Meet the DEAL Community

Detroit, Michigan, United States of America

Alex Johnston is a civic designer and social entrepreneur. In 2014, Alex founded Cities Reimagined, a civic design firm that employs principles of design to solve complex challenges in urban cities. She is a graduate of the London School of Economics with a Master’s Degree in Cities. Alex started her career as a social worker, working with at-risk mothers and their babies. On one memorable occasion at the local Department of Social Services, Alex watched her client wrestle a food stamps application so long that it touched the floor. From that moment on, Alex has been obsessed with solving civic problems by placing users at the center of the design process. Alex is currently based in Detroit, Michigan. She serves as the CEO of Cities Reimagined and is a Senior Fellow for the Institute of Social Innovation at Babson College in Boston.

Jordans, England

My grandmother and mother were both radical Quakers, and I seem to be channelling them.; so what happened? In 1969 I dropped out of an economics degree after one term of mounting fury, and spent most of the next 20 years supporting community initiatives associated with the environment, the arts, and homelessness. The Open University introduced me to systems thinking, and I went on to do a couple of masters degrees (philosophy / world development) and a Ph.D. on The Equitable Construction of Social Institutions. After that excursion, it was back to community work, including some time in Lesotho and Mozambique, though I was also able to pick up a couple more masters' in business and tertiary education along the way. I've synthesised all that has been shared with me over those years into a way of looking at viable complex adaptive human systems, and I'd quite like in turn to share what I've learned before I become a candidate for reincarnation. (I'm hoping for tortoise next time around.)

Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada

Sustainability Nerd & Founder of innoindex.org; an open web app for users to identify, compare and evaluate product sustainability. Sustainable cleantech innovation is what excites me! But how do we avoid greenwashing and what is truly sustainable (planet, social, economic)? --> innoindex.org

Kendal, England, United Kingdom

Over the past thirty years, I have been a senior lecturer in sustainability, a member of Degrowth research groups and an advocate for heterodox economics. Most recently I led the Aspiring Leaders' Programme at the University of Cumbria in partnership with Brathay Trust, developing the third sector advocates of the future.

Fordingbridge, England, United Kingdom

Retired Early Years and Forest School Teacher. Currently Plastic Free Ringwood Community Leader (Surfers Against Sewage) , Ringwood Community Fridge Coordinator (part of the Hubbub Community Fridge Network) Member of Ringwood Race Against Time (Charity 1189272) m Part of the organising team for Greening Ringwood with Ringwood Town Council. Assistant Group Scout Leader (Beaver Scout Leader for 20 years) of First Poulner Scout Group - I have 5 sons, 5 daughters in law and 7 grandchildren - it's their future i worry about and want to do something to help

City of London, England, United Kingdom

I am interested in alternative thinking to economics. At uni

Royal Tunbridge Wells, England, United Kingdom

Dad, geography teacher, Thames lifeboat volunteer crew. Interested in philosophies of idling, indigenous knowledge, and living well.

Louisville, Colorado, United States of America

I am an emerging idea creator and systemic change-maker, and I am enthusiastically curious to meet mentors and collaborators.  I believe that by changing the properties of the currencies we use, we can make it most profitable for individuals and communities to cultivate the common good.  I fight for all people to have universal basic access to well-being without cost; for the planet's wild places and natural systems to thrive in perpetuity; and for the new systems we create to be safe, equitable, and liberating for all people.  You can learn more about my work to revolutionize the currencies we use at https://www.make-money-better.com/

Oxford, England, United Kingdom

I am the founder and CEO of THIRST - The International Roundtable for Sustainable Tea. I set it up after witnessing at first hand an uprising of women tea workers in my birthplace, Munnar. I am greatly inspired by Doughnut Economics and hope to persuade the tea industry to apply it in order to understand how to balance its many social and environmental challenges.

Newark, Delaware, United States of America

Sacramento, California, United States of America

I'm a regenerative urban agroforester working on stewardship of urban food system repair, cultural evolution and climate adaptation / resilience at the neighborhood scale

Washington D.C., District of Columbia, United States of America

My name is Ronan Taylor. I have a background in paleoecology and herpetology. I have worked for organizations such as the Smithsonian and National Geographic and have conducted research on four different continents. I am currently trying to develop optimized modular systems of environmental restoration that utilize new technologies. I strongly believe that combating climate change is the challenge of our time and environmental restoration is a key component of this fight.

New York, United States of America

I am engineer based in New York, and I am pivoting my career toward the field of sustainability and environmental science.

