he or she can make it. So I think that to me is what art does. It's a way of communicating these wonderful ideas and feelings that we have inside our heads. And they're trapped there, and art allows you - by playing music or painting, or writing poetry... - it allows you to communicate this in this holistic kind of way.

Johnjoe McFadden - Author of “Life is Simple: How Occam’s Razor Set Science Free and Shapes the Universe”

Johnjoe McFadden - Author of “Life is Simple: How Occam’s Razor Set Science Free and Shapes the Universe”

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Author of Life is Simple: How Occam’s Razor Set Science Free and Shapes the Universe
Co-author of Life on the Edge: The Coming of Age of Quantum Biology
Professor of Molecular Genetics & Assoc. Dean (Int’l) · University of Surrey

I think that's what art is all about is communicating these big, complex objects, which are ideas inside our head, but in a non-dissected way in which the object isn't completely dissected, or it's dissected in such a way it can be reassembled in somebody else's mind. So you get a full experience of what the artist had or as close as he or she can make it. So I think that to me is what art does. It's a way of communicating these wonderful ideas and feelings that we have inside our heads. And they're trapped there, and art allows you - by playing music or painting, or writing poetry... - it allows you to communicate this in this holistic kind of way.

Highlights - Karina Manashil - Pres. of Mad Solar - Exec. Producer of “Entergalactic”, “Pearl”, “X”

Highlights - Karina Manashil - Pres. of Mad Solar - Exec. Producer of “Entergalactic”, “Pearl”, “X”

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President of Mad Solar · Creative Confidante & Industry Catalyst for Scott Mescudi a.k.a. Kid Cudi
Exec. Producer: Entergalactic starring Mescudi, Jessica Williams & Timothée Chalamet
Pearl · X starring Mia Goth

And what was so moving was when we went into Netflix to the theater to screen the finished product for the first time. You're sitting there and at the end of it, Scott was crying, and I looked over - it made me cry low-key - but Scott was crying and he said – This completely blows my mind because this is the first time I had a vision up here in my head and tried to express it, and then had to trust all 300 plus people, all around the world, working in different time zones, in different places, and each of them putting a hand to it and seeing exactly that vision. And then watching the product, and it is the best version of anything I could have ever possibly had in my head.
So, to us, that's the purest, most beautiful... Again, how fortunate that every hand was moving in tandem and moving in lockstep, and all of it. But that was the beauty of collaboration, this opportunity for a small vision to touch so many hands and become the big vision.

Karina Manashil - President of Mad Solar - Creative Confidante for Kid Cudi - Exec. Producer of “Entergalactic”

Karina Manashil - President of Mad Solar - Creative Confidante for Kid Cudi - Exec. Producer of “Entergalactic”

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President of Mad Solar · Creative Confidante & Industry Catalyst for Scott Mescudi a.k.a. Kid Cudi
Exec. Producer: Entergalactic starring Mescudi, Jessica Williams & Timothée Chalamet
Pearl · X starring Mia Goth

And what was so moving was when we went into Netflix to the theater to screen the finished product for the first time. You're sitting there and at the end of it, Scott was crying, and I looked over - it made me cry low-key - but Scott was crying and he said – This completely blows my mind because this is the first time I had a vision up here in my head and tried to express it, and then had to trust all 300 plus people, all around the world, working in different time zones, in different places, and each of them putting a hand to it and seeing exactly that vision. And then watching the product, and it is the best version of anything I could have ever possibly had in my head.
So, to us, that's the purest, most beautiful... Again, how fortunate that every hand was moving in tandem and moving in lockstep, and all of it. But that was the beauty of collaboration, this opportunity for a small vision to touch so many hands and become the big vision.

Highlights - Lee Jaffe - Author of “Jean-Michel Basquiat: Crossroads” - Artist, Musician, Poet

Highlights - Lee Jaffe - Author of “Jean-Michel Basquiat: Crossroads” - Artist, Musician, Poet

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Artist, Musician, Poet
Author of Jean-Michel Basquiat: Crossroads

Jean-Michel Basquiat's combination of words and images, this visual poetry, just from a cultural standpoint has been so important. When I met him in 1983, black people were not allowed in the art market, pretty much. And you see that he broke down this barrier, which opened the door for all this multiculturalism within the art market. And you can't diminish the importance of that at all. It's helped to give a voice and an audience to all these incredible artists that might not have had that.

