To all Facilitators of Open Space Technology OPEN SPACE AND CLIMATE CHANGE
Greetings, At the 16th International "Open Space on Open Space" (WOSONOS) Conference, held in San Francisco in July 2008, a significant conversation was convened by Rebecca Peterson, an Associate Professor in Environmental Studies at York University (Canada), on the theme of Open Space and Climate Change. The key question that arose was: How can we - the community of OS facilitators internationally, raise awareness of the urgent need, in the next 10 years, to find solutions to human caused Climate Change and how might OS make a contribution to significant leverage points? One major idea that emerged was whether we might harness the entrepreneurial spirit of the global Open Space community by facilitating Open Space events focused on addressing Climate Change. This would involve OS facilitators identifying potential sponsors for Open Space events with themes like: "The Social and Economic Opportunities associated with a Low Carbon Economy". The exact wording would obviously vary according to local circumstances and the specific interests of Sponsors. You could target groups with a concern to address global warming as potential event Sponsors - government; private sector; community groups; Non Government Organisations (NGO's). It may also be possible to leverage existing events - someone mentioned a major Climate Change conference coming up soon in Denmark. Please note that we are not asking OS facilitators to be Sponsors of events. We need to keep the boundaries clear. This is about how to maximise replication and leverage. We maximise leverage and ownership by planting the seed of this idea in the minds of other people - and offering ourselves as facilitators. QUESTION 1: Would you be willing to identify and make such contact with potential sponsors? (and then tell us how you are doing) QUESTION 2: Would you like to be part of a general contact list to keep this idea alive by sharing stories and ideas? Initially this would simply be a circular email on the theme of "Climate Space". We believe this topic warrants a separate list from OSLIST. QUESTION 3: Would you like to be part of a WORKING GROUP (whoever comes are the right people) with a more limited email circulation to keep the momentum going? QUESTION 4: Do you have any other comments? I invite you to write to me (Michael) at angchapl...@admin.uwa.edu.au with specific responses to the four questions above. It would make it easier for me to read if you would cut and paste the questions into a new email and insert your answer underneath each of the four questions. Full details of the Climate Change conversation from WOSONOS 2008 will be available in due course at www.openspaceworld.org Michael Wood, Western Australia Erica Peng, USA Rebecca Peterson, Canada (Convenors of the Action Planning Conversation) * * ========================================================== osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu ------------------------------ To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options, view the archives of osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu: http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html To learn about OpenSpaceEmailLists and OSLIST FAQs: http://www.openspaceworld.org/oslist