Oxford, England, United Kingdom

I have been a supporter of environmental organisations for years, but have recently got more personally involved in the movement to reduce waste. I'm a director of SHARE Oxford which aims to reduce consumption and promote a circular economy. It runs a Library of Things and Repair Cafés. I am working with a group to bring about an Oxfordshire Doughnut Collective

Bonn, Germany

Our present moneysystem is a contageous dangerous sick nervous system of cities and our post urban society. It is the money system that prevents us to remain within the tolerancies of our ecosystems. The current monetary system has two characteristics that are not normally seen. Firstly, it is a mathematical echo chamber that is completely disconnected from the real world, and secondly, the use of money is a systemic shifting of responsibility. Today's monetary system is therefore a major cause of the destruction of the Earth's habitability by us as a human race. Measures to protect this habitability currently have to be financed from taxes that come from an economy based on this monetary system. This is absurd. The financial sector has the opportunity to do something about it. However, it takes little or no notice of this responsibility. Of course, the habitability of the earth is to be given a higher ethical value than gold and money. But then it is also a moral duty to curb their destructive role. A new monetary order based on real values is possible. How, is described in my book "Nature as the Standard of Value. Three measures for creating a monetary system that protects our livelihoods" (Published Dec. 2024 in German, I am still looking for an English publisher.) https://value-for-money.org/en/ As a sinologist, I started my career in the financial world and later became a financial correspondent for the Dutch press in Bonn. After eleven years in the financial world, I joined a large German DAX-listed company to help it go public internationally. There I rose to the management level with responsibility for quality management. Since 2006, I have been researching how cities can achieve sustainability in real-world laboratories from Beijing to Hamburg. In 2014, oekom Verlag published the book "Wurzeln für die lebende Stadt" ('Roots for the Living City’). This book is available as an open science document. From 2014 onwards I have setup, directed and/or supervised four living labs in and between urban quarters. One in Berlin and three in the city of Hamburg. The results where published in 2023 in the German scientific reader „(Re-) Konstruktion von lokaler Urbanität“ (W.-D. Bukow et al. (Hrsg.)) in the article with the translated title ‘Small towns and quarters as the smallest units of an urban society, their fundamental role in ensuring sustainability and resilience with personal responsibility and self-efficacy’ https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-658-39635-0 One of the results of this research is the observation, that our money system is a dangerous sick nervous system of cities. For a bit more information please look at: https://value-for-money.org/en/ For more information about me, see: https://www.linkedin.com/in/harristiddens.

Dubai, دبي‎, United Arab Emirates

Resident, visitor and worker

Santiago de Chile, Región Metropolitana de Santiago, Chile

Soy docente de la Universidad Mayor de Santiago de Chile en la asignatura Tecnologías de la Información y Comunicación en la Facultad de Ciencias y de la Escuela de Cine. También hago de Liderazgo e Innovación en la Escuela de Ingeniería Ambiental.

Milano, Lombardia, Italia

I am a consultant in the field of purpose-driven strategy and marketing. I am also the manager of a Technopole belonging to a regional innovation ecosystem in Bologna (Italy), focused on life sciences.

Woodside Park, London Borough of Barnet, England, United Kingdom

All-round IT guy - for certain values of 'all-round' - for a living; writer, musician and cartoonist the rest of the time. Grumpy a lot. Immensely grateful for rare things that provide grounds for optimism, such as this place. Everything is connected.

Highbury, England, United Kingdom

Hi, I've photographed in many of the world's most fragile environments. This has included the arctic and for The BBC across Africa.. I've provided aid and development in the most unstable states. This has included Afghanistan, Somalia and Yemen. I've also led many digital change programmes for banks, governments and media organisations. I'm a writer and consultant using the power of stories and digital technology to drive ESG change.

Singapore, Singapore

I currently serve as Director of Social and Community Services for The Salvation Army and also double up as a social justice coordinator for part of the Southeast Asian region. I studied economics back in my undergraduate days with the aspiration that I might be able to help end poverty. That hope remains work-in-progress. What matters is that doughnuts go well with coffee.

City of London, England, United Kingdom

An economics graduate pre Doughnut theory, former property professional now a Programme Manager with Challenge Works (a nesta enterprise) looking to stimulate innovation to make cities more sustainable. I also own a craft beer brand and venue in London.

Barcelona, Catalunya, Spain

Writer and designer excited to contribute to building a better world

Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais, Brasil

PhD in Sustainable and Social Entrepreneurship, MSc and BSc in Geography. Have been teaching and researching about how to foster bottom-up/grassroots development in mining territories beyond the neoclassical paradigm.