Lee Jaffe - Author of “Jean-Michel Basquiat: Crossroads” - Artist, Musician, Poet

Lee Jaffe - Author of “Jean-Michel Basquiat: Crossroads” - Artist, Musician, Poet

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Artist, Musician, Poet
Author of Jean-Michel Basquiat: Crossroads

Jean-Michel Basquiat's combination of words and images, this visual poetry, just from a cultural standpoint has been so important. When I met him in 1983, black people were not allowed in the art market, pretty much. And you see that he broke down this barrier, which opened the door for all this multiculturalism within the art market. And you can't diminish the importance of that at all. It's helped to give a voice and an audience to all these incredible artists that might not have had that.

Highlights - Philip Fernbach - Cognitive Scientist - Co-Director, Ctr. for Research, Consumer Financial Decision Making - Co-author, “The Knowledge Illusion”

Highlights - Philip Fernbach - Cognitive Scientist - Co-Director, Ctr. for Research, Consumer Financial Decision Making - Co-author, “The Knowledge Illusion”

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Co-author of The Knowledge Illusion: Why We Never Think Alone
Cognitive Scientist · Co-Director of Center for Research on Consumer Financial Decision Making, CU Boulder

The human mind is both genius and pathetic, brilliant and idiotic. People are capable of the most remarkable feats, achievements that defy the gods. We went from discovering the atomic nucleus in 1911 to megaton nuclear weapons in just over forty years. We have mastered fire, created democratic institutions, stood on the moon, and developed genetically modified tomatoes. And yet we are equally capable of the most remarkable demonstrations of hubris and foolhardiness. Each of us is error-prone, sometimes irrational, and often ignorant… How is it that people can simultaneously bowl us over with their ingenuity and disappoint us with their ignorance? How have we mastered so much despite how limited our understanding often is?

Philip Fernbach - Co-author of “The Knowledge Illusion” - Cognitive Scientist - Co-Director of Ctr. for Research on Consumer Financial Decision Making

Philip Fernbach - Co-author of “The Knowledge Illusion” - Cognitive Scientist - Co-Director of Ctr. for Research on Consumer Financial Decision Making

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Co-author of The Knowledge Illusion: Why We Never Think Alone
Cognitive Scientist · Co-Director of Center for Research on Consumer Financial Decision Making, CU Boulder

The human mind is both genius and pathetic, brilliant and idiotic. People are capable of the most remarkable feats, achievements that defy the gods. We went from discovering the atomic nucleus in 1911 to megaton nuclear weapons in just over forty years. We have mastered fire, created democratic institutions, stood on the moon, and developed genetically modified tomatoes. And yet we are equally capable of the most remarkable demonstrations of hubris and foolhardiness. Each of us is error-prone, sometimes irrational, and often ignorant… How is it that people can simultaneously bowl us over with their ingenuity and disappoint us with their ignorance? How have we mastered so much despite how limited our understanding often is?

Highlights - Aniela Unguresan - Champion of Diversity, Equity, Inclusion in the Workplace - EDGE Cert

Highlights - Aniela Unguresan - Champion of Diversity, Equity, Inclusion in the Workplace - EDGE Cert

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Co-founder of EDGE Certified Foundation (Economic Dividends for Gender Equality)
Champion of Diversity, Equity & Inclusion in the Workplace

I co-founded what has become EDGE for gender and intersectional equity back in 2009, and at that time workplace gender and intersectional equity were still very much seen as a societal issue rather than a business issue. Organizations were asking themselves if it's within their role to tackle these issues of equity, diversity, and inclusion in the workplace, or if they are the mere recipients of what is going on in societies, following the beliefs around what men and women should be doing at work and at home. So at that time we wanted to contribute to this transition from making gender and intersectional equity a business issue and help organizations see that how they manage their talent and how they are able to attract, develop, motivate, and retain diverse talent is a key component of their sustainable business success.